Character Design & Animation
Design and animate 2D characters and creatures using Spine, developing their visual personality, movement, behaviours, and animation style to support gameplay and bring the world of Echo Zero to life.
Interactive experiences
A world that moves,
reacts and responds.
Echo Zero — a cooperative sci-fi action game and our third commercial title at Wildboy Studios.
The project
Echo Zero is a cooperative sci-fi action game where players build a base, battle robots and clear slime nests in a hostile alien world.
- Role
- Co-Founder · Senior Designer
- Timeline
- 2023 — Present
- Company
- Wildboy Studios
- Domain
- Video Games
- Platforms
- PC · macOS · Steam
- Website
- Visit Echo Zero
- Steam reviews
- Positive (20 demo reviews)
My responsibilities
Environmental Assets & Props
Design environmental structures, props, and visual assets that help establish the world of Echo Zero, creating elements that support the game’s sci-fi setting, atmosphere, and visual identity.
Interaction & UI Animation
Design UI interactions, transitions, and animations that provide clear feedback to player actions and help communicate changing states, progression, and important gameplay information.
2D VFX Design
Design and animate 2D visual effects for gameplay, characters, abilities, environmental interactions, and feedback moments, helping make actions feel more responsive, readable, and satisfying.
Gameplay preview
Character design & animation
Building personality
through movement.
Characters need to communicate personality and gameplay state through both design and movement. I develop those together, from the first silhouette to the in-game animation.
- 01Design
- 02Rig
- 03Animate
- 04In-game
Zero
Redesigning our
main character.
As Echo Zero evolved, so did Zero. I helped strengthen the silhouette, improve gameplay readability and support a wider range of Wargear and animation. Stronger silhouette. Clearer proportions. More adaptable equipment.
Character animation
Movement defines
how Zero feels.
From a resting pose to a burst of action, each animation helps establish personality, weight and response.
Wargear
One character.
Multiple configurations.
The character needed to stay recognisable across different Wargear, while sharing a flexible rig and animation system. Build one flexible character system that supports multiple visual configurations.
Creature design & animation
Something strange
beneath the surface.
Veltex, Sporecreep and Slime Spider share a hostile ecosystem, but each needs a distinct silhouette and way of moving. I develop the artwork, build a flexible Spine rig and bring each creature to life through animation.
- 01Photoshop layers
- 02Spine import
- 03Bones
- 04Mesh & weights
- 05Constraints
- 06Animation
Veltex
Sporecreep
Slime Spider
Robot design
Machines shaped
by what they do.
A robot’s silhouette and movement should give the player a sense of its role before every mechanic needs explaining. The visual design of each robot reflects the role it performs.
- 01Build / Construct the base
- 02Support / Clear slime nests
- 03Destroy / Detonate on contact
Environmental assets & animation
Machines that
bring the world to life.
From the Bot Builder’s artwork and Spine rig to its in-game movement, animation helps these structures communicate what they do. The Droid Printer and Explosion Droid Maker extend that same visual language across the world.
VFX design & animation
From structure
to destruction.
I design effects that make destruction readable and satisfying. The slime nest moves from static artwork through a Spine rig and destruction animation, before being brought into the game.
Caravan destruction
From illustration
to destruction.
The finished explosion brings the caravan artwork into motion, breaking the structure apart in one clear destruction sequence.
UI & interaction design
Player actions.
Clear responses.
The interface is part of the world around it. It needs to communicate what can be used, what has changed and what the player can do next—even while the game keeps moving.
- 01Player action
- 02Visual feedback
- 03World response
01
Icons that make choices clear.
I helped shape the iconography for Wargear items and power-ups, giving different options a recognisable visual identity. The icons work alongside labels, selection states and feedback to help players understand what they are choosing.
02
Information where players need it.
My work on the player HUD and world interactions focused on clear information, contextual actions and responsive feedback. These details help players understand what they can interact with without losing track of the game around them.
03
Build the next step.
The structure UI brings building and upgrading into one place. I helped organise the choices and their feedback so players can see the available options and decide how to develop their structures.
Digital interactive experiences
Different medium.
Familiar design questions.
Games have taught me to think in connected systems: what someone can interact with, how they recognise it, and how the experience responds.
Whether I’m designing a SaaS workflow or a game system, I’m designing how someone understands, interacts with and receives feedback from a digital product.
Game design Product design
- 01
States
Character states System states
- 02
Feedback
Player feedback User feedback
- 03
Hierarchy
HUD & UI Interface hierarchy
- 04
Flows
Game loops User flows
- 05
Motion
Animation Interaction feedback
- 06
Actions
Abilities User actions
- 07
Progress
Progression User progression
- 08
Systems
Design systems Design systems
Reception
Early players.
Positive reception.
Selected excerpts from Steam demo reviews. The full game is still in development.
Read demo reviews on SteamWhat I learned
Great interactions are felt
before they’re noticed.
A hover state, a burst of VFX or a character reaction might appear for a moment. Together, those details help players understand what is happening and what they can do next.
Everything the player sees is part of the same interactive system. The strongest experiences happen when those pieces work together.
Still learning
An evolving game.
An evolving design.
Echo Zero is still in development. Characters change, animation is refined and interactions evolve through play. Something that works alone can feel different inside the full game—and that is one of the things I enjoy most about working on it.
Each iteration teaches us something new about how Echo Zero should look, move and feel.
- 01Design
- 02Build
- 03Play
- 04Learn
- 05Refine