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Release Date: March 10th, 2026
Platform: Playstation 5
Role: Technical Level Designer (September 2025 - March 2026)

Ghost of Yōtei: Legends is a cooperative multiplayer experience focused on traversal, combat, puzzle solving, and team coordination. As a Technical Level Designer on the Legends team, I supported gameplay spaces, gameplay asset implementation, traversal systems, and technical solutions across story missions, survival maps, and the Raid experience.

Responsibilities

  • Implemented gameplay-ready multiplayer spaces from blockout through final polish

  • Authored collision and navigation setups for traversal-heavy environments

  • Rigged interactive environmental assets with custom collisions and scripted gameplay states

  • Maintained gameplay metrics and traversal readability across raid spaces

  • Supported encounter flow through traversal pacing and combat-space structure

  • Debugged gameplay-space functionality across AI, traversal, and interaction systems

Cross Discipline Collaboration

  • Environment Artists​​

  • Mission Designers

  • Gameplay Programmers

  • Tech Artist

  • Lighting

  • VFX

Tools:

• Proprietary Sucker Punch Engine • Custom Tools • Maya • Jira • Perforce​

Gameplay video provided by Admiralvic
Featured Content shown between 0:00-4:10

DESIGN GOALS & INTENT

Core Design Goals​

  • Support readable multiplayer gameplay spaces

  • Encourage communication and exploration

  • Improve traversal navigation and flow

  • Maintain gameplay readability across complex encounters

  • Support replayability through encounter pacing and spatial design

Raid Design Goals​

  • Establishing player expectations around difficulty

  • Reinforcing four-player coordination

  • Introducing traversal and puzzle mechanics progressively (corrupted water, pressure plate puzzles, blood tree blockers, etc)

  • Encouraging  players to observe and communicate rather than simply follow the critial path

LEVEL DESIGN OVERVIEW

Responsibilities

  • Opening traversal sequences

  • Early puzzle mechanics

  • Initial combat encounter layout

  • Communication-focused gameplay spaces

Layout Goals

  • Guide players naturally through traversal

  • Create environmental awareness

  • Support multiplayer communication

  • Introduce mechanics progressively before later encounters expanded upon them

GAMEPLAY AND ENCOUNTER DESIGN

Combat Encounter Design​

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The first combat encounter was designed around

  • Establishing difficulty

  • Spatial learning

  • Route discovery

  • Combat readability

  • Punishing positioning mistakes

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The most visually obvious route intentionally exposed players to enemy fire, encouraging players to quickly adapt and identify safer traversal routes through environmental observation.​

Traversal & Puzzle Design​

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The opening traversal spaces were designed to immediately establish the Raid's difficulty and communication requirements. Environmental hazards, traversal mechanics, and puzzle interactions were layered together to reinforce teamwork and spatial awareness.​

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Key Mechanics Introduced

  • Corrupted water hazards

  • Multi-step traversal challenges

  • Communication-driven puzzles

  • Pressure plate mechanics

  • Team-dependent progression​​

Iteration and Playtesting​

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The Raid spaces were iterated on throughout development based on internal and extenal playtests​

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Examples of Iteration

  • Adjusted traversal difficulty and spacing

  • Refined puzzle readability

  • Improved combat sightlines

  • Updated layouts to reduce player confusion

  • Corrected soft-lock risks during multiplayer progression

GAMEPLAY ASSETS & TECHNICAL IMPLEMENTATION

Gameplay Asset Support​

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I maintained and implemented gameplay asset systems used throughout Legends content, including breakable gameplay assets and interactive mission objects.

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Cross-Discipline Collaboration

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To support downstream implementation (VFX, Lighting, Rigging) I worked closely with Production to to improve gameplay asset workflows, implementation pipelines, and communication surrounding asset functionality and gameplay requirements across design, art, and engineering.​

Responsibilities

  • Collision Modeling

  • Navigation & Collision Functionality

  • Collision Material Sound tagging

  • Breakable Behavior and Asset State rigging

Environment Rigging

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I maintained and implemented rigging solutions across multiplayer gameplay spaces supporting mission design and environment art​

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Examples of Iteration

  • Navigation and traversal systems

  • Collision implementation

  • Gameplay metrics

  • Mission-state compatibility

  • Custom gameplay spaces

  • Nonstandard traversal solutions

Tunnel Rigging

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The “Tunnel” gameplay spaces required fully custom technical solutions due to their nontraditional implementation outside normal world navigation systems.​

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Examples of Iteration

  • Custom collision setup

  • Navigation support

  • Traversal spline implementation

  • Pathing obstacle setup

  • Gameplay barriers and metrics

​​Working on Ghost of Yōtei: Legends strengthened my understanding of:

  • Multiplayer gameplay flow

  • Communication-focused level design

  • Gameplay readability

  • Encounter Pacing

  • Cross-discipline collaboration

  • Technical implementation workflows within large-scale production environments

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The project also reinforced the importance of iteration, player observation, and clear gameplay communication when designing cooperative multiplayer experiences.

Reflections and Takeaways

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