Justin Lu
Game Designer
The Big Apple
A true epicenter of the arts, New York City is also the East Coast center of dining and shopping. Between the abundance of famous museums and legendary nightlife, you will never run out of attractions and experiences.
From The Met to pre-Prohibition-era gastropubs and 75 Michelin-starred restaurants, New York’s charm is hard to beat. Experience every kind of performance in New York City, from improv comedy to world-class Broadway shows.
High on Life | Level Designer
Squanch Games, Releasing Dec 2022
Travel to various planets and locations across the cosmos, go up against the nefarious Garmantuous and his gang of goons, collect loot, meet unique characters, and more, in the latest comedy adventure from Justin Roiland!
Main Contributions:
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Developed level blockouts and enemy encounters to create engaging combat, traversal, and exploration experiences.
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Scripted mission flow and narrative gameplay for several areas in the game using UE4 blueprints.
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Designed unique traversal mechanics and communicated them to team members through detailed pitches, docs, and diagrams.
Neon White | Level Designer
Angel Matrix, 2022
Neon White is a lightning fast first-person action game about exterminating demons. You are White, an assassin handpicked from Hell to compete with other demon slayers for a chance to live permanently in Heaven.
Main Contributions:
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Designed level blockouts and enemy encounters that emphasize fast paced movement and replayability.
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Refined the game’s progression experience by tuning rewards for completing missions and costs of unlockable content.
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Created the 3D environment art kits for most of the game's worlds and did the initial art pass on several levels.
Boom was initially intended as a tutorial level for explosive barrels, which in Neon White are useful for traversal as well as taking out groups of enemies. The level guides players through a series of barrel-focused gameplay beats, each one teaching players something new.
The main path is emphasized by interactable objects (barrels and destructable barriers), splashes of color, and enemies. Later parts of the path are visible in the background, informing the player whats to come and making the level very easily navigable on the first run. Glass windows are used to show a future path that is not immediately accessible.
Each barrel in this level serves a teaching purpose and also guides you to the next beat. There's a barrel that players typically target with the intention of killing an enemy but it simultaneously breaks a door down and reveals the path forward. In the next beat the room is shaped to encourage use of the downward Stomp ability, which when used on some barrels provides the extra powerful jump needed to exit the room.
The player can skip an entire room by positioning themselves behind a barrel and riding the explosion to access a roof with a hidden entrance. This secondary path is hinted at by the trees on the roof.
My instructions for this level were to use every weapon and enemy introduced previously. This was going to be the final level of Mission 9 and needed to feel epic and test the player's skill. It ended up being the longest level I designed for the game. I wanted to invoke the feeling of breaking into a castle and dismantling all it's defences from the inside. In planning this level I came up with gameplay beats that would fit within this theme.
The first half of the level is meant to test the player's ability to use the main cards of the game. Both regular shooting and use of discard abilities are required to be succesful. These beats of scaling a wall, clearing the ramparts, and fighting up a causeway are also intended to feel like you're peeling apart layers of defences from the castle.
One of the shortcuts in this level is to shoot at half of the balloon demons instead of chain jumping them from the bottom as most people would usually do on the first run. Killing all enemies is required to complete levels in Neon White.
This level closes out Mission 9 so I wanted to make sure it had a memorable ending. I used interactable gameplay objects to create a player-triggered chain reaction that invokes the feeling of breaking down the final defences of the fortress. As the player is launched into the air in the final stretch, tripwires travel between the towers and explode a barrel, shattering the glass covering the end goal.
Ginkgo | Lead Designer
Student Project, 2020
Ginkgo is a single player horror game inspired by East Asian horror. Armed with a magic needle that can sew parts of the world together, solve puzzles and outsmart monsters as you explore a surreal world.
Main Contributions:
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Created level blockouts for narrative moments, traversal puzzles, and chase sequences.
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Designed many of the game's unique stitching mechanics and behaviors of various NPC creatures.
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Developed a modular environment art kit used throughout the game and did final art and lighting for many rooms.
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Golden Loft | Game Designer
Halon Entertainment, 2019
In Golden Loft, you will explore your grandfather’s attic and uncover his fascination with the Golden Ratio. Play with various contraptions and curios that your grandfather collected in his travels around the world.
Main Contributions:
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Designed puzzles that provide an intriguing escape-room-like experience while teaching mathematical concepts.
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Created game design documentation and level layouts.
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Modeling, texturing, and lighting for the game's two puzzle rooms.