Portfolio

Ghost of Yotei

by cindy

Senior Systems Designer
Sucker Punch Productions (Current)

Sr System Designer Responsibilities

  • New Game+ Lead
    • MVP plan and team management
    • 2 New armors, 10+ Charms, new Vendor, New resource
    • Balance of faucet/sinks
  • Owner of Progression, Economy, and Collectible systems
    • Prototyping to ship
    • Balancing
    • See more details below

Ghost of Yotei PS Blog Article

ROLE: Senior Systems Game Designer
COMPANY: Sucker Punch Productions, SIE
RELEASE: 2025
PLATFORM: Playstation 5

Additional Responsibility Details:

  • Progression
    • Armor sets and Charms: perks, and unlocks
    • Design and implementation of all upgrades for armor, weapons, and gear
    • Designed, implemented, and managed all bounty hunt system rewards
    • Skill Trees (non-weapon) and Skill statues
    • Minigame progression such as Zenhajiki, Sword Forging, Bamboo, Onsens, and Fox Follows
    • Implemented and managed Traveler’s Maps
  • Economy
    • Design and implemented pickups and collectibles such as Mon
    • Worked directly with Ainu and Japanese consultants on collectibles
    • Armor, weapon, and cosmetic object implementation and management
    • Vendor inventory and locations
    • Pickup variants and coordinated flavor
    • Prototyped, implemented, and managed chests and other such interactive game objects
  • Balance
    • Reviewed External and Internal focus testing to adjust game balance across major benchmarks such as weapon unlocks, armor unlocks, upgrades, collectibles, and skills.
    • Conducted data analytics on data to improve the game
    • Used internal and external logging software and improved data collection across the game
    • Managed Entitlements (deluxe edition rewards, cosmetics, etc) across main game
  • Misc Design
    • Created and presented design, progress, and feature pitches to Creative Directors and to coworkers at company wide meetings
    • Design and prototyping for Sensei weapon training
    • Initial design for Wolf Chase mechanic
    • Worked closely with
      • Campaign team on mission needs and progression
      • Combat team on Armors, Charms, Skills, ammo, Ranged weapons, and melee weapons
      • Character Art and Tech Art teams for implementation of all cosmetics and dyes
      • UI team for Gear menu UI, Vendor UI, Upgrade UI , Inventory menu UI
      • Env Art team for prop creation and implementation for collectibles and pickups
      • Content owners on various sub systems like Puzzleboxes and minigames like zenhajiki
      • Writing who supported most of the above efforts