Assassin's Creed Odyssey
Product Designer (Quest Designer)
As a Quest Designer for Assassin's Creed Odyssey, I shifted from my previous role as a Level Designer to explore new aspects of world-building and narrative-driven content. This role allowed me to combine my expertise in level design with quest creation, enhancing gameplay experiences by ensuring quests were deeply integrated into the world. I collaborated closely with Narrative and Cinematic Designers to craft immersive and memorable player journeys.
Here are some key highlights:
In Summary
Key Contributions:
- Designed and implemented multi-path quests that allowed players to approach objectives with diverse playstyles and outcomes.
- Focused on environmental storytelling to immerse players in ancient Greece's historical and mythical landscape.
- Collaborated closely with the game design and programming teams to improve enemy AI in combat encounters.
- Developed player-centric solutions to minimize quest-related bugs and bottlenecks during development.
- Enhanced player navigation and engagement by crafting compelling environmental cues
Regional Quest Ownership • Making Fetch Quests Fun and Rewarding • Character Quest Ownership • Additional Contributions
Regional Quest Ownership - Messara, Crete
I led the design of several side quests in the vibrant Messara region, focusing on themes of civil unrest, cultural diversity, and trade. The narrative struck a balance between weighty political intrigue and light-hearted, humorous moments to capture the region's dynamic spirit.
City of Kydonia: Civil Unrest Quest
Key Contributions:
- Challenge: Push the boundaries of the quest system to create engaging, dynamic gameplay.
- Solution: Designed a quest with three objectives that could be tackled in any order, leading to varied outcomes and a final boss fight with different difficulty levels based on player choices.
- Result: The quest provided players with meaningful choices and outcomes, enhancing their sense of agency.
City of Gortyn: Gotyn Out of Hand Quest
Key Contributions:
- Challenge: Leverage systemic features like Nation Power while incorporating handcrafted content.
- Solution: Created a quest that adjusted enemy presence based on the region's power dynamics, allowing players to strategize their approach.
- Historical Tie: Highlighted Gortyn’s legal history through references to the ancient Gortyn Code, blending real-world lore with gameplay.
Making Fetch Quests Fun and Rewarding
I reimagined traditional fetch quests by incorporating humor, emotional storytelling, and thoughtful objective placement to create engaging and memorable player experiences. Collaboration with Narrative Designers was key to making these quests feel rewarding and impactful.
Say That Again! Quest
Key Contributions:
- Objective: Inject humor to make fetch quests more enjoyable.
- Approach: Collaborated with a Narrative Designer to craft witty dialogue and strategically placed collectible items, allowing players to feel clever by pre-collecting them.
Flowers for the Dead Quest
Key Contributions:
- Objective: Create a meaningful fetch quest with emotional impact.
- Approach: Designed a journey through curated scenic vistas culminating in a Viewpoint discovery. The story led to a heartfelt twist, leaving a lasting impression on players.
Character Quest Ownership - Mikkos Questline, Hephaistos Islands
Working remotely with Level Designers from Chengdu, I contributed to designing quests in the Hephaistos Islands, balancing narrative and gameplay needs while minimizing environmental changes. This experience strengthened my skills in collaborative problem-solving and adaptive quest design.
School of Hard Knocks Quest
Key Contributions:
- Explored non-lethal, arena-style fights with fun, player-driven dialogue choices that could lead to character growth and allyship.
Doctor’s Pet Quest
Key Contributions:
- Navigated design challenges by working within an established region, collaborating with the Chengdu studio to creatively integrate quests while minimizing changes.
- This pre-pandemic remote collaboration experience honed my skills in cross-studio communication and problem-solving before there were established protocols and tools to aid in doing this more effectively.
Additional Contributions:
- Onboarded new team members, sharing best practices in quest and level design.
- Wrote flavor text and contributed to brainstorming narrative beats for quests.
This project was a rewarding opportunity to deepen my quest design expertise while leveraging my level design background, ultimately contributing to a rich and immersive player experience.
Assassin's Creed Odyssey is a 2018 action role-playing video game developed and published by Ubisoft. It is the eleventh major installment, and twentieth overall, in the Assassin's Creed series and the successor to 2017's Assassin's Creed Origins. Set in the year 431 BC, the plot tells a fictional history of the Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta. Players control a male or female mercenary who fights for both sides as they attempt to unite their family and uncover a malign cult.