Anders Howard
andershoward@gmail.com
San Francisco, CA.
OBJECTIVE: Continue to grow my career as a game designer while contributing to well crafted games.
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EXPERIENCE
11/09 - CURRENT Zynga Inc. (http://www.zynga.com)
Senior Game Designer 11/12 - Current
Game Designer from 11/09-11/12
- Systems design from prototype to polish, create world maps, model economies, write content, lead a team of designers and developers in major game systems development. FishVille, FrontierVille, CityVille 2, 1 unannounced title and a bunch of prototypes.
3D Character Art Intern
- Helped set up 3D to Flash pipeline for an unnanounced browser-based MMO: set up rendering environment (materials and cameras), helped architect the cloth dyeing and swappable armor systems.
- Concepted characters and armors.
- Modeled characters, armors, and creatures and painted them with stylized toony textures.
Junior Game Designer / Vector Artist
- Spent some time as a vector artist - illustrated some props and buildings for Barn Buddy - a farming game for Face Book.
- Pitched features to executives, designed low level game systems for Barn Buddy.
Language Integration Tester
- Wrote and executed testing plans for a variety of SKUs on multiple platforms across 5 projects.
- Tested AAA games in various stages of production for general, first party, and language bugs.
- Worked with translators to uncover language bugs.
SKILLS
- Experience managing multiple teams of designers and engineers (including remote teams); providing high and low level feedback for systems and content implementation; efficient prioritization of new work.
- Aggressive prototyping and balancing of new systems; tweaking game design based on metrics analysis.
- Scripting with Python, Actionscript, MEL, Kismet, C#, and proprietary scripting languages. For example, I have scripted quests, economy simulators, 3D tools, level triggers, Flash prototypes etc.
- Experienced content designer centered on quest writing, narrative design, level design, item design etc.
- Strong Art fundamentals: light, color theory, materials, anatomy, kinesiology, architecture, composition.
- Texture painting in a wide range of styles - painterly to realistic.
- Software: Maya, 3DS Max, ZBrush, Mudbox, xNormal, Crazybump, Topogun, 3DCoat, Photoshop, Illustrator, Flash.
- Some rigging, shader, and MEL scripting experience.
Game Design
3D Art
RELATED EXPERIENCE / AWARDS
-
04/10 Dinner Love and the Quest for Soup
(Play it here!)
Designer/Artist/Proposer
Proposed to my (then) girlfriend via video game that I made in my spare time with a few friends. -
09/08 - 09/09 Full Moon Manor (Independent Project)
(http://www.fullmoonmanor.com)
Project Manager / Game Designer / Artist
My duties include planning and scheduling milestones, assigning tickets to team members, contributing to and editing the game design document, and character + environment art for Full Moon Manor, a 2D puzzle platformer game for the PC nearing completion. (School Senior Project) - Finalist in the South by Southwest (SXSW) Screenburn Game Design Competition for my original game design FLOAT, a casual game designed for the iPhone / DS / PC.
- Finalist in the South by Southwest (SXSW) Screenburn Game Design Competition for my team's game design Full Moon Manor, a casual game designed for the PC / Web.
- Project Manager / Game Designer / Artist on CAEN – a WWII themed student mod for Unreal 3, SPR08 - FA08. My duties included scheduling milestones, assigning work to team members, reviewing work and adjusting schedules, writing the game design document, and miscellaneous modeling + texture work.
- Game Developer's Conference: Conference Associate. 2006-2009.
My duties included facilitating speaker sessions, manning expo booths, general attendee customer service, and networking with games industry folks in my spare time.
- Awarded "Best in Class" by a faculty jury in Life Drawing class, Spring 2007.
- Character Maquette "Dobbs McKraken - Space Pirate" on display at the Art Institute of CA-SF SPR07 - Current.
- Co-designed the “Chemical Existence” total conversion modification for Half-Life that received an invitation to the Valve Mod Expo '99.
- Avid Tabletop Gamer.