Technical Designer
Engine: Unreal Engine 5
Language: C++ and Blueprints
Duration: November 2021 – April 2025
My Role: Technical Designer
My 3,5 years at Liquid Swords has been filled with a lot of fun, learning and growth. Working alongside so many industry veterans has made me grow tremendously, both as a developer and a person. I started at an early stage of both the company and the project, which means I’ve got to be part of not only building the game but also the team and the studio culture.
Not only have I done design and programming in a traditional sense, I have also taken multiple pipelines from A to Z. By collaborating closely with both the code- and design departments, I worked to create a solid technical foundation taking into consideration things like performance, system stability and scalability. I’ve also worked to create a good development user experience, doing things such as automating tedious work, reducing system complexity and limiting visual clutter. I’ve focused on maintaining creative boundaries within the systems, not to constrict but to help lead the way towards the intended player experience. I have applied systemic thinking when using my creative problem solving skills, while still leaving room for expandability and bespoke functionality. And finally, I have acknowledged when things don’t work and implemented the necessary changes. This has allowed for experimentation, quick iterations and reduced frustration within the team, ultimately putting our focus on being creative.
I’ve also supported the team by continuously teaching and sharing knowledge with people from all departments throughout the entirety of my time at the company. I’ve assisted others with their day-to-day work, but also provided deeper insight for making technical decisions and proposing solutions for many different kinds of problems.
My Design Philosophy
I believe innovation requires constant iteration, which is why my approach isn’t just about building functionality. It’s about engineering systems that help innovate gameplay. The tools we use shape the way we think and inspire us to create, so having great tools is absolutely vital.
Part of shaping the studio and game at the early stages
I joined when the team was less than 20 people, about 15 devs, and they had only worked on the game for a couple of weeks.
Teaching an entire studio a new game engine
During my first few months I became the go-to expert for the Unreal Engine, as I was the only one with experience working in it. I empowered a team of veterans and guided early technical decisions with my deep insight of the engine. I provided both individual guidance, partook in meetings, and held presentations regarding larger systems and features, sharing knowledge on what functionality exists, how to use it and common pitfalls. It meant teaching all disciplines including code, design, art, animation, audio, QA and everyone in-between, to make sure we were all on the same baseline level of knowledge.
Building up the Team & Culture
While they had already established some parts of the studio culture, I brought my positive energy and attitude to the team, and tried to lead by example. I was always happy to help out, share my knowledge and provide guidance to those that needed it. My work directly reduced frustration within the team by improving workflows and helping people become more proficient with the tools, increasing productivity and producing a better end result. But most importantly, the people were happier!
It became an open environment where people were encouraged to focus on what they do best, and work together. Instead of forcing people into certain roles and responsibilities, people naturally fell into roles that focused on their strengths.
During the recruitment processes for the design team, my job was to help find people who filled the gaps the current team didn’t already cover. I received recruitment training and interviewed, reviewed and hired parts of the design team. It was a great learning experience in understanding the inner workings of a team, how team dynamics affect how people work together, and how different skillsets complement each other.
Defining the game pillars
I joined when the pillars were still being established. As part of the design team, our job was to ensure they supported the final vision of the game. It meant many discussions and iterations of various design areas, where we brainstormed and had workshops to explore ideas on both a high- and low level. We then created vision boards and presentations for the CCO (Christofer), and adjusted according to his feedback. I provided my insight and ideas and gave suggestions for improvements that ended up being part of the final definition for the game’s pillars.
Being part of this gave me a deep understanding of the game’s vision. It helped me in all areas of my work but especially when bridging communication between design and code. It informed a lot of discussions and decisions for how we built our systems.
Core responsibilities
I’ve been a feature owner of many systems of various scales, both directing others and doing work on them myself continuously throughout development. I’ve taken part in the game design ideation process, individually creating designs, but also working together with others, then prototyping various features to help us settle on the experience we wanted to create. Then I designed the technical architecture, and did the implementations together with other programmers. Both me and others created content using these systems, and I worked closely together with them on workflow improvements and further iterations on functionality from both their requests and my own ideas.
AI Systems
I have been a main vision holder, contributor, and driving force of the overarching AI Systems design, architecture, and implementation. Including:
- Runtime data management
- Reasoning & logic flow
- Perception
- NPC Creation workflow
I’ve also made notable contributions by designing and implementing NPC behaviors, working with a closer focus on the player experience. I created new components (tasks, decorators and services) and used them in behavior trees and other reasoning systems.
Narrative
Some of the earliest design decisions we made as a team were about narrative and narrative systems. In addition to being part of that process, I was also evaluating tools and establishing workflows for the writers and narrative designers early on.
I was the feature owner for one of the narrative systems of the game related to player communication, and part of designing others as well. I created visualisations of narrative ideas and high level flows, made some prototypes and in general experimented with different player experiences. I worked together with writers to make both their and my ideas come to life.
Some of my work with NPCs and AI systems had a focus primarily on the narrative, for which I worked to establish a narrative flow that worked well within the world.
Supporting the team
I have continuously driven knowledge sharing initiatives by leading discussions, holding team-wide presentations and providing hands-on guidance, talking about new and existing systems, design intentions and technical best practices. I’ve provided extensive documentation, how-to guides and created visualization aids for several big systems and for smaller features. I’ve shared knowledge about the engine and our in-house tools, for both the internal team and external co-dev partners.
The day-to-day support I’ve provided has been a lot of helping with finding and fixing bugs, giving examples of good scripting practices and providing suggestions for solutions. But I’ve also provided deep technical insight that has guided important technical decisions.
I have had a positive impact on the team at a bigger scale as a natural effect of the work I’ve done with the workflows and pipelines. I have improved efficiency in both the development processes, increasing turnover time and iteration speeds, and in cross-departmental communication, by providing a common language and point of reference.
Workflow & Process
My work is colored by intention, both in design and code. Where there’s a lack of clarity, I seek understanding to create it. Where I spot issues, I see the solutions and take initiative to implement them. I look ahead and work proactively, fixing issues before they become a problem or minimizing the effect of them. My extensive knowledge of both design and programming allows me to do this and is a huge asset in my everyday work, especially in communication and collaboration.
Collaboration & Communication
While I’ve collaborated with all departments on various aspects of my work to ensure cohesiveness and high fidelity, I’ve been fully incorporated into both the design and code teams – Providing the voice of the other department in both contexts. It has also been a great space for me to learn, listen and take in feedback.
Bridging the gap between design & code
Bridging the gap between design and code is about achieving a mutual understanding of wants and needs. I find solutions that meet both technical- and design requirements, without compromising on the developer user experience. I set realistic expectations and guide both teams in the same direction, while solving problems whenever they arise. A lot of the time researching and experimenting to come up with concrete solutions.
Featured Content
As part of my role at Liquid Swords and as a developer in this industry, I’ve gotten the opportunity to be part of podcasts and videos related to games and the industry, held presentations and more.