23 YEARS EXPERIENCE - 11 SHIPPED TITLES
DEREK WARNER
PRINCIPAL LEVEL DESIGNER
COMBAT ENCOUNTER DESIGN | SINGLE PLAYER / MULTIPLAYER LEVEL DESIGN | BLUEPRINT SCRIPTING
ABOUT
DEREK WARNER
PRINCIPAL LEVEL DESIGNER
As a principal level designer with 23 years of experience in the game industry, I specialize in crafting immersive worlds and gameplay systems with a strong focus on level design. Most recently, I contributed to an unannounced title, following my role as a co-developer on State of Decay 3 with Undead Labs at Blind Squirrel Games.
Over my career, I've shipped 11 titles across major consoles and PC, including Rainbow Six: Vegas, Shadow of the Tomb Raider, MAG, SOCOM 4, SOCOM: Combined Assault, Delta Force: Blackhawk Down, Marvel's Avengers, Unit 13, Murdered: Soul Suspect, Firefall, and Drifters: Loot the Galaxy.
My expertise encompasses design document creation, technical specification design, level design and implementation, enhanced blockouts, and content creation using leading third-party and proprietary development tools.
Marvel’s Avengers (PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PC)
FINISHED PROJECTS
SHIPPED TITLES
23 YEARS OF CREATING ENTERTAINMENT
Blockout to completion of Calypso Casino level including gameplay and combat encounter scripting
Blockout to completion 64, 128, and 256 multiplayer maps
Level design of first combat runout in a tomb raider game, including scripting of enemies and in-game cutscene scripting
Stealth mission creation including combat scripting, pathing of enemies, and light and dark stealth areas
Level design of the E3 demo including scripting of enemies and cutscenes. Level design and scripting of procedural war table missions
Delta Force Blackhawk Down (PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PC)
PROGRAM EXPERIENCE
USING THE TOOLS
DESIGN AND SCRIPTING EXPERIENCE WITH MANY PROPRIETARY EDITORS
Extensive experience with the Unreal Engine starting in 2003 with v2.0 though to today with v5.X. Scripting experience using Kismet and Blueprint
Experience with many proprietary editors and tools at studios throughout the game development space
Experience using blender for blockout, level collision creation and quickly iterating on design elements
Extensive use in blockout and previs of level design layouts. Used in the past for quick iteration and blockout creation
Extensive use to create quick videos to show progress, design ideas, and bugs
EXTENSIVE UNREAL ENGINE EXPERIENCE ver. 2 - ver. 5
DESIGN PLANNING
PAPERMAPS AND BLOCKOUTS
ITERATION DONE QUICKLY
Illustrator 64 Player map from MAG
Illustrator level design layout from Murdered Soul Suspect
Early in my career I used Adobe Illustrator for detailed top-down maps to plan pacing, sightlines, cutscene locations, and player paths.
Over the past several years at studios like Red 5 Studios, Crystal Dynamics, and beyond, I have relied on SketchUp to create my paper maps. This hybrid approach helped iterate quickly with fast exports straight to in-game testing.
That said, Unreal’s built-in blockout tools have improved dramatically in recent versions, making them more powerful for quick prototyping and adjustments.
Looking ahead, I plan to leverage Blender more for advanced blockouts and previs. I always adapt my workflow to best suit the project, keeping with metrics driven design, fast iteration, and stronger final levels.
SketchUp level design map from Firefall
Metrics layout from Blackhawk Down
SketchUp level design layout from Blackhawk Down
Blockout layout from Blackhawk Down
CONTACT ME
LET’S BUILD INCREDIBLE GAMES TOGETHER
DEREK@DEREKWARNER.COM
MAG E3 REVEAL (PS3)