Alex Roycewicz is a Level Designer at Infinity Ward, where he has been working for 2 years. Alex created awesome levels for Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. Although his background is in modding, this is his first position as a professional designer.


How did you get your start designing games?

I got started designing games roughly around the age of 13 or 14. I ended up getting a PC as a present, and coincidentally bought Half-Life to go with it. I immediately became immersed within the game and decided to try and figure out how the game worked and what I could do to edit it. Soon, I came across the bundled level editor, WorldCraft, on the installation CD and started tinkering around inside of it. There wasn’t too much documentation and I didn’t have any internet access at the time, so things started out incredibly slowly, but over time I became more familiar with the editor and began to construct very, very basic levels.


How did you get noticed and ultimately hired by Infinity Ward?


Once I decided I was good enough give an industry job a shot, I started creating a portfolio of my work on a website a few friends helped me put up. At the time I didn’t have too many full levels, as they take quite a while to build, so I thought that the best way to show my skill without spending another half-year building new levels was to create a few “scenes” within the editor I was using at the time. This way I could focus on a specific talent I wanted to show off without investing too much time into it. After I built a few of these scenes, I put them up on my website’s portfolio and started to send out résumé’s to different companies around the world who were hiring. I received a few replies from different companies, and IW was one of them. Seeing as they worked on Call of Duty, Call of Duty 2, I decided that they would be the best company to go with as they had quite a bit of experience under their belt, and the move wasn’t too far either.


What has your experience working at Infinity Ward been like?

Working here has been excellent! Everyone is incredibly friendly and helpful, and the workplace is very casual and comfortable to work in. I love my job here… Where else do you get to ride scooters around the office?


What do you think makes a game great?

Easy accessibility, high replayability, great controls, customization, frequent rewards for the player … The list is quite long. Some things such as high levels of iteration while in development contribute greatly to the end product, as well. There have been a few never-ending meetings, too, but ultimately progress is made and great ideas are born while other ideas are cut. Call of Duty 4 was changed around quite a bit during development, but what came out in the end was amazing.


What advice do you have for prospective designers?


Keep working towards your goals! Be it to get into the gaming industry, finish a level, or even learn how to make a simple room. If you believe that you want to become a designer, there really isn’t anything stopping you as you can get all the materials and knowledge that you need online!

http://www.infinityward.com/tools.html