Amplitude

PROCESS + JOURNEY

As an independent developer, Harmonix was intrigued by the recent emergence of crowdsourcing platforms as a means of funding game projects. The studio decided that a revival of studio’s cult favorite Amplitude could be a strong candidate to test the waters. Originally released on the PlayStation 2, the game was a critical success, but failed to reach a wide audience. As part of the team assembled to pitch the game to the Kickstarter community, I developed all new branding and contributed to the pre-visualization used to generate buzz during the campaign.

Upon reaching our funding goal, major work began on the game engine to improve its rendering pipeline and overhaul it’s authoring tool set in order to support the new game. Leveraging user flows and wireframes, I worked closely with the engineering team to build out the development road map, ensuring the team would have the necessary tools to build the game and deliver on the tight timeline.

Told in the form of a multi-act concept album, the narrative of the game revolves around a group of synesthesia researchers using nanotechnology to reprogram the human brain. Both the visual design and technical execution of the menus and HUD positioned the player as if they were interacting with the same operating system as the protagonists, complete with simulated biometric authentication, scripted virtual assistance, and graphical glitches.

While the game was originally envisioned as a high-definition remake, I was a vocal advocate for deploying the 12 years of expertise we’d gained between iterations; championing both usability and accessibility as a form of a fan service.