• My first task as a combat designer was to own the level design related items while working close with art team for final polish. These five themed designs were created towards being repurposed with modular use for both interior and exteriors combat instances. There were a total of 27 instances created by the time Free Realms launched, 80% of those were repurposed from these original map designs. Also, are several one-off maps which are listed in the combat instances section.

Theme: Tiered Canyon

Top Down - Map	Danger Peaks	Trail Of Betrail	Forest Troll Fort

Sweet Water Climb	Highroad Hijinks

Theme: Earth Cave

Top Down - Map	Maya Blockmesh	Mushroom Cavern	Forgotten Caves

Sweet Water Climb	Cracked Claw Caverns

Theme: Manmade Tunnels

Top Down - Map	Maya Blockmesh	Deep Mines	Tavern Cellar

Haunted Mines	Den Of Secrets	Briarheart Caverns

Theme: Deep Earth Cave

Top Down - Map	Maya Blockmesh	Hot Springs Cavern	Bat Cave

Bixie Hive	Cray Caves	Frost Fang Caverns

Theme: Snowy Canyon

Top Down - Map	Snowy Canyon	Howling Hils	Misty Mountain

Theme: Forest Exterior Note: These maps were designed and modified from a prexisting instance geometry.

Original Geometry	Floren Forest	Snarling Hedges	Bristlewood Glade

Tree Leaf's Retreat	Vale Of The Ancients

Combat Instances:

• When the Free Realms combat team first assembled, each designer took ownership over his assigned zones which included, base population, ability creation, AI behavior scripting, and event scripting . By the time we launched the combat designers had a collective hand in each other balancing and tuning. This entailed scrapping or retrofitting zones to the new arcade dungeon crawl pacing the directors had realigned focus towards. These five selected instances are personal favorites that highlighted some interesting nuggets of design contribution.
• In addition, I also mentored two junior designers with map making (using Adobe Illustrator) and design document methodologies. Some of their detailed versions of the following maps are based off my original designs.

// Snarling Hedges : Map Theme, Forest Exterior

• Originally designed as one large maze (pictured below), I was tasked to redesign this space with a more meaningful flow for scripted events within a 3 day turnaround. Given the short deadline, I had no time to create an Illustrator map, which led to a freestyle approach to this design which still encompassed light maze elements. Both Kung Fu Panda and Lord of The Rings were big inspirations for scope and scale.
• Players must navigate through a small maze and venture across a long windy landbridge where they have the option to explore a cave as bonus objective which entails breaking a curse that has been casted on the vine golems population.

Responsibilities: Redesigned original map, terrain sculpting, object placement, lighting, content development and NPC abilities.

Original Geometry	New Layout	Snarling Hedges	Snarling Hedges

Snarling Hedges	Snarling Hedges	Snarling Hedges	Snarling Hedges

Snarling Hedges - Level Highlights:

// Deep Mines: Map Theme, Manmade Tunnels

• This zone was our first attempt in making combat instances have scripted narrative components throughout gameplay, rather than just dictating story through encounter start screens.
• Robgoblins have taken over the mines and have kidnapped one of the miner's. Players must rescue and escort the trapped miner to the cave-in area where he dynamites through allowing passage to the boss, "Tuga the Bruiser".

Responsibilities: Redesigned original map, created block mesh, object placement, lighting, content development and tuned NPC behaviors.

Top Down Map	Cave-in	Mage Battle	Teraz - Mini Boss

Escort The Miner	Blast Cave - in Site	Tuga - Boss Battle

Deep Mines - Level Highlights

// Forest Troll Fort: Map Theme, Tiered Canyon

• With having diverse terrain this map runs an inclined flow matched with a variety POI's along an undulated critical path.
• Queen Verda is stealing from all the village dwelling Trolls and has no intentions of ceasing her selfish motives. She will expand her rampant thievery operation outside of the Fort unless she is stopped..

Responsibilities: Designed original map, content development, NPC base population and tuned behaviors.

Tiered Canyon - Top Down	Fort Entrance	Village Area	Bridge Crossing	Training Area

Forest Troll Fort - Level Highlights:

// Briar Patch:

• A map theme was requested within an evening turnaround time that would encompass a thorn thicket. I intrinsically reverted to the Saruman character in The Two Towers as a source of inspiration for a premise.
• The corrupt wizard "Azure" has claimed the Briar Patch as his secret base of operation, corrupting the forest folk of the Briarwood for his plot to raise an army to overthrow the area. Players must break the protective barrier guarded by the corrupt Floren, Nettalie in order to reach Azure. and his summoned fungal soldiers.

Top Down Map	Nettalie Battle	Fungal Soldier Summon	Azure Absorbs The Cauldron's Power	Boss Behavior Tree

Briar Patch - Level Highlights:

// Bristlewood Glade: Map Theme, Forest Exterior

• Originally designed as a densely tree populated area, I was tasked to redesign this space with a more meaningful flow for scripted events. My goals were to create a space with an enchanting forest appeal that would punctuate with a majestic waterfall end point.
• Players must path through snaky undulated terrain to reach the waterfall valley basin where the evil Floren has taken residence within the vine grotto.

Responsibilities: Redesigned original map, sculpted exterior terrain, object population base population, and tuned NPC behaviors.

Top Down Map	Entrance Area	Mini Boss Alcove	Valley Basin	Floren Boss Cave

Bristlewood Glade - Level Highlights:

NPC Development:

• One great thing about being on Free Realms is that the combat team was able to contribute input towards the move sets and abilities of NPC's. In my previous studio experiences this area was handled by a specialized combat designer. A combination of animations principles learned from art school with an extensive gaming background made for intrinsic ideas for the development of these NPC's. I was paired up with both a character artist and animator to help execute these enemy NPC's.

Responsibilities: Redesigned original map, created block mesh, object placement, lighting, content development and tuned NPC behaviors.

Tree Soldier - Is a tall sentry enemy NPC that resides within the forested areas of Free Realms

1. Staff Strike - Used as a weapon, but also is a preemptive queue that emits a protruding thorn ability.
2. Staff Strike in ability context
3. Cyclone Gust - Similar to the Woodman leaf attack found in Mega Man 2, the tree soldier exhales a barrage of leaves on p
4. Camouflage Crouch - The form and shape of the Tree Soldier where so indicative of the landscape, which inspired this pose used for blending into the background.
5. Camouflage Crouch in context.

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Azure - As we were short on unique enemy NPC's, I pitched the Saruman angle for the Briar Patch boss. The result ended up as one of the most memorable boss NPC's of Free Relama.

1. Levitation Summon - The core of Azure's attack are based on wave summons of corrupted forest creatures which queued by this animation.
2. Blast Back - A knock back ability that fires off any time players attempt to melee Azure.
3. Staff Blast - Azure draws power from a nearby cauldron that enables his staff to emit projectiles.

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Umari - A large yeti Boss of the Hot Spring Caverns and Snowy Canyon. The inspiration drew from mountain civilizations and tribal elements.

1. Mighty Roar - A loud zone shout causing for reinforcements to aid the battle.
2. Power Punch - A Powerful melee punch with an added knock back ability upon impact
3. Slam Down - A high jump proceeded by a two fisted ground pound causing a brief stun

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Necrowart Zombie - A subterranean creature possessed by a fungal attachment. This character design had been preconceived prior to my arrival to Free Realms.

1. Swing Kick - Propelled by his arm anatomy, the Necowart Zombie uses a knock back melee ability with this kick.
2. Poison Cloud - A poisonous gas cloud that slowly decreases life which is emitted by the fungal attachment.
   
3. Necro Gaze - A hypnotic gaze that briefly stuns players.

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Man Eating Plant - A transmutated plant that stalks the forest. This character design had been preconceived prior to my arrival to Free Realms.

1. Leaf strike - A simple long reached melee attack.
2. Gatling Spike - A long ranged spiked projectile attack.

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Environment Hazards & Interactive Objects:

Below are a few personal favorites that received positive feedback:

Responsibilities: Concpet development and

Icicles:

• Found in ice cave dwellings, these falling shards challenge players to plan their movement along the critical path.
  
• The execution of this effect was pulled off by using an ability cast layered with particle effects to enhance the suspension of disbelief.

Protruding Thorn:

• Thorned spikes with a knock-back ability that sprout when a tree soldier strikes his staff on a surface.

Rolling Boulder:

• Players need to dodge these rolling menaces in selected paths with an incline.
  
• The game play worked well however, the tech side present problems after launch as the knock-back from impact was clipping players through geometry.

Boom Box:

• One of the most successful novelties of Free Realms, this was originally designed as aninteractive object to trigger yeti to dance in a combat instance.
• The concept was later appropriated as a marketplace item for players to purchase as a sound emitting mechanism.

Dynamite:

• Players have the opportunity of triggering explosions in blocked areas or can interact with other NPCs for quest related objectives that entail blowing up stuff

Launch Pads:

• The image below is a small simple stunting/platforming setup (a theme tied into an excavation site) I placed in a combat instance to demonstrate the potential use of our existing jump mechanic. After Free Realms launched it was evident that players loved to invent their own jumping activities as we observed them finding a variety of different cliffs which they would launch from over and over again. I was then green lit to design a jumping activity and was paired with one of the original Everquest programmers, Steve Clover to implement the feature.

Platforming Prototype

• Steve was able dig into the code and put together a smoke and mirrors version of a physics component into one of our existing design tool editors. From there I provided feedback on the intended functionality and we iterated accordingly. We ended up prototyping with a copied version of an overworld zone called "Seaside Village". The Seaside geography is the most expansive and diverse out of any other overworld area in Free Realms which leant itself well with jumping distances and would most likely avoid introducing unwanted bugs. The prototype was well received prompting launch pads for global placement in the overworld. However, the metrics used for jumping distances were only intended for Seaside therefore, players would surly be able to break the game if we placed launch pads in other zones. In the end we agreed to reduce the jump scale, the tradeoff meant Seaside was littered with a few extra pads.

• Launch pads were eventually introduced as a housing item for purchase in the Free Relams marketplace continues to be one of the top selling microtransaction items.
  

Responsibilities: Redesigned original map, created block mesh, object placement, lighting, content development and tuned NPC behaviors.

Seaside Launch Pad	Client Area Editor	Terrain Editor View	World Atlas POI	Snowhill Launh Pads