Jesse McKinney ▫ Digital Designer ▫ 3D ▫ Motion ▫ Interactive Design Portfolio

Guardian Legends
Jan 08 - Present
Guardian Legends is a MMO Game Project currently in the concept stages of the development cycle. The game combines the immersion of a first person shooter; with the freedom to design, create, upgrade, or build anything your mind can come up with. This freedom will allow for a completely open ended game play as all the factions involved square off in a race to dominate the galaxy. This fusion will create a unique first person experience where anything can happen.
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April 05 - Present
Ascension came about as a result of a very successful nine year run by RenWerX development team and its computer game mod Renegades for the Starsiege:Tribes Series. The goal of the project is to create a multi player game from scratch that provides a solid framework for RenWerX and other mod teams to base mods off of. Currently there are six mod teams working to complete the core game with the hopes then of creating mods from it to suit their individual tastes.
On this project I serve as both Project Producer, as well as Lead Level Designer. As Producer my duties include handling day to day project operations, managing and coordinating all 11 internal departments and the 60+ person staff, setting timetables, milestones, and development goals, and ensuring that the game maintains the highest quality possible.
As Lead Level Designer I am responsible for the management of the entire level design staff. From recruitment & training, to ensuring my staff has everything they need to complete assignments as professionally and efficiently as possible. In addition, I also perform all the tasks of a level designer, from map conceptualization and planning, to construction, to final map cleanup testing I am intimately familiar with the entire level design process.
Related Links: RenWerX Studios

2004-2005
In 2005 VU Games released the long awaited third installment of the StarSiege Tribes Series this time on the Unreal 2.5 engine. Upon release RenWerX immediately began to lay down the foundations for the third installment of the popular Tribes mod Renegades. A few months into this process I joined RenWeX in the capacity of a Level Designer.
Unfortunately, not all went as planned for the game and within six months of the games release the games publisher announced it was dropping all support for the game citing extremely poor sales and general rejection by the community. This sealed the fate of the final installment of the Tribes Renegades Mod. However, in those short six month, much progress was made toward the completion of TV|Renegades. I personally managed to teach myself UnrealED and went on to produced a few maps for TV|Renegades. It was at this time that I built Quebes. Quebes was a large scale map project featuring vast terrain expanses, massive indoor garden bases, and a tranquil zen setting. To date Quebes is still my favorite map of all time, due to the robustness and flexibility that the Unreal Editor offered, combined with a very immersive map concept.
Related Links: RenWerX Studios

2003-2004
Jedi Academy was important milestones in my personal history. For the first time ever I was exposed to the wonders of GTK Radiant and BSP modeling. This new breed of tools and concept allowed me to, for the first time, create my own buildings and assets instead of just using prefabed objects. Radiant was my first true experience with any sort of modeling application.
Although my work from these early years lacked in detail, most of my early maps focused on one thing, being fun. By the time I moved on from this series I created four maps for Jedi Academy of which I released one publicly. Zion, a massive multi zoned map featuring such areas as a complete wild west town, space battle arena, jousting ring, rancor fighting pit, lake zone, and more. Still ranked in the top 20 Jedi Academy map downloads of all time, Zion stands legacy to uninhibited creative exploration of my early years as a level designer.
Related Links: Download Zion (Jk3 Required)

1998-2001
Starsiege Tribes, or just Tribes as it came to be known was a very fast paced Multiplayer FPS game based on the Starsiege Universe. Many factors made this game unique to itself including the scope and learning curve of the game, and the fact that it had one of the largest mod communities ever backing its success. It was also the first exposure I had to a truly immersive multiplayer experience. Tribes was my first love and my first addiction. A few months after its release I began to experiment with the level editor. Not knowing at the time how to create my own content most of the maps I made utilized prefabed assets and therefore were completely server side maps.
Related Links: MiniMod , Torque Game Engine