Asgard’s Wrath 2

Role: Systems Design LeadTeam: Led a team of 15+ designers across combat, progression, and encounter teamsProject: 100+ hour AAA VR action RPG (GOTY winner, IGN 10/10)

Scope & Ownership

Owned core combat and progression pillars, including bosses, enemies, AI companions, and encounter systems
Designed and implemented group combat, AI navigation, spawning, population management, and enemy behaviors
Built UE5 editor tools and validation systems adopted studio-wide to accelerate iteration and enforce gameplay standards
Personally authored major content including first hero ability set, first enemy faction, encounter tooling, and three cinematic bosses (Heru, Set, & Loki)

Outcomes

Enabled rapid iteration across a modular combat library supporting 130+ enemies, 4 heroes, AI companions, and dozens of abilities, while maintaining consistent combat feel
Helped ship a 100+ hour AAA RPG in ~4 years, achieving IGN “Masterpiece” status and multiple GOTY awards
Established reusable combat and progression frameworks adopted across heroes, enemies, and level teams, reducing duplicated setup and accelerating content production
Improved cross-discipline iteration speed by embedding validation and tuning directly into the Unreal editor, cutting late-stage rework and integration risk
Promoted to Lead Designer after this project, overseeing Combat & Systems teams and partnering closely with Narrative and Level Design.

Systems Design Lead

As the Systems Design Lead on the award-winning Asgard's Wrath 2, I led a team of designers to create:

4 playable heroes with unique combat, skill trees, and puzzle gameplay
5 AI animal companions with their own unique combat, skill trees, and puzzle gameplay
Companions converted between ridable mounts and humanoid companions
130+ Enemies - 4 major factions, unique elemental variants
10 huge cinematic boss battles
12 mini-boss encounters
38 ambient interactive creatures to bring the world to life
12 player-customizable weapon types with unique play styles
Level & Encounter design tools
Endless Dungeon Mode

For this 100+ hour action-RPG adventure, rapid but high-quality development was essential.  To achieve this, my teams created:

A deep and robust combat system emphasizing player choice and autonomy
Group/mob combat systems including enemy ranges and combat circles
Navigation systems
Spawning and population management systems
Boss editing tools and systems
Stats systems and calculators
Enemy and Companion AI systems
Vehicle systems
Loot and Crafting systems
Pseudocode programming language for rapid editing of AI behaviors
Animation metrics and supporting tooling
Skill and milestone systems
Documentation standards to keep inter-team collaboration rapid and clear

Impact:

Delivered a complete combat and progression foundation supporting 4 playable heroes, 5 companions, and 10+ bosses
Enabled designers to author encounters independently through reusable tools and systems, reducing reliance on engineering for iteration
Established encounter and AI patterns reused across the project, improving consistency and reducing per-level setup time

I personally developed the designs for many of these systems and mentored and guided on the rest.  I led my team, gave targeted feedback, and trained them to work cross-functionally with engineering, art, vfx, animation, and audio to deliver a high-quality product.

I'm a very hands on lead.  Work I did myself included setting up the combat system, the first faction of enemies, the first hero's ability set, encounter building tools, and 3 major bosses (Heru, Set, & Loki).  

Asgard's Wrath 2 was built in 4 years and achieved "Masterpiece" status on IGN.  

Skip to 18:10 to see the Loki Battle! This was the final boss in Asgard's Wrath 2. 
I personally built this fight from start to finish utilizing Unreal Blueprints.