Vincent Charland
LEVEL DESIGNER
Gotham Knights
Open World Team - Ambient life and World Activities
Responsible on working on various civilian events encountered across every district of Gotham City. Worked on at least 500+ locations across the game world and each of them have different variations, helping diversify the player experience each time they patrol Gotham City. Density and diversity of each events vary based on each district, respecting narrative and gameplay goals. Ensured timely delivery of high-quality content for milestones and industry events. Collaborated with the Level Design Director on post-launch optimization efforts to enhance the player experience.
More comment and examples from players on this reddit thread:
Crime Activities
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Ownership of the multiple train stations across Gotham City. Responsible for designing interesting civilian encounters and crime activities.
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Each crime activities features different variations, designs and ingredients based on the enemy faction that will be randomly chosen to spawn at that location.
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Designed each encounters while respecting narrative ideas and gameplay goals.
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Circumvent the tight spaces in the train stations by placing grapple points locations that allows player to move around the area without feeling stuck or forced to backtrack away, while simultaneously offering great opportunity for stealth takedowns.
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Assisted fellow level designers to resolve design-related bugs and blockers, ensuring smooth progression through production milestones.
Gameplay of a Bomb Threat crime activity in one of the train stations featuring the Regulators enemy faction.
Gameplay of a Bomb Threat crime activity featuring the Freaks enemy faction. (Starts at around 6:37)
Gameplay of a Bomb Threat crime activity featuring the Freaks enemy faction in another train station.
Gotham Knights, ''The Kelvin Incident DLC''
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Responsible for crafting and designing an entire arena from concept to release, as well as multiple sections between arenas, offering small secrets and challenges for extra rewards.
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The Arena took place in the Gotham City Reservoir and the multiple sections later, in S.T.A.R. Labs.
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Responsible for balancing and designing the enemy encounters of each combat waves, as well as choosing the appropriate optional objectives.
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Level Showcased on Floor 6, 7 and 8 of the DLC.
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Sections between arenas showcased multiple times between floor 11 and floor 14.
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Collaboration with Level Art, Concept art and other departments to attain a satisfying level of quality.
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Heroic Assault DLC intended for 4 players with high quality gear and skills, but playable with 1-3 players.
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Arena needed to be compatible with multiple game modes (Defend objective, Defeat chosen targets, repair generators, etc.).
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Designed the layout and grapple points to give enough space for combat as 4 players without feeling stuck together and giving a lot of possible angles to approach combat.
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Multiple entry points to allow freedom of choice to the players and avoid traffic as 4 players.
Various screenshots showcasing the layout of the map (during the Repair the Generators game mode).
Showcase of the level, grapple points, entry points, including the Defend Console game mode.
Showcase of the Repair Generators game mode.
Showcase of the Defeat Faction Leaders game mode.
For sections between arenas, named connectors, responsible for designing the layout of multiple connectors. Also collaborated with the team to design ideas for reusable short/light puzzles to offer exploration incentives to the more curious players. Each connectors were assembled with modular rooms, individually designed as a team effort, to be both reusable and modular enough to allow full creativity when designing our own sections afterwards.
Shooting an explosive barrel next to a door to expose a hidden room.
Proximity elemental mines to subtly guide player towards hidden rooms and encourage them to be careful when moving around.
Hitting an electrical panel to disable laser doors that blocks progress and/or hide hidden rewards.
Simple walkthrough through some of the sections I made.
*Note: The images and videos above were played on the Very Easy difficulty, solo, and with an over-leveled character to showcase the level design and the features of the level rather than the actual difficulty. For an actual playthrough of the level (and others) with the intended difficulty and in a cooperative multiplayer setting, see the video below.*
Full Playthrough video of the DLC. My work (arena) is showcased at around 1:17:21 (and multiple times later at: 1:38:26 and 1:59:49).
Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League
Collaborated with Rocksteady as part of a Co-Dev initiative with WB Games Montreal and Rocksteady.
Helped develop new content on the open world, in-game activities and helping with the overall development of the game and post-launch support, focused on level design.
Wonder Woman
Collaborated with Monolith Productions as part of a Co-Dev initiative on the now cancelled Wonder Woman game using the Lith Engine.