top of page

PROJECT LIBRARIAN

Project Librarian is our 3 - years project in collaboration with AIV, started in the last months of 2022 as an academic project and currently in development. 

​

We started as a team of three game designers, and during the first few months, after conducting market/competitor analysis and other pre-production practises, simulating industry standards, we decided to create a first-person survival horror game with a Sci-Fi setting, delivering a playable build to the best of our abilities by the end of the year.

​

In the second phase of development (2023/2024), our team expanded to include 3D artists, programmers, sound designers and narrative designers. This led us to completely reorganize our workflows and essentially rebuild the project from scratch, not to expand its scope but to improve its overall quality, while also catching up on everything we couldn't accomplish in the previous year.


Our current goal is to develop a polished and refined vertical slice - delivering the highest quality we're capable of - to be released as a demo on Steam in 2025.

MY ROLES

PROJECT MANAGEMENT

QUALITY ASSURANCE

GAME DESIGN

LEVEL DESIGN

GENERAL TASK

AS A
SCRUM
MASTER

MY TOOLS

Over the past three years, I’ve ensured the proper application of the Scrum framework by organizing key ceremonies such as daily stand-ups, sprint planning sessions, and reviews. I also maintained up-to-date documentation, such as task backlogs and project boards, and tracked velocity graphs to help the team stay on course and meet our objectives efficiently.
My goal throughout was to support my teammates by organizing time, workflows, and deliverables—putting them in the best possible position to perform at their highest potential.

HacknPlan
TeamVelocity.png

I helped the team playtesting builds and versions, providing feedbacks about features, organizing "Gym Maps" to test mechanics and to identify possible issues, while also taking care of optimization issues. I standardized best practices and kept track of all major bugs and their solutions in dedicated documents, and worked closely with each departement to ensure the desired quality.

GoogleSuit2.png
Office_2019.png


QUALITY
ASSURANCE

ue-logo-stacked-unreal-engine-w-677x545-fac11de0943f.png

MY TOOLS

3D_Folder_Reorganization.png
BugTracking

I maintained the team's documentation and supported my teammates in creating reusable templates, from pre-production tools like market and competitor analysis to gameplay loops, MDA frameworks, and case studies.
Additionally, I contributed to the design of several core mechanics - such as our I.A. Finite State Machine - prototyping them both in documentation and directly in Unreal Engine 5, before pitching them to the team for feedback and iteration.

Microsoft_Office_Visio_(2019).svg.png
Google_Sheets_logo_(2014-2020).svg.png
Google_Slides_2020_Logo.svg.png
Google_Docs_logo_(2014-2020).svg.png

AS A
GAME
DESIGNER

Google_Chrome_icon_(February_2022).svg.png

MY TOOLS

LDD - Level Section Breakdown
LDD - Player Journey

AS A
LEVEL
DESIGNER

MY TOOLS

purerefip.png

I applied the Level Design pipeline to create map sections from scratch for our project, following all phases from pre-production to post-production. To enhance the environments, I also incorporated selected asset packs from the Unreal Engine Marketplace.​​​​​

hand-writing-blank-notebook-paper-texture-variation-collection-set-free-png.png
SketchUp-brand-logo_b5344fd998cf67ad0e89521d3e3e78ed.png
Blender_logo_no_text.svg.png
ue-logo-stacked-unreal-engine-w-677x545-fac11de0943f.png

REFERENCES

Collecting references from any media that may be useful, trying to identify tropes and anything that can be made in a modular way

SKETCHES

SR_SketchA.jpg

Even with so many excellent digital tools available, I often prefer to start with a sketching phase on paper to quickly visualize what I'm imagining

METRICS & PROTOTYPES

SR_Metrics.png

I collect metrics related to both the environments and the furniture, so I don't have to correct them later on

UNREAL BLOCKOUTS

SR_Screen2.png

I develop the final blockout in Unreal, incorporating simple mechanics through Blueprints and beginning to implement pre-lighting that mainly involves guidance and color coding

SIMPLE 3D MODELING

SR_BlenderAssets.png

FULL PROTOTYPING

SR_ScreenC_Perspective.png

I am able to produce simple modules/assets in Blender to use during the Blockout phase to improve the level's quality right from the prototyping stage

Creating a prototype of the area in SketchUp before moving to Unreal helps me visualize proportions, metrics, and any architectural errors with greater precision and clarity

Within the team I always tried  to help my teammates with their tasks, regardless of their department., Doing so, I made myself available to contribute even in areas where I didn't feel particularly prepared, for example:

​

  • UE5 Blueprints

  • Simple Level Sequences

  • Finite State Machine I.A. design and breakdown

  • SFX research and implementation

  • Animations research and implementation (Blender and/or Mixamo)

  • Environment block-mesh and enrichment

  • U.I. implementation

​

This has greatly helped me understand the priorities and "language" of each department, and sometimes it has also allowed me to discover areas that I initially didn't consider much but found to be extremely interesting (ex., U.I. or Blueprints).

AS A
SWISS ARMY
KNIFE

©2023 by Giacomo Palmaro. Creato con Wix.com

bottom of page