Age of Darkness: Final Stand

Age of Darkness: Final Stand is a dark fantasy survival RTS where you must illuminate, build and defend humanity’s last bastion against hordes of Nightmares. Set in the remnants of a kingdom consumed by a deadly fog, you decide. Will you hide in the light? Or take back your world.

Role Overview

In 2021, when I joined Playside Studios, I was put onto Age of Darkness as a Game Designer and was primarily responsible for the design of new content and being the “Keeper of Survival Mode” for its early access release. This role entailed being in charge of gameplay balance for every new feature that came into the survival mode of the game. After early access, I would go on to design future content that would be released in game patches every month. This involved new player units, heroes, enemy threats, buildings, perks, gameplay systems and quality of life improvements.

The team then worked on a full fledged Campaign that would be comprised of 10 fleshed out, unique missions. I was responsible for designing out 4 of these missions (namely missions 1,2,7 & 8) and also the main boss fight found in the finale. My main responsibilities were focused around level design, mission feature implementation & balancing.

responsibilities

  • Documentation, Prototyping and Implementation of Gameplay Features

    • Gameplay Systems - Armour, Factions, Unit Weaknesses, Perks, Points of Interest

    • New Player Units, Heroes and Buildings - Mechanics, Balance Adjustments

    • New Enemy (Nightmare) Units - Mechanics, AI Behaviours

    • Bespoke Boss Fight for final Campaign Mission

  • Economy Design

    • Gameplay Balance - Player and Enemy Units, Buildings, Gameplay Systems (Armour, faction bonuses etc.)

    • Enemy Numbers - Open-World and Enemy Waves (Death Nights and Pesters)

    • Resource Placement

    • Player Progression

  • Mission Design

    • 4 fully designed out Campaign Missions

    • Level Designs from Concept to Implementation

    • Setting up of Main and Side Objectives

    • Implementation of all Mission Gameplay Features via custom made editor in Unreal Engine

    • Holistic Balancing of all elements in each mission