Just Cause 3 is the game that brought me to New York City in September 2012. During my first year on the project, I developed the network and multiplayer technology. However, as you might know, the game did not ship with any multiplayer. But some of that code lives on in the proprietary Avalanche Studios engine (Apex engine) today.
As a result of multiplayer being scrapped, I transitioned into a lead programmer role for the feature team. We were in charge of the individual gameplay systems that didn’t fall under AI, UI, or Character. For example, we developed the systems for missions, challenges, open world spawning, heat, cinematics, playbacks, scripting language, and so on. In short, my team glued the game together.
This game was a huge success! It became critically acclaimed and warmly received by players. In addition, it also sold extremely well. What we achieved with a comparably small team of about 100 developers at peak size was genuinely impressive. The professionalism and quality of the group were of the highest standard. Some were colleagues from Starbreeze, such as Roger Mattsson, Anders Sudow and Engin Cilasun. And others, like Roland Lesterlin, David Grijns and Javier Olazabal, I would work with for years to come. There were so many talented developers gathered at the same time and place.
Just Cause 3 is a game that I am extremely proud of having been part of developing. Above all, it’s nice to know that my work contributed immensely to its success. Consequently, I was promoted to lead gameplay programmer for the studios next game, Just Cause 4.
Information
Release date: December 1, 2015
Platforms: PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Microsoft Windows
Developer: Avalanche Studios
Publisher: Square Enix
Credited: Programming and Lead Feature Programmer
Role(s): Lead Feature Programmer, Multiplayer Programmer
Time on project: 38 months