GDC 2012 Presentation:

It Stinks and I Don’t Like It – Building a Better Engine Experience at Insomniac Games

 

Description

Video game development has progressed significantly over the years – from punch cards and user made tools to enterprise level applications. While the technology that we use on a daily basis has changed significantly, can we really say that the experience of creating games has improved as well?

Studios are constantly on the look-out for the next best tech, middleware, or ideas to help make their next title a reality (and success). With licensed tech and often-times even proprietary software, the User Experience is frequently viewed as a second class-citizen when efficiency and deadlines are in the fore-front. At Insomniac Games, we’ve decided to make the user experience of our tools a priority. By leveraging traditional engine programming with web application technology, Insomniac Games has created their new engine from the ground up with a focus on the user experience.

PDF Location:

http://www.gdcvault.com/play/1015459/It-Stinks-and-I-Don

Video Location: (GDC Vault Subscribers only)

http://www.gdcvault.com/search.php#&category=free&firstfocus=&keyword=ahern&conference_id=

 

UX at Blizzard:

  • Task Dashboard Roadmap
  • Task Dashboard Tasks List
  • Editor Event Logging
  • Web Store CMS - Add An Item
  • Web Store CMS - Create a Sale
  • Node Graph Components
  • Node Graph Interface
  • Extension Mods Wireframes
  • Extension Mods Wireframes
  • Extension Mods Wireframes
  • Extension Mods Wireframes
  • Extension Mods Wireframes

    •  

    Please check back after BlizzCon for full details about a number of additional systems that I helped to develop – many of which are forthcoming in future patches.

     

    UX at Insomniac:

    Editor UI Design

  • Animation Editor
  • Cinematic Editor
  • Material Editor
  • Level Editor

    • Editor Style Guide

    Primary Typography Color Scheme Panel Organization Grid Layout

     
    While at Insomniac, I was tasked with designing not only all of the interaction logic and flow for our internal web-based editor, but also prototyping and developing the majority of all user-facing systems and UI. What you see above is a small sample of what was done during my time at Insomniac. Please feel free to contact me if you wish to see more.

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