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Getting to know xSUND0WN
Getting to know xSUND0WN

Getting to know xSUND0WN

You may recognize Cameron "xSUND0WN" as a former Marketing Specialist at Epic Games on the title Fortnite Battle Royale, with prior experience as a competitive Design Analyst on Paragon. Cameron is an individual with a big heart for Esports and gaming who joined Predecessor as our new Senior Gameplay Designer.

Tell us about your experience in the game industry/gaming.

I started doing competitive gaming around the age of 12 or 13 back on 1st and 3rd person shooter games and went to my first major tournaments when I was 14 and from there I was completely hooked. Spent my entire teenage and early college years playing and competing across FPS, TPS, RTS, and then MOBAs before swapping over to working for a few gaming orgs while finishing out college.

After college, I ended up with a job at Epic Games where I’d been for just under the past 7 years. I started out working in QA and then went on to work for a bunch of different disciplines from design, to systems, to competitive, to marketing/creators, to production and on the broadcast side of things. I felt I really got to be involved in so many different projects and gain a ton of valuable experience along the way.

What will you be doing for Predecessor?

I’ll be working as a Senior Gameplay Designer on the design team. I am in particular very personally interested in helping bring the heroes of the game to life, while providing a baseline floor for accessibility, but also making sure they allow for competitive and skill-expressing play. In addition to this, as someone whose gaming roots lie in controller/console play, I want to stay on top of making Predecessor play and feel very smooth regardless of what system or input you use.

Those two things, along with doing my best to relay my experience to the incredibly talented designers already on the team that have done such a great job bringing Predecessor to life already.

What are you most excited about in your new role at Omeda?

Am I allowed to say everything?? Seriously from the team, to the game, to the community, and everything in between. I’ve always loved competitive team games that offer a lot of depth not only in terms of skill, but also in teamwork, smarts, and coordinated efforts. I’m excited to be able to make something awesome that every part of the community can enjoy and working with everyone to iterate on that product once it’s live. Trust me I’ll be out there playing just as much as all of you!

Who is your favorite role/character in Predecessor?

My role preference goes jungle, then offlane as my strongest, and then equally enjoying both support and mid-lane. I will carry if I have to, but I tend to just want to farm until I’m at 2 or 3 items and that’s less fun for me personally than throwing myself into the fray repeatedly as a jungle/offlaner.

With your background in Esport, could you see yourself casting Predecessor? 

Don’t threaten me with a good time! I’ve always enjoyed getting the opportunity to cast and talk about any game, but Predecessor would be a blast. However, for that to be possible we have to put all the systems in place for people to be able to compete at a higher level and ensure the game has a healthy enough scene to support it. So while casting would be cool, my primary focus is going to be on making sure the game is in a good place, there is a wide enough variety of heroes for competitive matches to be exciting and variable, and that there is a foundation in place that let’s people express their skill. Plus, I don’t doubt there are some amazing casters out in the community waiting for their shot.

It’s been only a few days but what's your first impression of the team?

They’re awesome. It’s exciting to have an opportunity to make a game with a team that was derived from a very dedicated and passionate player base beforehand. So far everyone has been incredibly welcoming and fun to work with. Really hopeful with all of this talent and desire to succeed that we can make an awesome game that keeps players engaged.

You worked on Paragon previously, is there anything specific that got into the game that the community might remember?

Let’s see… I named Narbash thunk, did a lot of work on both iterations of Iggy n Scorch when it comes to a design iteration perspective, and most visible was probably being the hero designer on the Murdock rework when he came out. Adding in the lights, fixing some bugs with his Hot Pursuit, hooking up all the new effects, and making his laser feel a bit more responsive. He was a lot of fun to work on!

If you could add one thing to Predecessor what would it be?

Do you think I’m going to stop at adding just one thing? Come on Nibori you know me better than that! I think the obvious answer here would be more heroes right? Definitely want to ensure we are able to keep content rolling out to everyone so all the old favorites are back, but also I really can’t wait to sink my teeth into some original hero design.

I can’t wait for everyone to get their hands on EA!