CARS: FAST AS LIGHTNING

About the game:

• Company: Gameloft NYC
• Genre: Tycoon & racing
• Target audience: Kids 5-12 (main), males 13-30 (secondary)
• Release date: October 9th 2014
• Downloads: 60+ million
• Distinctions: Editor's Choice on iOS

About my work:

• Position: game designer (creation), lead game designer (updates)
• Design work: features, documents, UX, maps, content design, quests, controls, tutorial
• Other work: team management, presentations, localization file, tracking

Cars: Fast As Lightning was released in October 2014. Its gameplay is a unique tycoon / racing combination, featuring the most famous characters for the Pixar license Cars!

This game targets young kids, and the design of the controls and interactions was focused on this target. From the one-touch racing gameplay to the VO giving life to the cars, the game has been regularly tested by our audience throughout the development.

I've taken part to all the design aspects of this project during the development. After pitching the first game concept, I worked on the entire documentation, including gameplay mechanics, economy, multiplayer features and user experience. I've been following up every feature developed daily with a team of 30+, as well as creating and integrating content (quests, racetracks, game items...).

I was also communicating regularly with external studios such as Disney (story, voice over), Pixar (license restrictions) or the translating and QA teams around the world.

Right after the game was released, I took the lead designer role on Cars' updates and have been working closely with the marketing and data science teams to determine what new features would benefit the game the most every month, to improve the game's retention and revenue per player.

What I learned:

• How to react to change quickly and efficiently 
• How to solve or defuse growing conflicts within the team or with third parties
• How to improve KPIs month-to-month by designing features & content for updates