The Legend of Monkey Island

Role: Game Designer
Engine: Unreal Engine 4
Time on Project: 8+ Months
Release: 20th July 2023
Platforms: Windows, XBOX Series X|S, XBOX One, XBOX Cloud Gaming, Playstation 5

Project Description:

The Legend of Monkey Island is a three part Tall Tale experience built from the ground up as a love letter to this original IP. The gameplay is filled with new features, secrets and side-quests to embark on. Players are invited to meet classic characters from the Monkey Island games, in a new narrative that brings the iconic locations of Monkey Island to the Sea of Thieves.

The Legend of Monkey Island is coming free to all Sea of Thieves players, beginning with the first of three new Tall Tales on July 20th. Bring your wits, your finest hat and a talking skull, and we’ll see you mighty pirates there.

Role Responsibilities:

Heavy involvement in the development of this project, from the prototype phase to release version
Developing gameplay surrounding a narrative experience that fits both IPs involved
Tailoring the experience for both new players and veterans of the Sea of Thieves
Hands on implementation with new systems to deliever a new quality gameplay experience
Iteration on the design based on playtests and requests made by the original IP holder
Collaboration with other teams involved on the project; design, engineering, artists, content, audio, producers
Supporting teams across all three tales with tasks and bugs
Assisting in development of new features and systems to ensure they are as designer-friendly as possible
Implementing dialogue and text based features that support localisation

Project Challenges:

Adjusting Sea of Thieves gameplay to fit with existing external IP:

We had to adjust the world of Sea of Thieves to match the vision and values of the Monkey Island games
Several elements of the design were reworked based on the prototyped flow
When designing for this project, we had to be considerate of the narrative elements and style of the world of Monkey Island games

Balancing difficulty for a multiplayer gameplay experience:

Combat sequences were scaled depending on players size and offers a cinematic experience
AI Ship pathing systems were used to tailor an experience that utilizes the terrain in interesting ways to create epic moments for the players to enjoy and share with each other
Through frequent playtests, level changes were addressed by collaborating with the environment team

Creating a new combat experience within Sea of Thieves:

Sea of Thieves combat was adjusted to offer more control over the old systems
Worked closely with engineering teams to update the combat system
New systems were implemented to weave narrative elements into fights, such as bespoke cinematic sequences that reflect what is going on in and around the fight

Prototyping flow without systems and content:

Implemented the general flow outlined in the high level design document using existing content
Adapted Sea of Thieves gameplay features to fit the needs of the prototype
Created new blueprints to support areas of the flow

Translating the required design ideas to other content teams:

Worked with content teams to allow iteration in the work flow based on design requirements
Discussed presentation of key locations for the flow with the content teams (for example, have landmarks visible from specific locations to help with navigation and the clarity of the objective)
Analysed use of reactive environment elements with the content teams (for example, opening a stone mechanism will trigger an animation and reveal lights to invite players inside)