About Me

I’m Taylor!  I’m a game designer with a background in engineering. I primarily specialize in combat design (player, enemy, and combat systems), with additional work in systems, UX, and non-combat gameplay. I’ve worked in shooters and action-adventure RPGs; first person, third person, and isometric. I’ve spent most of my career as a hybrid lead + contributor, flexing more or less into each based on what the project and people need at the time. I’m also a very active gamer, playing nearly all the genres under the sun 🙂

Profile Pic
I’ve since switched the facial hair option to trimmed beard

I’m passionate about giving people enjoyment, it’s why I’m a designer. I broadly strive to make engaging and intuitive gameplay with high clarity, such that even difficult challenges leave players wanting more. I’m also passionate about my peers’ happiness with their work, and our work processes and implementation being sturdy and sustainable. Beyond just aligning with my desire to add joy to the world, I think these are important for making great games. I aim to inspire and support those around me to put love into their work, which shows itself in the game for players to enjoy!

As a designer, I most-often find myself following a core principle of “When a player fails (dies, takes damage, etc), they should have an idea of what they can do better next time.” I believe this to be the core of what motivates players, and is ultimately the player-facing value statement of feedback loops. It necessitates high clarity and intuitive design, and often has me leaning towards layering simple systems / mechanics over single-system complexity, since it provides a more intuitive learning process when things go wrong.

As a lead, I primarily view my job as setting my team up for success. This ultimately means a lot of things, including well-laid plans, clear communication on team goals and individual goals, respectful mentoring and reviews, providing examples of “what good looks like”, building trusting relationships, and more.

As an engineer, I put a lot of focus on sustainability. I’ve worked on several very large, very long-term projects, so my understanding of “tech debt” is deeply ingrained, and is a core part of how I think about code (and scripting) alongside other needs like performance, bugs, security vulnerabilities, so on. Admittedly, I haven’t worked as a dedicated engineer in the new AI-coding era, so I have some experiential learning to do on how these things have shifted.

 

I’ve professionally developed in: 

  • Unreal (4 & 5)
  • Proprietary game engines (League of Legends)
  • C++
  • C#
  • Python
  • (and more)

Some Favorite Games Played:

  • MMOs:
    • Dark Age of Camelot (off and on for 7 years, the game that turned me into a gamer)
    • World of Warcraft
    • Final Fantasy XIV
    • TERA
  • Shooters:
    • Escape from Tarkov
    • Fortnite / Apex Legends / PUBG
    • Helldivers 2
    • Overwatch
    • Warframe
  • ARPGs:
    • Diablo 4
    • Path of Exile 2
    • Last Epoch
  • Other:
    • Bloodborne (and all the Souls games)
    • Factorio
    • Clair Obscur
    • The Last of Us
    • Starcraft 2
    • Hollow Knight
    • Super Metroid
    • Epic Seven
    • Zenless Zone Zero
    • Hearthstone
    • Subnautica
    • Monster Hunter
    • Slay the Spire
    • MapleStory

Other Interests: Typical nerd stuff: Music and anime! I used to play guitar and drums, both in a garage band and school band, and have dipped my toes in the audiophile space. And on the anime side, my wife and I watch an episode with each meal, so it’s a lot (though sometimes it’s an episode of something else, but uuusually anime). Mostly love the more cerebral stuff, like Nippon Sangoku recently and Orb, but One Piece is a mainstay!