BioWare Blog: Being a Level Designer, Part Two

BioWare’s Cori Nicole May returns with a second entry to her “The Trials and Tribulations of Being a Level Designer” blog series.

I’ve made cutscenes, too. I discovered, in so doing, that I also have a terrible cinematic eye, and dramatic effect is not my forte. Fortunately, by some grace, in the meantime an entire department of cinematic designers has been created, and no one will ever be forced to watch my amateurish efforts again. I marvel at those who can do it, though; I love playing through the game and seeing the new cutscenes and staging that have been put in, the close-ups and pull-backs for special effects. I try to remember to tell the cinematics people how wonderful their work is, because I know how mediocre my previous attempts had been, in comparison. And the level artist and character artists too, for that matter. I just hope that makes up for the many times I have to go and whine about bugs and different interpretations of how something should look.

I occasionally get to have some input into voice acting as well, even if my pleas to have Russell Wong in the game fell on deaf ears. Well, ears who couldn’t afford Russell Wong, at any rate. And some times I pay for that. It took me a few weeks, but I eventually began to realize that my officemate was actually turning up the volume on his computer whenever Nathan Fillion was speaking, just to watch me swoon all over again. (Yes, I was the only female technical designer for a very long time. Yes, this did occasionally result in hijinx of this sort. But it also meant I got to read the Dragon Age novel before almost anyone else, as Mr. Gaider wanted to know if it was swoon-worthy.)