Elaine Gomez | Game Designer @ Brass Lion Entertainment | Ep 22 - Out of Play Area

Episode Transcript
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John (00:00):
Devs what's really, really good with you all out there.
To the attentive audience.
I may have pulled the Diaz and amreleasing this episode number 22,
1 week later than I previouslywas aiming for for the 22nd.
I apologize, sincerely.
And appreciate you all forunderstanding and not being up in arms.

(00:20):
I've been busy working on some internaldev days, work and presentation.
Plus as of November the 15th, your boyhas leveled up to a level 38 human being.
And, you know, I figured I'djust go ahead and catch up over
the national day of mourning.
I've been busy with interviews.
The Latin X game festival brought meback for their third annual event.

(00:41):
Happened virtually over Twitch.
Did a really awesome interview.
It was pretty candid.
Shout out to Jason Vegafor putting that together.
Before kicking off the episode, Iguess I'll call out a few things.
Elaine Comez is a unicorn.
She's a Puerto Rican,Dominican Latina game designer.
What?

(01:01):
Yes.
You heard it right.
Have you ever worked with one?
Let me know.
That's a rare breed.
I got to connect with her when we didthe game design panel at last year's
the 20, 20 Latin X games festival.
And I'm really a fan of heractivism in the industry.
She goes in and bears all talking about.
All the trials and tribulations, shewent through surviving her childhood.

(01:25):
Getting her master's in game design.
Breaking into the industry and findingher happy place slash probably even
forever place at brass line in attainment.
So we.
Without further to let's start the show.
On episode 22 of the Out ofPlay Area Podcast, we feature

(01:46):
the amazing Elaine Gomez.
She is an award-winning game designercurrently working at brass lion air
attainment with five years of experiencein gameplay and systems design.
She is one of six co-founders of theLatin X in gaming and supports the
organization with game developmentrelated initiatives and resource.

(02:07):
Courses.
Elena's passionate about mentorship andoften lends her design knowledge and
resources to serve young game developers.
Across the globe.
You may know her work fromElan Emedia on beyond the blue.
So.
Please show a warmwelcome for he lane Gomez.

(02:30):
Let's start the show.

Catherine (02:33):
Bienvenido Bienvenue Welcome to the out of play area podcast, a
show by video game devs for game devs,where the guests open up one-on-one
about their journey, their experiences,their views, and their ideas.
No ads, no bullshit.
Join us as we venture far outof the play area with your host
seasoned game designer, John Diaz

Elaine (02:57):
I feel you with a Puerto Rican beer has Melaya
and it doesn't taste the same.
when it's important either.
I don't know what it is.

John (03:04):
save it for when I'm like in New York and they get
the good stuff or I'm in Dr.

Elaine (03:09):
Hell.
Yeah.
When I went to the Dr.
They had precedent at our likeVilla or whatever, like the
fridge was stack, it was so good.
And anytime that we would drinksome, they would just restocking.
So like, all right.
Those free prissy, thenthey all day everyday.

John (03:26):
ah, this is the best that like all included.

Elaine (03:28):
Yes.

John (03:29):
of you never go thirsty.
You never go hungry.

Elaine (03:32):
it was such a fun experience.
It was my first timedoing an all-inclusive,

John (03:36):
which part of the island?

Elaine (03:38):
so we landed in Santo Domingo, but our Villa all-inclusive resort
place was all the way in food.
The Ghana

John (03:45):
Yes.

Elaine (03:46):
we had to drive,
like

John (03:48):
four hours,

Elaine (03:50):
a long time.
my brothers and I were not happy becauseimagine going on an airplane, right.
You go in like five hours orwhatever, And then you get off.
It's like, okay.
Another five hours of transit.
It's like, dad, what did you do?
We got confused with airports.

John (04:05):
And it's not an easy drive.
I'm sure there's some,
off-roading you gotta do.

Elaine (04:09):
Yes.
Oh, the guy was pretty wild.
I've never seen somebodydrive like that in my life.
, John: you're happy that.
The plane lands, everybody claps.
Everybody's excited.
You take the breath of air.
You're like, yes.
All the humidity.
Yep.

John (04:22):
then in the car

Elaine (04:24):
It was like, woo, woo.
And like, I was going speeding.
Then the motorcycles that likedon't follow any type of traffic
laws now was scary.
Like scary stuff happening.
And there's like, no, not evenlike traffic lights or anything.
Everybody's just going and stop in and go.
And it was wild, but it wasnice to see the countryside,
during that, like five hour drive.

(04:46):
So you were able to see the mountainsand it looked like rainforests
and farms and things like that.
So that was really nice.

John (04:52):
just a beautiful nature.

Elaine (04:54):
Yeah.
And then the rest of the timewe were just driving around my
dad booked like a, tour bus.
And then we went to like Santiago,Bonnie, like where my grandmother
grew up, which are like, I wouldn'tsay slums, but it was poor.

John (05:07):
Yeah, villages

Elaine (05:08):
And then they took us like super deep into really poor
neighborhoods where people werelike making homes out of, like, it
looked like mud and brick and stuff.
yes.
And then we went into theboard of it and that was
really

John (05:24):
if you think you seem poverty get to the board of Haiti and that
gives you a whole different perspective

Elaine (05:30):
That was really sad to see all that.
It's like, it breaks your heartbecause you're like, oh shit,
like I'm here for vacation.
I have everything and here they arejust like whatever they have just to
make like a few cents essentially.
So heartbreaking, but I'm glad I saw it.
Cause it makes you humble and makes yousee things a bit different, you know,

John (05:48):
It makes you grateful for everything.
We got everything, everylittle thing, you know?

Elaine (05:53):
Yelp.

John (05:53):
yeah, it's crazy.
Like we don't got to get into it,but the difference it makes of who
colonize you are settled, right?
Like the difference of how France justkind of use the land and the people
versus Spain and how they kind of atleast gave a little bit back to the
country and support it and helped it grow.

Elaine (06:12):
the history impacts a lot of today.
Right?
I had to go to Puerto Rico for a while.
I was there for about six weeks,seven weeks, to be with my mom
and my grandmother, who's growingthrough her Alzheimer's and all that.
my uncle has been doinga lot of, ancestry.com or

John (06:28):
yeah.

Elaine (06:29):
deep.

John (06:30):
all that.

Elaine (06:31):
super deep.
And he has had the opportunity tolike talk to my grandfather because
he's had a lot of one-on-one time

John (06:37):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Taking advantage.

Elaine (06:39):
Like, I didn't know, like my grandfather's family comes from
like my, your Domo's, which are thepeople who like had plantations.
So like, I have no, this like battle in mymind was just like, I know that my dad's
side of the family came from like slavery.
Cause my dad's family'slike black Dominican.
And then you have mymom's side of the family.
Who's like spend your didn'thad plantations and own slaves.

John (07:03):
Uh,

Elaine (07:04):
battle in my head.
And I was like, wow, like I have two sidesof my DNA, which literally we're against
each other and like abuse the other.
And it's just like, I've beenreally thinking about that a lot,
but there's nothing I can do about it.
Right.
It's just the history of the family.

John (07:19):
Just carrying on and passing down the knowledge, right.
Of like experiences and tellingthe stories that it's very
real in the Dominican Republic.
my mom is hardcore fair skin, lightskin hides from the sun does not
let her skin touch the sun at all.
And, she's super old schoolmentality where it's like darker

(07:41):
skinned equals working the land.
Right.
and, means or whatever.

Elaine (07:46):
if you see my mom and my, my aunt, everybody's like super
white, like they're lighter than me.
cause I got little son,

John (07:53):
yeah, you, you come back from Puerto Rico for a good while.

Elaine (07:56):
it's interesting to see like even in, none of my immediate
answer, my mom, but they're cousins.
They have like green eyes and
Hazel eyes.
So that's a recessive gene,definitely in the family.
but then my dad's side is like,Theano and black, like mixed together.
So you could definitely see.
like their whole like featured thefeatures on their face is way different

(08:17):
than like, common Dominicans they use.
Although I have been light-skinnedDominicans, I have mid white Dominicans,

John (08:23):
see.
yeah,

Elaine (08:25):
in Puerto Rico.
The same.
We have Chinese Puerto Rican stew.

John (08:28):
yeah, the islands is so close and yeah, you get everybody, I
don't know how they get there, but
they,

Elaine (08:34):
how they get there either, but
they do and they make it work and theymake ends meet and Hey, they're happy.

John (08:40):
I, always think that life is good.
Right.
But again, when you come fromover here, have pretty good means,
money goes a long way and, havingfamily over there helps for sure.
Right?
Cause then you get put in touch with thelocals and you're usually accepted, right?
Like once you're in there, you're justimmersed in the culture and you want to
learn more and you want to contribute and

(09:00):
talk, the ish, eat the food, danced,
all that.
words per minute speaking,up significantly.
If I've hung out in VR for a bit.

Elaine (09:16):
Different.

John (09:17):
choose to you, Elaine.
Thank you for taking the time.
So I loo,

Elaine (09:21):
that Lou.
You're welcome.
Thanks for having me

John (09:23):
I get to, reminisce on first time I got to meet you
or at least do a joint event.
Thing was for

Elaine (09:30):
Latin

John (09:30):
X Latin X games festival at the end of last year.
If you sound it out and Juan.
So it sounds like I'll, hopefully we'llbe seeing all of them sooner than later.

Elaine (09:41):
Yeah,
hold on.
Just got a job with Microsoft.

John (09:44):
I've been trying to poke him behind the scenes and be like, yo
bro, when are we going to talk?
When are we going to catch up?
And he's like, yo wait,let me get settled.
Let me figure it out over here.
And then I'll come through.
That's

Elaine (09:52):
He's
so sweet.

John (09:54):
Wonderful human being.
Absolutely.
When we last spoke, you were at,which is funny because every time
heard of this place, I could havesworn it was your own company.
it's your name on it?
It's your business.
You
made that thing,

Elaine (10:11):
No, this, this happens to be the money starts with an E it's Eli and media,
but,
they, I found out that they named theElan medium because, the studio was
close to the line, in New York city.
just After that,

John (10:25):
APA.
So that would have been, likeManhattan, and then like up into Queens.

Elaine (10:30):
you're asking the wrong girl

John (10:34):
Oh, well, so let's get into it.
Where's home for you.

Elaine (10:38):
home for me, man.
That's a complicated andloaded question actually,

John (10:42):
Whereas like

Elaine (10:43):
physically

John (10:45):
and like stomping grounds and like hanging out,
games.

Elaine (10:49):
grounds growing up home is New Jersey.
But my heart's on in the island.
Right.
Cause that's like family,

John (10:56):
yeah

Elaine (10:58):
like my heart is in Puerto Rico, my stomping grounds growing up is,
in Puerto Rico.
But I feel like I would love to callCalifornia home, like in the future.
So like my heart's like superdivided into these three locations

John (11:10):
well, this is what you like studied got work.
Made games,

Elaine (11:15):
made friends.
I feel like I came into my ownwhen I moved to California.
Cause like in New Jersey it waslike, I was around my parents and
it was more like, you know, pleasingyour parents, like doing things.
Right.
So you don't get yelled at either.
They mean just being a goodkid or at least trying to be,
and then
just doing what I gotta

John (11:34):
I call it a dodging.
The

Elaine (11:36):
do

John (11:36):
clutter.
Yeah.
this was where

Elaine (11:40):
Yes

John (11:41):
boots yourself.
Bilty lane.

Elaine (11:43):
Yeah.
I went on my self-reflectionlike identity.
Like who am I really?
What do I believe in all that stuff?
went through all of that in California.
So it's a special place for me.

John (11:54):
Hell yeah.
It's a beautiful place too.
I love it.
When east coast has comeout to the west coast, it's
usually a very different world.
It's a different speed.
It's a different way of life.

Elaine (12:03):
it is a different way of life because everything in New
Jersey, New York is like on the run.
Got to go, go, go.
It's
like you go from here to here.
There's no time in the, agendafor you to do anything else.
But do all these things over here.
I feel like people'slifestyle is a bit more lax.

John (12:16):
I imagine it's something to do with the sun and the heat and the ocean.

Elaine (12:20):
Yeah.
Being close by right tothe water and whatnot
maybe.
And also like, you don'tget any season changes here.
Like pretty steady, but back home inNew Jersey, as soon as that fall hits,
winter feels like gray and gloomy.
you're just sad and then pack on weightbecause you just eat because you're sad.
Cause it's ugly outside.
Like that's just how it is.

(12:42):
Right.
And you go through that hibernation period
from like, essentially once Thanksgivingis over, that's pretty much it it's
just green, gloomy and cold allthe way into like sometimes April
and even may still a little cold.
So
for half of the year is like, that.

John (12:59):
yeah, it becomes like playing movie, watching TV show catching up on
time then spring, summer rolls aroundthen you're like, all right, let's go.
Let's do stuff.
I don't want to be on TV.
Anything, anything like this?
So Elaine talked to me aboutbreaking into the industry.
What was that?
Like, what did it take for you to.
I get in and achieve your dreams.

Elaine (13:21):
it doesn't matter whether it's in games or not like whatever you want to do.
persistence is key.
And if you're really passionate aboutsomething and you have your heart
set in it, you have to keep going.
And you have to figure out how to do it.
Like I've had to do that with my own life.
when I decided to go for a master'sin game design and my parents
were like, we can't afford it.

(13:42):
So you need to figure out how you'regoing to pay for it, literally.
but I was determined and I was persistent.
I was like, I'm not going tolet that be an obstacle for me.
And I think that's something as, theLatin X community, you know, like coming
from hardworking families who like reallygave it their all so that we could have
a future and we can have what we have.

(14:03):
I feel like translates so hard intomy passion and drive for everything.
Right?
So like in the same waythat you see people success,

John (14:12):
Hmm.

Elaine (14:13):
get there just by coasting through Some people have just coasted
through, they have connections, they have
the privilege.

John (14:20):
Are

Elaine (14:21):
us,

John (14:22):
Peters?

Elaine (14:23):
Oh, they're good.
Bush bullshitters.
But for us, as people of color,you know, people who were not born
in the United States, people whodon't have money, could literally
build yourself from the ground up.
are your biggest true leader andyou are the reason why you want to
get to wherever you want to get to.
persistence is key.
If there is A will, there is a wayI believe in that 100% I did it.

(14:45):
parents didn't have the moneyto put me through school.
What did I do?
tried to apply to as many scholarshipsand grants and financial aid as I could.

John (14:52):
Yeah,

Elaine (14:52):
I was like, I'm not going to let money, stop me from chasing after a
master's degree because that's, money.
pay it eventually.

John (15:00):
It's an investment.

Elaine (15:01):
Right?
Exactly.
It's an investment in me and my future.
And that's how I did it.
do I have student loans?
Yeah.
Up the ass.
I got a lot of student loans, I can tellyou that if it wasn't for that degree in
the networking and the connections thatI made, wouldn't be where I am right now.

John (15:17):
give it 10 years.
good.

Elaine (15:20):
And it's just a hump.
It's just an obstacle that Ihad to get through in order
to come to the other side.
whether it's like a graphic designer orputting up your own designs, your own
work store, it being a content creatorand putting up your Twitch channel with
like whatever thousands of followers, ifyou want to be a game designer, a game
developer, launch a game, it publishedby a big company, whatever it may be,

(15:40):
whatever your dream is, persistent.
Don't quit.
I needed to work really hard.
I needed to sacrifice a lot to bewhere I am today I'm not here because
am a chosen one or anything like that.
I'm here because I work my ass offI did sacrifice a lot, any y'all
don't, you know, the tears that I shed
the times where I felt lonely andisolated, because studying do my thing,

(16:05):
and everybody else was having fun,relationships like bringing my parents
were like, you need to get married.
to have a kid,

John (16:11):
Any grandkids?

Elaine (16:13):
And I was just like, no my focus is on my career, And now they
look at me and they're like, oh, Elaineand Lena, she has a nice apartment.
She has a good.
salary.
She has a nice car and all this stuff.
I was just like, I wouldn'tbe able to have Any of this.
If I,
had a kid in a

John (16:25):
Yeah.

Elaine (16:26):
years old, you know what I mean?
But I'm happy where I am now.
And you know, when I'm made, I madeit, but I made myself get there.

John (16:33):
yeah.

Elaine (16:34):
myself.
I challenged myself.

John (16:36):
will say that I was trying to hustle to break in, right.
I didn't see anybody aroundme talking about making games.
Everybody that was making games wasJapanese or, blonde hair, blue eyes,
white American, or something like that.
Right.
really wasn't, something that I sawmyself represented in, but I went for it.

(16:56):
Right.
head down, I wanted to do this thing, wentto school and made the damn thing happen.
And I'm super happy.
You're here specifically them Latin X,and gaming for one, To have this space
for all of us, with similar backgrounds ofstories, to, share and help put each other
on encourage one another and network.

(17:18):
Right.
You guys everywhere, right?
There's a Twitch.
There's clubhouse.
There's Twitter spaces.
There's the discord.
There's LinkedIn
events, Have you ever beenasked for design portfolio?
my first time was for thisjob at EA was like, Hey, can
we see a design before that?
I was like, I don't got one of those.
I've been doing this shit for man long.
I don't got no design

Elaine (17:38):
Really, I always get asked to our portfolio
yeah.
Portfolio and in my job hunt, it varied.
Some studios asked for even a design test,
some folks didn't

John (17:51):
common design tests or, you know, string for the resume
or you got referred by somebody.
what do you put in your design portfolio?
Out of curiosity?

Elaine (17:59):
So, because I went to graduate school and had some games, my
portfolio now is a combination of gamesthat I have worked on and published
as well as games that I'mworking on personally,

John (18:12):
what is it?
Is it like videos?
Is it docs?

Elaine (18:15):
So I'm actually thinking about putting ducks.
Cause I think that would be helpful.
but so far what I have are like gifts,
like showing like movement.
I do have some videos and I have art
for some of my games as well.
And then for the games that have released,I just put the link up for if it's on HBO
or if it has like a steam page.

(18:37):
just put the.

John (18:38):
that makes me feel better.
Right.
Cause it's definitely like, here's thegames I worked on and then he has YouTube
videos of like the content or whatever.

Elaine (18:46):
Yeah, I think that's fair.
As long as you are communicatingand showcasing, what you did,
like even game jam games.
I love to do game jams and any game thatI finished, that it has like beginning,
middle end, and it's nice and polished.
I

John (19:03):
So I take it.
There's a few that didn't make it

Elaine (19:05):
Nope.
they're prototypes,

John (19:10):
That's awesome.

Elaine (19:10):
telling people too, that in your portfolio, it's totally cool to also
have a section called prototypes and just
put stuff that you worked on on there.
Cause

John (19:20):
Hell
yeah.

Elaine (19:21):
people to see.
oh, you actually need something small.
And it works.

John (19:26):
That's a good call out, right?
Like, especially for professionals thathave been doing this for awhile, right.
Like depending who you talk to.
Right.
When I talked to people outsideof the game industry, they
will be the first to point out.
Like that looks ugly.
That looks whack.
You know, it doesn't look like, callof duty or last of us or whatever.
I was like, all right.
Non-professional

Elaine (19:43):
who do you think I am?

John (19:47):
Right.
But when

Elaine (19:47):
Yeah.

John (19:48):
they can see the, presentation to see, oh, I see the mechanics here.
I see the systems at work.
did you stand these up?
What did you learn?
What interested you?
Right.
It's all about peaking orscratching at interests you like?
Oh, why did you buildthis fighting mechanism?

(20:08):
Oh, tell me more about yourpassions in combat design.
Right.
And be like, oh, okay, cool.
actually need somebody like you.
Right?
Like, more.
are you today?
You've recently made a jump I'm superinterested to see what you're doing today.
What's your role?
What's the job like how you liking it?

Elaine (20:27):
So I did get a new job, which was really exciting.
Uh, I had been looking fora job for a year and a half,

John (20:34):
That's

Elaine (20:35):
a long time.
Yeah.

John (20:36):
You didn't tell nobody.

Elaine (20:38):
I didn't tell anybody.
and I was kind of just at first it wasjust kind of like, okay, let me just test
the waters to see if I can find something.
I wasn't really like super into it.
I wasn't like, Oh, I need a new job.
I need to get outta here.
But things changed atthe studio that I was at.
And I started to notice things thatI just was not comfortable with.
things that were affecting my mentalhealth and like my personal life.

(21:01):
And that's when I was like, you know what?
I really do need to take this seriously.
to find a new place to be.
at that point it was like a year lookingand not to say that like, studios didn't
want me because I went super far in theinterview process in several studios that
I really, really, liked, but it just like,I guess the timing just wasn't right.
You know, and the door closed and hadto move on, but I'm so glad that that

(21:22):
happened because the company that I'mat now, breast line entertainment.
so new company, they literally juststarted hiring and like opening up
everything like in December of last year.
So they've only been hiring in the pastwhat, like maybe five months or so.
And if I would have gotten a newjob prior to that, I would have
never been able to come to thatstudio because it just didn't exist.

(21:47):
So I feel like the timing was just soright for me to be able to apply the
studio that had literally had just opened.
They had just startedtheir hiring process.
I was within the first like 20people that they hired at the studio.
pretty special.
And, it's special to me becauseout of all the companies that

(22:07):
have been interviewing for.
were the ones who were the most diverse.
And when I say diverse, I mean,it the co-founder and like C level
of the company people of color.
And the CEO is a woman that to me is like,yes, like you, you don't see that often.
Right?
You don't see black, south Asian,brown or even women NC level, a lot

(22:31):
in,
companies.

John (22:32):
Very true.

Elaine (22:33):
I feel super lucky that I'm able to be at a company that is like that.
And because the founding members,like the executive team diverse.
Therefore the whole team isdiverse from all departments.
I would say like white folks are theminority, which is like really uncommon.
Right.
And it feels really good.
It feels really good to be a part ofthat because like, oh, y'all see me.

(22:56):
Y'all get me.
You know what I
mean?
It's, it's a different type of vibe whenyou can talk to folks about like, culture
about like what's going on in the world.
And people get you in the, they understandyou, they don't dismiss you, you know?
Or they don't want to sweep things underthe rug because it's controversial.
Like like they you being boldand like standing up for the
things that you believe in onsocial media or things like that.

(23:18):
So it's important to me as special to me.
And I'm really, really luckythat I was able to, to land
a spot, as a game designer,

John (23:25):
timing is everything it feels like it had to pan out this way, like
was written well in advance for you.
it sounds like a lot of whatyou're talking about to me
feels like New York, right?
It feels like New Yorkcity, big ass melting pot.
you get everything shapes,sizes, colors, creeds,

Elaine (23:42):
Hmm.

John (23:43):
to kind of be yourself, be real,
what's on your mind and peopledon't get easily offended.
Right.

Elaine (23:51):
Ms.
A lot more tougher skin backhome in the east coast, for sure.
But funny you say that because thestudio is based off in New York.
So will be relocating there in a coupleof months and my lease is up here.
So I'm really excited.

John (24:06):
Oh, my goodness.
You're leaving the west coast where you

Elaine (24:08):
I'm leaving the west coast.

John (24:10):
became, Elaine, the adult, the
the game developer
going back,

Elaine (24:15):
Yeah, I'm going back, but I'm so excited because, um, uh, of course I have
friends back in New York and New Jersey.
My family's there.
It's a big, closer to Puerto Rico so I cango fly out a more, probably more often.

John (24:28):
same time zone.

Elaine (24:29):
Yep.
And just like the nightlife and thefood and everything in New York city,
it's just like nothing compares likeLA got nothing on New York city pizza
on any type of food on the bars.
Is this, everything is so much betterin my opinion, in New York city.
So excited to just go backand enjoy all of that.

John (24:49):
You're not going to get any arguments for me.
Like New York, New York can definitelybe expensive for a lot of things,

Elaine (24:55):
Yeah

John (24:56):
I feel like for living, living life, hanging out, drinking, eating,
partying, just the parks, the people,the trains, whatever, whatever to
cabs taxis, that's not as expensiveas you would think, compared to
other places in the country, like

Elaine (25:12):
For sure.

John (25:13):
on the west coast.
For sure.

Elaine (25:14):
Yeah.
cost of living here is insane.
Like what I pay forgroceries here is wild.

John (25:20):
and Kelly gets like the good ass fruits and vegetables,

Elaine (25:24):
real, like, cause there's agriculture here and along the west coast.
So you would think thatproduce and stuff is cheaper.
Um, but I don't know of it's likehow much I'm buying or what not.
my grocery receipts are always super high,but I'm comparing it to New Jersey as well
because new year's is the garden state.
So we do have quite a bit of producer andin Phoenix where I lived for a few years

(25:45):
when I was working at Elan media, thecost of living is also much lower there.
So anything from going to arestaurant to like grocery shopping,
anything was a lot cheaper as well.
So,

John (25:54):
yeah.

Elaine (25:55):
compare and contrast.

John (25:56):
of living is always a big consideration when you're trying
to, make decisions between offers andplaces to work and things like this.
it's really cool with thepandemic that work is a thing

Elaine (26:08):
Yup.

John (26:09):
would have told you, was no way that games companies were
going to let people work from home.
and how

Elaine (26:14):
And now it's like, everybody's like writing on it,
and like nothing.
It's like everybody wants a hybridsituation after the pandemic,
which I think it's great.
Cause I like my own space.
I like being at home and I liked theflexibility, but at the same time I
do miss talking to people and havingmeetings face to face and getting
that like teamwork and comradery thatcomes out of just being around people.

(26:37):
and that's really helpful for game design.
Right?
So like right now, like game designingduring zoom meetings, like that's tough.
It's
not easy.
It's
not easy

John (26:47):
It takes much more effort, more intentional, meetings a lot more.
One-on-ones you know, you can't justkind of read the body language and
like watch people on the screen.
You got to sit there and talk,okay, what happened there?
What are we thinking?
it's a whole different beast.

Elaine (27:03):
Yeah.
And I actually got an opportunity well,I got two offers during my job hunt
one of them, was from EA.
So it was just like,

John (27:12):
ah, my goodness.

Elaine (27:15):
Yes.
I

John (27:16):
So close.

Elaine (27:17):
about it.
Like I spent a whole week, weighingthe pros and cons writing lists.
I talked to my mom and my dad, I talkedto my uncle, I talked to my best friend.
I talked to my partner.
I talked to as many people as

John (27:30):
Yeah

Elaine (27:31):
Like what do you think would be the best decision?
Like if, if it were upto you, what will you do?
And I would ask, but ofcourse I had my and cons list.
But at the end of the day, whenit came to having an opportunity
to be part of diverse team, theywere genuinely interested in me and
helping me get mid-level to senior.

John (27:52):
Hm.
Hm.

Elaine (27:53):
Professional goal right

John (27:54):
Hell yeah.

Elaine (27:55):
move up.
Right.
And, right off the get go, I wastold, Hey, like are like at the end
cusp of made you are about to levelup and like, all you need is just a
little bit more time, a little bitmore mentorship and you can get there.
And, my manager now at Breslin, he's like,I know that we can get you there in like a
year or two, but if you do really, reallygood work, who knows, it could be quicker.

(28:18):
So to me, that's what really,gave me the confidence
of knowing that Breslin was thecompany that I had to pick, because
that was so important to me.
And just didn't offer that to me.
You
know, like the benefits were great.
The salary was great.
actually got lucky cause I was ableto counter, brass line with EA salary.

(28:39):
and I was like, Hey, can youmeet me in the middle here?

John (28:42):
Uh

Elaine (28:42):
Breslin ended up offering me a bit more than he did,

John (28:46):
Came over the
top.
That's how much they wanted

Elaine (28:48):
yeah.
That's how much he wanted me.
So that made me Feel special.

John (28:51):
Yeah.
Feel

Elaine (28:52):
Right.
Yeah, exactly.

John (28:54):
which EA team, what location would it have been?

Elaine (28:58):
I would have gone to the new full circle skate team
out in Vancouver.
Yeah.
But, they would have allowedme to work remotely from LA.

John (29:07):
So that you were going to be making LA money.
Woo as I understand it, LA payis significantly higher than
a lot of the other locations

Elaine (29:17):
because cost of living is so

John (29:18):
it's expensive and those taxes no joke.
And the property
ridiculous.

Elaine (29:24):
and that's why you see the big differences in the salary.
It's literally because youwouldn't be able to survive.

John (29:30):
Yeah.
I got a lot of people that were like,Hey, John, you want to make a move to LA.
We'll make it worth your while.
and it doesn't work out.
Like you can offer mea whole bunch of money.
And it just doesn't equal out for thequality of life that you can have.
And a lot of other places likeSeattle not having a state tax,
a lot of places in Canada, right.
your dollar goes a long way.

(29:52):
see how you could have done it better isto be able to take the two offers, let
the teams know what they're dealing with.
Be, be transparent, behonest, be upfront like, Hey,

Elaine (30:01):
Hm

John (30:01):
I want.
This is what I'm looking for.
This is what I'm weighing between let themmake the call and show you their hand.
Ooh, that was wonderful.

Elaine (30:09):
Hell yeah.
That's exactly what he did.
And I had to give a lot of creditwhere credit's due to Jean Leggett.
Jean was the one who not onlyhelped me with a portfolio

John (30:19):
Yeah.

Elaine (30:20):
but she really coached me when it came to interview time, like me links
and resources to, negotiate salary.
and just to build my confidence.
She's like you are a bad ass bitchand you need people to see that.
Cause you're like hiding that from people.
So I was like, you know whatfine, I'm going to do that.
I'm going to ride that wave, you know,because I have accomplished a lot, though

(30:42):
I'm technically a baby in the industry.
I've only been around for like fiveyears as a game designer or so.

John (30:47):
you're over the hump, right?
Five years is like the drop-off point.

Elaine (30:51):
So she's like, you are bad-ass, you work really hard and you go out
of your way to grow and be better atwhat you do so that people see that.
So, and that's exactly what I did.
last year, in the beginning ofthe pandemic, I was taking courses
like online and getting certifiedon like programming and like user
experience and all this stuff.
And the last thing that I did wasget certified by Abel gamers, for

(31:14):
accessible.

John (31:15):
know that

Elaine (31:16):
And to be honest with you, that changed the course of my job hunt, because
everybody was interested in the factthat I got certified in accessibility
and that I cared about accessibility.
and both EA and brass line told methat that's what set me apart from the
other candidates, nobody had spokenabout accessibility aside from me, and

(31:38):
nobody was as passionate about it as me.
And that
was something that they both really,really valued, and they didn't
have anybody on their teams who wastrying to champion that in any way.
I feel like that was what reallysold me to both EA and brass line
I feel like that's what reallypushed them to extend an offer.

John (31:54):
Basically at the end of the day, it's up to you to sell yourself
it's so great when things come up thatyou're naturally passionate about.
Right.
Cause then that kind of overwhelmsany group of people who are trying to
get to know you and see if you can bea fit when your passions come out, it
becomes overwhelming and contagious.
Right?
So the people that interview generallyleave positively in any kind of go

(32:15):
back, excited to be like, well, youknow, this person, we got to bring
her for the next round or to talk to,the rest of the team to see you know,
they feel the same way kind of thing.

Elaine (32:24):
it was wild and EA because of the circle team is so small, I
believe, the creative director himself,apparently like after I got cleared,
quote unquote HR, like the first
call.

John (32:37):
like the phone screen.

Elaine (32:39):
Apparently she liked me so much that she went to the director
and he was like, okay, I want her toget interviewed for this specific and
this specific thing, which weren'teven things that I applied for.
It was just like, he.
Really I come into the HR recruiter.
Like she sold me really welland he's like, all right, let's
try her out for this and this.
and they loved me, but
I think that my personality helpsa lot because I'm so bubbly.

(33:00):
And, I am very passionate about whatI do and I'm always have a smile
on my face, you know what I mean?
I don't know.
It's, it's like, , just kinda sticks.
Like people remember that when they're inthe call with you when they talk to you.
so I think the whole package ofwho I was as a person and what I
was interested in and all of that,they just really vibed with it.

(33:20):
and I don't know a special to me, right.
Because told early in my career, like whenI was in school that, could not show my
emotions, know, that I had to be carefullike that Latina, fire that you have,
you got to put that down because thatmakes people uncomfortable or that makes
people think that you're not stable enough
to like have conversationsand things like that.

(33:42):
So I always saw my personalityalmost as like a hindrance to me.
Finding jobs and stuff, including like,even my, my resume, in the beginning
I had like pink and all this stuff.
Like I just wanted to be me,

John (33:55):
Oh, that's awesome.

Elaine (33:56):
but I feel like that really hurt me in some ways,
cause I never got callbacks.
Yeah.
And as soon as I started changingmy stuff to be modern, but have,
colors that were bold, not so?
much girly.
That's when things started to change.

John (34:11):
That's a good call out, right?
Cause I would say specificallyfor game designers, resumes
that stand out, catch my eye.
Right.
And those are the ones that I read more,spend, more time kind of going through

Elaine (34:21):
yeah

John (34:22):
know, word template style, but you know, to each their own, if you perceive
it as being very girly, you know, thelittle bit that I've learned and touched
on and I can always learn more is there'sdefinitely these unconscious biases and
people tend to have image in their head ofthe ideal candidate for the role, the type
they're looking for.
Right.
and so yeah, the design of a resume candefinitely, conflict with the image you

(34:46):
have in your head in whatever, crazy way.
Right.
As, as stupid as it is.
so that's interesting.
Cause know, experience sayingthat yo, I had it this way and I
changed it up and it got me results
for

Elaine (34:58):
100%.
just feel like there are moments tolike, be like super girly and then
there are moments to just like, there'llbe laid back, But like, you won't
catch me even when I was in the studiobefore, COVID you catch me like wearing
nice clothes, you know, like I wasn'ttrying to like come in and sweats or
hair not brushed and things like that.
Like I always try to lookfly as much as I could.

John (35:21):
Yeah.

Elaine (35:21):
not for anybody else, but it was for me just

John (35:24):
You feel good

Elaine (35:25):
I value that, You

John (35:26):
Yeah.

Elaine (35:26):
like dressing, nice looking, nice smelling.
Good.
Right.
There's that stigma in the industryor people just don't smell good?

John (35:33):
We don't have the good hygiene.
Yeah,
man.

Elaine (35:35):
that.

John (35:36):
up.
bring your best self tokind of raise your team up.
I'm all about that man.
Like do what makes youfeel good and comfortable?
And at the same time, you know, you candefinitely say that it's like, oh, it's
not about how you look it's about howgood you are at your job or whatever.
But there is a little bitof, if I see a person that.
I respect their fashionsense, look or whatever.

(35:58):
I generally gravitate towardscollaborating with that person or
wanting to work with that personas opposed to, to not right.
Like, again, I'm an animal andmy, my lizard brain, right.
These are just the thingsthat I grew up with.
my family really kind of put alot of value towards looking good

(36:18):
smelling, good dressing, good.
know, speaking well, things like this.
And

Elaine (36:23):
right.

John (36:23):
sticks with you,
for better or for worse.

Elaine (36:27):
Yep.
And my family was the exact sameway just like something that I
rallied because I saw it in my home.
Like saw my mom like that.
I even saw my dad.
my dad is like classy.
you would see them.
Like my dad will observe what mymom wears and he will coordinate his
outfit with hers without telling her

(36:47):
it's so cute.
It's so cute.
But it's like one of those things wherelike he wants to look good for her
and vice versa and it's just so sweet.
I grew up in That So therefore,like I saw that and like, I just
that way and exact same thing.

John (37:04):
I haven't shared it on here yet, but I'll share that my first interviews,
you know, way, 2006, 2007 around there,

Elaine (37:12):
I was still in the high school.

John (37:18):
it's all good.
It's all good.
That, you know, being a senior,you know, comes with a little bit
of age and experience and wisdom.
I haven't seen some things all good.
I totally had slacks, justshoes, a button shirt, and a tie.
And this day, the whole team that Iwork with at midway makes fun of me.
And it was like, yo, John, youstood out like a sore thumb.

(37:38):
We definitely wasn't even going togive you a chance to dress like that.
Like this

Elaine (37:42):
too

John (37:43):
game industry.
they thought I was much olderthan what I was actually.
Right.
So mind you I'm like early twenties,no experience trying to get a job
with these awesome game developers.
And were like, yeah, we told you we'relike 30 something the way you address,

Elaine (37:55):
Oh, Mike.

John (37:56):
damn.
I don't know if it's the case thesedays, but there's a thing, depending
on who you talk to, where it's likedress accordingly to the job role.

Elaine (38:06):
That's true.
I actually, in all the interviewsthat I had prior to COVID and even
during COVID, cause I was on zoomcalls and stuff, think I ever dressed
up like that ever like always hadjeans and like a nice shirt, you know?

John (38:20):
is the industry uniform.
Yeah.
you could still be about it.

Elaine (38:25):
Yes.
Yup.

John (38:27):
a line.
You're a game designer, AB Breslin.
what are you in charge of?
What are you responsible for?
Is it a specific area of the game designor is it like the whole game design?

Elaine (38:37):
let me see if I can walk through, safe spaces with this NDA.
So for sure, I can saythat I'm doing Gameplay.
design.

John (38:46):
Gameplay.
Oh yeah.

Elaine (38:48):
of things that I'm doing that are much player focused.
what is the player goingto do in this area?
What are they going to see?
What can they interact with?
what can't they do?
So I'm trying to answer a lot of thosequestions were specific areas in the game.
and it's interesting becausein the game that we're working
on right now, it's an MMO RPG.

John (39:07):
Oh

Elaine (39:08):
really big.
game yet.
Very, very big.
and working with a team that is fullof veterans like crystal dynamics, EA
BioWare, Ubisoft, like you name it.
And like we have industryveterans who have like 10, 15
years on me and they are smart.
They so much.

(39:30):
And I'm just trying to.
As much of a sponges, I can justlearning from them, just hearing them
speak and analyze things and meetingsand stuff has been really helpful for
me because I come from indie world.
I've worked on indie games formy entire career so far, and
projects are such a smaller scale.

(39:50):
And when I was at the type of gameplaydesign that I was doing was theory.
I don't want to say simplebecause every game can be very
complicated, no matter how,
how simple it may look, but definitelyit didn't have as many moving
parts as what I'm working on now.
So, I feel like it grabs all typesof creative spaces in my brain where

(40:12):
I do need to be very methodological,and like, think of things, very
carefully with understanding what theboundaries are, what, the potential
like case scenarios may be or thingslike that, like at a much more elevated
level than what I used to write.
let's talk about like userexperience, even accessibility,

(40:32):
which is something that I'm veryfortunate to be able to start talking
about with my team, the get go,

John (40:39):
kind of expert.

Elaine (40:40):
phase.
Yeah.
which is really, really great because itmeans that whatever features we decided to
add feel organic because we thought aboutthem in tandem the rest of the gameplay
design waiting, add it an afterthought
understanding what arise fromthat what types of issues are

(41:02):
gonna come about what type of life.
constraints, whether it be technicalconstraints or just production
constraints, of those things.
Like I have to think about all of thatholistically I'm presenting an idea I
have never had to do that It's a lotof work and I feel like it's a lot of
responsibility, I want to make surethat my team knows that invested in this

(41:24):
and I want to make the best decision.
I don't care if it's my design thecreative director design, the artists
design, whoever I don't care as long asit works for what we're trying to do.
it has definitely been challenging.
The gameplay design of it all, literallycoming up with ideas from the ground up

(41:44):
we're building something from nothing.
There's no franchise, it's literallyan original project and the
creative director has the direction.
Right.
And they know perhaps what aresome things that they're really
interested and passionate about,but I need to come up with the Phil.
Like they gave me the start and theend what's everything in between.

(42:07):
I need to fill all of that.
And that can be veryoverwhelming and challenging.

John (42:10):
it's super interesting to hear you talk about going from a smaller team,
smaller scale type of project, to what Iwould say, the extreme opposite and deep,
deep, ocean waters of MMO RPGs, right?
Like even, people who've workedon AAA open-world games, MMOs are,
massive in scale and scope, right.

(42:32):
In the fact that they'realive game has no insight.
Right.
And then you're trying to to the biggestmarket, especially the market, right?
The MMO market there's likethree or four key players that
you want to take slice of.
that's a huge challengeyou guys have ahead of you.
And, I think you're going tolearn so much, Elaine is going to

Elaine (42:51):
Yes.

John (42:52):
who you become in a year from now surrounded by all those veterans,
but also kind of you the space andyou on for your expertise and your
vision, to bring to that to the table.
Right.
I think that's amazing.
That's an amazing, formula forsuccess you have on that team.

Elaine (43:10):
Yes.
Thank you.
And actually everybody's investedlike, not only my manager, that he told
me, like, he's like, I want to haveone-on-one meetings with you biweekly.
let's get you where you wantto be and let's shape you.
Let's figure out what's working.
What's not working what youneed, what are your strengths?
What are your weaknesses?
he saw that I also had a passionfor like other forms of design.

(43:30):
And there are other designerswho have a little bit of
expertise in other design areas.
earlier this week, he was like, Hey lane,I know that you're interested in expanding
your design perspective and sensibilities.
And there's this other designeron the team who wants to mentor.
So you guys go together, like figure outa, like a meeting time so that you all
can learn from each other feels like dope.

(43:52):
So I now have like two mentors,essentially my manager and
another designer who's like tojust taking his time to like,
just talk about stuff with me,
is really, really nice.

John (44:01):
your manager is actually following through on what he told you, right.
That he's very interested ingrooming you and helping you grow
and help you get to the next level.
And he's showing you that by pairingyou with the people that are doing
the things you show an interest in.

Elaine (44:14):
Yeah,

John (44:14):
and I mean, that's, that's just business sense, them being right,
like the better you make your team.
The better your product will beat the end of the day, for sure.
By like fostering your talent.
I love what you said, becauseit's something that took me.
longer to learn the timethat it took you to learn it.
it's that, it's not about ideaor my idea, being the idea.

(44:37):
It's about the best idea to make thebest game that delivers on the vision
and the goal we're trying to hit.
Right.
I think that's so, insightful andahead of the game, a perspective
to have, and to share with everydeveloper out there, right?
Like the beauty of what we do is thatwe bring in a lot of people around the
table and games are really recipe dueto a lot of chefs, there's definitely

(45:01):
people that are so insistent on this is mything, and this is the way it's gotta be.
And why don't you like my thing?
And it, and it's nevermeant to be personal.
Right?
it's

Elaine (45:12):
right.
Okay.

John (45:13):
the best end user experience.

Elaine (45:16):
A hundred percent.
Something that I have learned that Ibring with me from my personal life.
Is that.
it matter where I am, whether, causeI, I used to work retail when I
was younger, or working in like anoffice, like a dental office, being,
like a teaching assistant in college.
And even now in my team at a game studio,The skill sets that have transferred

(45:38):
has always been the people skills.

John (45:40):
soft

Elaine (45:41):
it's always about, can I read somebody I can tell by
somebody's space and the way thatthey're talking, if they're upset,
And it happened to me earlier thisweek with, one of our producers.
she got a little bit frustratedand one of our calls and afterwards
I just messaged her on slack.
And I was like, Hey, Inoticed that you got a little
frustrated, like here for you.
Like, if you want to talk like, and Iwanted to check in on you, you know, and

(46:04):
I'm just a designer, I'm not a producer.
I'm not an a C level person, butI genuinely care about people.
And I think that definitelycomes from my lucky lab.
Like that's 100% Puerto Rican.
Like I just love people.
And I love talking to people andI love getting to know people
and that level of personal, whereit's like, you are my coworker.

(46:25):
You don't have to be my friend,but I see you as a human being.
I see your interests.
I see your dislikes.
I see your vocabulary, yourmannerisms, your experience.
And I want to treat you likeyou would like to be treated
with respect with value.
And I always go beyond justlike, Oh this is my team members.
Like, no, this is John, youknow, like I know who they are.

(46:47):
I know what they like.
I can feel comfortable goingout for a walk with them,
going out to lunch with them.
We can talk about life.
and at lunchtime we don'thave to just talk about work.
We can be like, yeah.
I was watching the show.
Like, I really like it.
Like, do you have anyrecommendations for me?
And I can intern say the same thing.
Like, I feel like that'swhat makes the team.
And when you feel comfortableand you feel valued and you feel

(47:10):
seen you do good work together,
You know what I mean?
Because you know that no matterwhat's going to happen in
the meeting, I got your back.
If somebody doesn't understandwhat you're saying, I could be
like, no, no, you know what?
I think that John's idea is valid,even though it may have X and Y
and Z concerns, we can still tryto weave it in this other way.

(47:31):
Right.
And I could literally collaboratewith you in your ideas because my
ideas on my designs are not anybetter than anybody else on the team.
Like we're literally all in it together.
If any of us were to fall out, forwhatever reason, we would be missing
an integral piece into the project.

(47:52):
And that's why one of the reasonswhy I have a love, hate relationship
with ODOT Kadima, because he's likethat, he's like, nah, I saw me.
This is my game.
I designed it.
I programmed it.
I did everything for it.
Like it was just like, bro, like withoutyour team, your game wouldn't exist.
I couldn't design by myself.
Like my designs are good becausemy team gave me feedback and they

(48:16):
helped me get it to that state.
I learned that from like beinglittle and just like relationships,
friendships, like doing stuff at home.
Like, we were always very communal.
Like my parents are like, we are a group.
this house is not clean if wedon't all pour apart, literally
I was brought up like that.
So my mom wasn't theonly one that cleaned.

(48:36):
It was my mom, my dad, me and my brothers.
Everybody had their, tours andtheir special things that they
needed to do to keep the housestable and clean and beautiful.
Right.
So it's like the same way that Ithink about being on a game team.
Like I do my part and I bring somethingto the table, but it is nothing.
if everybody else doesn'tbring their stuff to the table,

(48:58):
you know what I mean?
And then that way wecomplete the whole pie.
Um

John (49:03):
the weakest link they say.
Right?
Like

Elaine (49:06):
Right, exactly

John (49:07):
These are skills that aren't typically taught in school, right?
You can make the argument that youcan't teach these skills they often
do come from your upbringing, yourexperiences in life, your opportunities
working, other jobs, build these up.
it's a shame too, because aretypically not things that people
write on a resume that you cango, oh, I'm a great people person.

(49:30):
I got the soft skills, right?
Like you don't really get to call it out.
It, it has to kind of come across in yourinterview style or the stories you tell.
And I think this key positions thatare really crucial to have these roles.
So any role that you're a people manager,a producer, I would say, you know, I'm
biased, but I'll say for game designerswho play this critical glue between the

(49:56):
creative division of the game, and, um,being, being that team builder, right.
That, that kind of thecreative contribution from
everybody and everywhere.
Right.
To be like, yo yeah, I, my title wasdesigner, but want to hear your ideas.
I want your feedback.
I

Elaine (50:12):
right?

John (50:13):
to let me know how this is working, ultimately building those bridges
and fostering that, communication.
So everything you've got.
adds on to that package as a designer.

Elaine (50:23):
It's not easy.
. It's not easy being personable andlike putting yourself out there
saying good morning, every, everystandup, you know what I mean?
Like go away, but it'slike, don't talk to me.
Like, I'm just trying tolike get through my day,
But when it becomes habit, thenpeople start remember, oh, and

(50:43):
Lynn didn't say good morning today.
Like, I wonder if she's okay.
Yes.
it has happened before.
one time at work at Elaine, I didn'twear makeup and several people
messaged me on slack and they'relike, bro, are you all right?
I guess something going on.
Yeah.
And I was just like, I just woke up late.
I didn't have time to do my face,

John (51:03):
does it

Elaine (51:03):
it's, nice.
It's nice that people observe you inthe same way that you observe them.
And because you and because youput in that effort, like people
see that and they will reciprocate.
I have never had instance wheresomebody has not reciprocated my
effort into at least just being kind.

John (51:20):
Work tends to be passionate opinionated job that we have

Elaine (51:26):
Yes

John (51:26):
you know, discussions are going to get heated and people are going
to get defensive whenever it's theirbaby or their thing or their idea.
for the most part, you can alwaysfall back to be like, Hey, we like
this because we care about the thing.
It's nothing personal.
curious if you've fallen into anyof these situations, On the job.
Have you had the benefit of workingwith Experienced people, newer people,

(51:50):
temperamental people, what types
of dynamics have you seen?

Elaine (51:54):
I've definitely worked with all of the above.
I
know what it's like to have amanager who was just an asshole

John (52:02):
my goodness.

Elaine (52:03):
wants to throw you under the bus.
He wants to make youfeel like you're nothing.
I've had that happen to me, to thepoint where like I had to go to therapy
because this person had crossed a line.
and you know, as a woman in games, youknow, it gets a little bit, even more
elevated because people, for whateverreason, feel like they are entitled to

(52:23):
speak to me a certain way, know that a guydesigner would not have been spoken to.
Then that way

John (52:29):
meaning like in a, in a talking down type
of thing.

Elaine (52:32):
there, are you talking down type of, we have like, Oh,
you don't know what you're doing.

John (52:35):
Oh

Elaine (52:35):
Um,
something like this, this happenedto me, one of my managers, a studio
that I was at, he straight up toldme if you think that you can design
better than me, you're sadly mistaken.
Even though I was like, bro, likeI have a master's in game design.
I know that I can design betterthan you because I have the
fundamentals that you do not.
But I wasn't, I can't say that to an

(52:57):
executive.
I got fired.

John (52:59):
it sounds like insecurity was coming out.
Like he
felt threatened,

Elaine (53:02):
Oh yeah.

John (53:02):
to kind of say something out of his

Elaine (53:04):
Yup and that's the same manager who like, literally
like destroyed my self esteem.
Like he would ask me, like, where wouldyou want to be in five to 10 years?
You know, very basic

John (53:12):
yeah.

Elaine (53:13):
And I told him, you know, I want to be a creative director.
That's like my goal.
And he literally laughed at me.
He laughed at me and was justlike, you don't have what it takes

John (53:22):
Wow.

Elaine (53:23):
Like, good luck doing that.

John (53:26):
by this time you were like how many years into the job until the industry?

Elaine (53:30):
About two years or so,
would say two, three years.
but this person crossed the line.
they, really, really did.
And they broke me.
It broke my spirit becauseI was so passionate driven.
I've always been that way.
But everything that I would do, he wouldjust criticize and like break down.
He would tell me to rewrite stuff.
There was a time where he got so madat me, cause I didn't do things to

(53:52):
the T that he wanted me to do it.
And he literally me to his office,locked the door behind me and
was just laying it out on me.
Like, what I'm telling you, this person'sveins were popping out of his neck and
his forehead and he's red in the face.
incompetent, incoherent.
don't know what you're doing.

(54:13):
The only reason you havethis job is because of me.
as easily as I brought youin, I can take you out.
if you think you're going to beanybody at the studio will think again,

John (54:23):
that is not okay.

Elaine (54:25):
I was not okay.
And I got worst job because afterhe yelled at me like that and I was
like, teary-eyed imagine somebody

John (54:32):
a frustration to, I

Elaine (54:33):
Yes.

John (54:34):
anger,

Elaine (54:35):
And it

John (54:35):
uppercut to dude

Elaine (54:36):
yeah.
And it was like, I felt like it wasso unnecessary and so unprofessional.
and especially because heclosed the door behind him.
Right.
So nobody could hear.
my eyes started watering because hellowas like 10:00 AM in the morning.

John (54:48):
just starting your day

Elaine (54:49):
in and design meeting right after that talk.
And I kid you not, when he saw me gettingwatery eyed, after he was done yelling
at me, like screaming, yelling at me,
John he's like, and I'm telling youall these things because I love you.
And I was just like,

John (55:05):
Wow.

Elaine (55:06):
mother was like, oh yeah.
But then a lot of thingsstarted making sense because
my guy had like, been asking melike, shit about my relationships.
Like, why are you dating this guy?
Like you deserve better than that.
And like
they started making sense,started piecing together.
I was like, bro, you'relike, you're married.

(55:26):
You have a child.
Like, y'all all this stuff.
Like, this is so bad.

John (55:30):
appropriate.

Elaine (55:30):
And it took me six months because I was so scared.
I was scared to lose my job and I couldn'tlose my job because I needed the income.
But it took me six months to like musterup the courage and be like, all right, now
I'm going to go to my creative director.
I'm going to go into my producerand I'm going to tell him what
happened because I don't feel safe.
I don't feel safe here with this person
working with this guy.

John (55:52):
tough it out, man.

Elaine (55:53):
Yup.
I would literally drive to.
Crying.
I was just like, I don't want to be here.
I don't want to be here.
And I'll be just like crying on myway to work and just like picking
myself up tickets, deep breathand walking through that door.
This was pre COVID.
Right.
But it was so
so hard.
And anytime this person talkeddown to me in meetings with other
people, nobody would say anything.

(56:14):
Everybody was stay quiet.
Even when our producer was like a woman,like she didn't even say anything.
And I was just like, nobodyloves stand out for me
to this dude.
Yeah.
and wasn't only that finally,when I was able to speak up and
talk about it with my directorand stuff, they moved me from him.
So he no longer was my manager.
The CEO became my manager.

(56:35):
So things became alittle bit better for me.

John (56:37):
As a result of you speaking up.

Elaine (56:39):
Yes.
But even then I had a one-on-one withthe CEO and he like snickered him.
And he's like, I'm not gonna fire him.
Like, he's a, C-level like, he's beenat this company for X amount of time.
Like I'm not going to fire him.
and I was like, all right, well,he's going to keep treating people
like this because no boundaries havebeen placed and he hasn't been spoken
to or whatever, but not my problem.
They moved me to somebody else.

(57:00):
But then again, they hired a newperson that treated me the exact same.

John (57:04):
it could be your manager,

Elaine (57:06):
Yeah.
A new manager, a new manager guy.
And he would like talkdown to me in meetings.
be like, well, what doyou want this to be?
You want this to continuethe same that it was.
Is that what you want?
Like you would talk to me like that.
And again, nobody was sayinganything and the another woman in
the room wouldn't say anything.
So at that point I waslike, you know what?
I can't be here anymore.

John (57:27):
Yeah,

Elaine (57:27):
of there.
but it was, I was reallysuffering in silence.

John (57:31):
that's insane.
Like, I mean, that's a long timeand what's easily apparent just from
your stories is it's ingrained inthe culture, in the people that they
hire in the way that things are.
Okay.
And let's slip under the rug and theseare places that I don't know how they
survive, I don't know how they succeedand how they continue to bring people on.

(57:53):
Right.
Like, I, I feel like

Elaine (57:54):
Nope.

John (57:54):
types of places, all the types of places that.
talent and just kind of keep the peoplethat can't get work other places.

Elaine (58:01):
That's exactly what happened because within the span of like a year,
half of the studio's gone, cause whowants to be treated like that and go
into an environment that's so hostileand tense, it's not fun to work anymore.
It's like, you were literally tryingto survive until you clock out.
And it's just like, I don't want it.

(58:22):
it's so heartbreaking becauseit didn't have to be that way.
know what I mean?
If you were just to correct people'sbehavior, everything would work
out and it would be fun, but it'sthe lack of initiative correct
people and to make things right.
to make sure that your, team feelsvalued and they feel respected, you
know, and that they have what they need.

(58:43):
Um

John (58:43):
take much it's one of those things where it just takes one
person to stand up and speak up
all it is.
Right.
That goes back to an ally for ourteammates for one another, cause
odds are, everybody has that little,little pinch in their chest or kind
of behind the neck, you know, like,oh, you know, I wouldn't like that.

(59:04):
If it was me and that's kind ofthe fucking cue stand up and say
something In, the moment, properly,respectfully as possible, right?
Like it doesn't have to be anythingother than like, that's not okay.
Or, Hey guys, let's take a break.
Right?
Like,

Elaine (59:19):
Right

John (59:19):
person, that's flipping out screaming, being disrespectful.
You need to take a break, step outside.
And, and that's not going to feelgood and it might fuel the fire, but
I bet you, after a couple of timessomebody is going to get it right.
It's going to sink in and be like, damnman, I'm missing out on a lot of key
discussions or meetings that peopledon't want to talk to me or people
don't want to bring me any of the ideas.

(59:40):
I'm saying this shit all idealistically,

Elaine (59:43):
Yeah.

John (59:43):
know for a fact, his dumb hardheaded motherfuckers that that are
like, oh yeah, this is the way it is.
And I'm always right.

Elaine (59:50):
there are dudes like that and they will not change.
And I'm not here to change people
what to do, like, you going torespect me or we're going to see
what happens because I'm not goingto be nobody's doormat either.
that's not why I'm working.
I'm why I'm here.
had to have one-on-one conversationswith dudes, where I was like,
Hey, like you talk down to me.

(01:00:11):
And that made me upset.
that was disrespectful.
And I would appreciate ifyou doing do that again.
I don't talk to you like that.
we're a team we're supposed tolike build each other up, not
treat each other like this.

John (01:00:22):
does that land?
How does it help
that

Elaine (01:00:24):
for

John (01:00:24):
give, receive

Elaine (01:00:25):
part, everybody's like, oh, I'm so sorry.
And like I had no idea that youtook it that way or, like my bad,
like I'm just really frustrated.
And I took it out on you.
My apologies.
It's like, take your shit out on me.
Like, I'm not your mama.
Like,
I'm your coworker.
But when I became friends withsome of the, my coworkers, like I
would be honest, like 100, I waslike, You need to fix your shit.

(01:00:49):
And I would say things like, andyou know, you question why you're
not in a relationship, whitegirls don't want to talk to you.
It's because you like this.
Why would anybody wantto be with somebody?
Who's constantly putting people down.
Who's constantly negative.
Seeing the bad in everything.
Like literally like take alook at yourself in the mirror
and be like, what about me?
Isn't that is not attractiveto other people on them.

(01:01:11):
Maybe you could find agirl and it'd be like that.
I was like that personal it'slike blunt in like, sure.
Sometimes I may have offended people, butthey always are like, you know what lane?
I was rough.
If he were in as much tough love asyou gave me, like you were right.
And nobody has spokento me like that before.
Nobody has me that before.
And I was like, Yeah.
because I legit care about you.

(01:01:32):
And when you care about somebody,it's a friend, coworker,
whatever, want the best for them.
Like, I don't want harm to come to mycoworkers, anybody that I care about,
I'm going to challenge you to be better.
If I see something that's not right,

John (01:01:45):
Yeah.

Elaine (01:01:45):
or that I know that you can get better at because it's, it's achievable.
It's not impossible.
impossible to be.
Kind to people or respectful, like, Yeah.
like you said, it's like, somepeople are just born that way.
They have the ability to justread people and they can read the
room and they know what to say.
And you know, there are people,persons, some people are not like that,

(01:02:08):
but you can be like, you know what?
You need to understandpeople's body language.
Like was their face?
How are they expressing themselves withthe vocabulary that they're using and
use that in order to to them, like learn.
Communicate, like that's suchan important, like it's a key
to anything like for our work,
for our relationships, our personallife, I don't care what it is.

(01:02:31):
Like communication is key.
you cannot express yourself, you don'tknow how identify, how you feel so
that you can tell the other personwhat's up, then, you know, take time
to do that because it's so important.
And it really changes.
Everything in your life.

John (01:02:48):
Yes

Elaine (01:02:48):
does when people know exactly what it is that you have on your mind.
You're like, all right.
You know, even if you need to takea day, you need to take a week, do
whatever you need to do, but communicatewith whatever you need to communicate.
And that's helped me a lot.
And I learned that very hard way,you know, waiting six months to
communicate that I felt trapped.

(01:03:09):
Yeah.

John (01:03:10):
long.

Elaine (01:03:11):
Or like being in a relationship for six months, six years, even
though I knew that it was toxic
because I didn't want to let themgo and I didn't want to be alone.
And I couldn't communicate the factthat I was hurt and needed to bounce.
Like all of that is all interconnected.
Like who we come at, the game studio,who we bring is the exact same people

(01:03:31):
that, who we are in, like in our houses.
Right.
Like I'm not going toface that, but that's just
me.
Right?
Like I'm not in certain type of waywith like my friends and my family.
And then all of a suddenI'm a different Elaine.
When I come into my studio, like,I'm the same person, but the emotions
and the things that I, have going on,sometimes in my life, I bring that into

(01:03:53):
the studio because I cannot set up.
That.
Right.
So if I am sad because my grandmotheris dying, like I'm going to try
my best to put a smile on myface, but that means some days
I'm just going to be a little up.
I gotta, you know what I mean?
Like not going to be smileyand like everything side, like
I'm going to be sadly, but atleast if people can read that

(01:04:13):
and can be like, yo Elaine shouldwe have a meeting right now?
Like, are you good?
Like, do you need some time?
Do you need to take the dayoff, feel free to do that.
When people see you and like, andyou can communicate that, like, it
just makes your life so much easier.
really really does.
And like, I, I drove it.
I live a drama free life
and I am so, so happy for that.
But it's because I have learnedto communicate and identify are

(01:04:36):
things that are not good for me.
And you know, what are thingsthat might bear me down?
Like this person, maybe I love them somuch that they bring too much drama.
So like I created a little
And then I'll be like, you know, I loveyou and I care about you, but like, don't
dump your problems on me because thathurts me solely, you know, stay away.
But that's, it's hard and it takes alot of growing up be able to do that.

(01:04:58):
And not everybody can dothat, you have people like me.
be your friend and I can help.
You I
mean

John (01:05:04):
to help everybody.
I, yeah, it's it's you seemlike a wonderful person to
have on the team for sure.
And,
this for sure.
People that might take advantage ofit or might cross the boundary reason.
It

Elaine (01:05:15):
100 Yeah

John (01:05:16):
gotten to the point now where you can spot that, recognize it and establish
those boundaries and reaffirm to be like,Hey, thank we thou have a conversation.
not again, kind of situation.
I've worked with a bunch of peoplein executive roles that are the
best at reading people, but whatthey are good at is questions.
and so that, that kinda makes up fortheir lack of being able to read faces

(01:05:40):
or catch tone or assess body language,Is to just be like, does this make sense?
How did that feel?
Hey, I'm not sure I'm unsure of howthat landed, how that came across.
Please let me know kind of thing.
Right?
So if you fall into that categoryof like, I don't really know how
to read body language of people,you know, then be more inquisitive.

(01:06:02):
Right?
Take a pause and ask going on in the room.
What's going on with people.
I love that.
I love, especially on zoom,you know, when it's silent.

Elaine (01:06:12):
Yes.

John (01:06:12):
saying anything.
Ask, ask, right?
Like, Hey person in the top left corner ofthe screen, what do you think about this?
Right?
Or like, this make sense?
I'm talking too much right now.
that's all it is.
Right?
Like you, you, you don't have tobe skilled or strong to questions,

Elaine (01:06:31):
Right.
And even, if you feel freeto ask questions, right.
Like
yeah.
Which happens.
we live in an age where there's so muchinformation on the internet I'm sure you
can go to YouTube right now and be like,top tips for like conflict resolution.
Right.
And you can watch a video.
I'm like, what are thethings that you should do?

(01:06:51):
If you see somebody like arguingin your, in your meeting you want
to, help dissing, diffuse thesituation, you know what I mean?
even if it's like, you know, there'slike me and like somebody has harassed
you or like, you really feel trapped.
Like there, I know there's informationout there on like what to do.
Who can you go to?

(01:07:11):
what is the process?
Even if it's legal, what isthe process that you need to go
through in order make sure thatyou get justice for what happened?
there's a lot of information out there.
So even if you're afraid and youdon't know what to ask, look it
up and inform yourself, educateyourself because knowledge is power.
And even if you can't put it intopractice, never know if there's

(01:07:31):
somebody in your life who's going toneed those skills or that knowledge.
And you can share it

John (01:07:37):
on the job, right?
Like you hopefully have access to HRthat you can approach with whatever's
going on professionally at the office.
know, if your manager's not aresource you can go to, or your
manager's manager, there's usually HR.
And like you said, right?
Like if, if you don't have friendsand the culture is overwhelmingly in

(01:08:00):
a direction that is making you worseat your job, less bubbly than you
naturally normally are in your day today, then reach out to us because both
of our teams are always hiring sure.
You've done so much in what I, I thinkis, like you said, your mid-level
five years, I think you got so muchahead of you up so many big things,

(01:08:25):
but you've already accomplisheda ton of things in particular.
I'm super excited for what you have helpedto create in Latin X in gaming, because
this was a big void that existed when I

Elaine (01:08:42):
Sure.

John (01:08:42):
up and coming in the industry.
And there is now a space for us.

Elaine (01:08:47):
Yeah.

John (01:08:48):
tell me more about how this came to be and your involvement in it.

Elaine (01:08:52):
to be honest, I always give credit to Christina Maya.
She sees our president and the one whoreally did her homework, to be honest
and try to reach out to people like me.
And she's like, Hey, identifiedyou as somebody who like, is really
passionate about the community,do you want to start something?
and it literally was justa simple meeting between a few
people, like a handful of people.

(01:09:14):
And we're like, what can wedo to help our community?
Because there is nothing out thereand we want to have something, even
if that means we need to do it.
Cause it's going to be work.
It's like realizing, okay,like we need a time though.
We need perhaps to put in our ownmoney to create some things are
we willing to make that sacrifice?

(01:09:34):
but I said, yes.
and it happened at GDC, the gamedevelopers conference in 2017.
That's where I met Christina.
And at the time she was working at Twitch,so she invited me to Twitch and like I
had food there and the office was insane.
Like they have like snacks
and like containers
Yes.
In San Francisco.
It was so
cool.

(01:09:54):
Yes.
So it was so cool.
And it was just nice to talk toher about, you know, her passion,
her desires and what she wanted.
used to be called Lennox in game.
and I was like, you know what,whatever you need, I'm here.
Like I just want to help.
in whatever way I can be useful.
Like just let me know.
and I became a staff of Latin X and games.

(01:10:14):
That's started morphing into Latin X andgaming, which is the name that we adopted.
we like rebranded.
we got a website andlike All that cool stuff.
And then we started not onlymeeting once a year at GDC.
Cause that's really where it started.
It was the Lennox and games, IGD chapter.
how we started.
so it was like, we were a SIG in IGA.

(01:10:36):
and we decided that we could do a littlebit more by just becoming a nonprofit.
Right.
that way it's easier for companies tosponsor financially when it's a nonprofit,
for tax reasons, this looks good.
for them or whatever.
Right.
so that's what we decided to do.
So it took a few years to get there.
Right.
So we were working really hard to try tobe part of conferences and conventions

(01:10:58):
and things like that, but we realizedthat we could do a lot more if we just had
a community online, because the realitywas that there's people all over the
world who just can not attend conferencesand conventions in the United States.
You know, like it's afinancial feat, right?
Imagine like an indie team fromlike Columbia trying to come to GDC.

(01:11:19):
And like we're talking about thousands,thousands, thousands of dollars.
So, if we can figure out how to createa hub online, where any developers or
industry professionals from around LatinoAmerica or the Caribbean can be a part
of where they can, post their games,post their projects, their streams,
whatever it may be maybe that would bebetter, So we decided to do that and we

(01:11:44):
put up a discord and the really, afterwe put up a discord, we like a celery.
We like boomed.
We got partnered on this chord,like overnight, almost because
Christina ended up working ondiscord within that timeframe.
we got there.
because she worked at Twitch,like she had connections to get
us partnered for Twitch as well.
So we just started getting like allthese, essentially little checkmarks right

(01:12:08):
in different social medias.
And then really wasn't until weput up only those online last year,
which was our Hispanic heritage month
on Twitch.
Yes.
It really wasn't until then thatpeople us and they were like,
wow, like who's Lennox and gamey.
And they seem like they're popping.
They seem like they're doing

John (01:12:26):
Yup.
Yup

Elaine (01:12:28):
uh, we started to getting, seen by a lot of more
studios, a lot of more people.
started getting a lot more love,with a lot of love also came
a little bit of hate, right?
the trolls who are like.
Latin X is in a word
LA,

John (01:12:41):
Yup.
trying to be inclusive, man.
I saw

Elaine (01:12:44):
exactly.
So we're still dealing with That Right.
But think when he goes onlinereally was a game changer for us.
And then when, like the articles startedpublished and the award started coming in
the game awards reached out to Christy andthey're like, Hey, we want to do a piece.
We want to
award
you.

John (01:13:02):
was awesome.
cannot tell you, I think by thenI had already done panel with
you and I love the game awards.
I love what it's become, it ends up beinga lot of announcements and trailers and
sneak peaks,
but still, I love seeing thehomeys on there and seeing
you guys get featured amazing.
It was amazing.

(01:13:22):
Amazing, amazing.
It was so

Elaine (01:13:24):
Thank you

John (01:13:25):
guys recognize on that stage people know, because again, I, I don't know.
I don't even rememberhow I found out about it.
, both so happy that I did.
And I think it was through thediscord and it was completely like,
oh my God, where has this been?
career.
Right.
I'm so happy.
I found it.

Elaine (01:13:41):
you know, a lot of people tell us that same thing.
They're like, I'm so happythat we have familiar now.
Like
we, I didn't know that y'all existed.
I'm so happy that you do.
and that makes us feel specialbecause with any organization, any
group that you try to build, when youstart it, it's really hard you get
really discouraged.
Yeah.

(01:14:01):
You get really discouraged becausein the beginning you're like, you
know, we're putting all this effortand energy, where is everybody?
Like, why aren't people turning up?
Why aren't people supporting
us

John (01:14:10):
food.
I got games.
Where is everybody

Elaine (01:14:13):
Exactly.
And, it wasn't until we startedgetting awards and accolades
that people to take notice.
And when, I mean people, Imean like studios and company,

John (01:14:23):
Sure, sure.

Elaine (01:14:24):
you know

John (01:14:24):
can get their brand on, get
money

Elaine (01:14:27):
that we would have, we reached out prior and didn't give us a time of day.
And then all of a sudden they'relike, Hey guys, they were like, okay,

John (01:14:34):
Well,

Elaine (01:14:35):
gladly like with you, but in the inside, it's just like, you
know, it's a little bit hurtful
that we

John (01:14:41):
say I wanted to say in seeing representations, making people
aware of who's in the space, doingthe job, they want to do that.
It can look like you, me, itcan be from any it's much more
open and much more accessible.
I can count on one hand thenumber of, non male designers
that I've worked with and I can.

(01:15:03):
Recall a Hispanic womandesigner that I've worked with.
it doesn't exist.
I would have thought before Imet you, that it didn't exist.
it's so awesome that theunicorn has been caught.
And as a result of that, I've gotten tomeet so many more, right through Latin
X and gaming through your connections.
And I want to call this out because Ihave a lot of nieces and nephews out there

(01:15:26):
I want them to see you know, they're,they're half Boriqua, half Dominican
or my sister-in-law's Puerto Rican.
Uh, shout out to Giana, out ifthis is something they want to do,
that you have someone living proofembodiments of coming from similar
upbringings to be like, Hey, this isa viable and lucrative career path.

(01:15:48):
a good living out of it,but they got to hustle.
It's not going to be easy.

Elaine (01:15:51):
Yeah.
It's

John (01:15:52):
to

Elaine (01:15:52):
and that's like anything in life, right?
Like I always, I tell people my story,which is when I was getting ready for
college games, wasn't even in my radar.

John (01:16:02):
wow.

Elaine (01:16:03):
Nope.
This came to
be when I was about 23 years old.
I was a junior in college and I had todecide what major TIFF officially declare,

John (01:16:11):
You were undeclared.

Elaine (01:16:12):
the reason why I was on declared was because even though I wanted to
pursue biomedical engineering and pre-medlike, I had my eyes and my heart set on
that when I started college, I didn'tget into school of engineering because
my sat math scores were not high enough.
so what I did instead was I went tocollege undeclared and prepping for a

(01:16:33):
transfer to the school of engineering.
So I started to take all ofthose pre-recs that you needed.
but in doing all of that, that'swhen I decided I was like, I
am, do not want to be a doctor.
is not for me.
And I had to have thatbig conversation with my
which was

John (01:16:49):
and biology and

Elaine (01:16:50):
it was the, the, upper level math.
So after calculus two, it was like, uh,

John (01:16:56):
Hey, but that's so much in games, man.
There's a lot of trig vector math and

Elaine (01:17:01):
yeah, when you're a programmer, I don't

John (01:17:04):
through

Elaine (01:17:04):
any of that.
Yeah.
I mean, it's helpful to understandcertain things, but never have, I once
had to do any type of trade or calculus.

John (01:17:14):
I'm in there right now, girl, like when we, when, before we got
linked up, my head was like in somenasty rotation and why isn't the
guy looking at the guy , you know?
And so super happy that itwas like, yo podcast time.
I'm a log off.
I'm a sign off.
I'm gonna get a beer.
we're going to de-stress unwind.

(01:17:35):
And I'll come back to itwith a clear head tomorrow
and maybe reach out to someprogrammer buddies, right.
To be like, yo, what the fuck isup with this factor right here?

Elaine (01:17:44):
that's, what's great about game development is like, when you
have a weakness, there's somebodywho always has this strength
or her strength.
So you can just go to them.
They're the expert
and they can help you out.

John (01:17:54):
Ask for help.
Quick, fast.
Right.
And we
what is it called?
I don't know.
I always change the numberevery time I say it, but it's
like a 10 minute rule, right?
Like it's taking you longer than 10minutes to figure out a plan or a
strategy and you honestly read andtry to brush up on and, and Google
some things in verse yourself.
If it's going to save you anhour it's going to take someone

(01:18:14):
else 10 minutes, go over and

Elaine (01:18:16):
Yep

John (01:18:17):
for help.
Yeah.

Elaine (01:18:18):
I learned to do that the hard way as well.

John (01:18:21):
You seem so.

Elaine (01:18:22):
I'm a strong, independent
woman.
I can figure this outmyself and that's Lena.
I don't, I can't do this.

John (01:18:27):
Where does that come from out of curiosity, right?
Dislike headstrong.
Like, I don't need no help.
I could do it on myself kind of thing.

Elaine (01:18:35):
that came from when I was little.
So when I was three yearsold, I contracted some
bacterial infection something.
I don't know.
They never found out.

John (01:18:48):
I life

Elaine (01:18:49):
Yes.
So what it ended up happening was that Iwent into like septic shock, which means
all my organs started shutting down.
this is all secondhand informationthat my parents have given me.
Cause I

John (01:19:00):
Yeah

Elaine (01:19:00):
I don't really remember what happened, but my mom was like, Yeah.
you were, your fever would,go up to like 105, 106.
And when we brought you to the hospital,like they had to dunk you in ice and water
to bring your temperature down becauseyou were not responding to medication,
you were not responding to anything.
they had to put me on abreathing machine and everything.

(01:19:20):
I couldn't breathe on my own.
I couldn't eat.
and this all happened.
I was three years old.
So, what ended up happening wasthat this bacteria, whatever it
was, it started creating, sepsis in,my hands and my feet, which means.
not only that it was, it wassepsis six anchoring gangrene.

John (01:19:36):
Oh yeah.

Elaine (01:19:37):
So all the oxygen supply to like my hands and my feet were getting cut off.
The blood circulation was not flowing.
Therefore started developing gangrene,which is the death of tissue.
Right.
was that I got gangreneto my elbows and my knees.
the doctors are ready.
I literally amputate my arms and my legs.

John (01:19:58):
You going to make games that are your arms.

Elaine (01:19:59):
seriously.
Right.
apparently this is like a really mutated,very rare bacteria, they sent my blood
and like tissue cultures to the besthospital in the world, which at the time
in Atlanta, Atlanta children's hospital.
And they did tests over there.
and they couldn't figureout what the hell is.
essentially the doctors toldmy parents to brace themselves.

(01:20:20):
They're like, she's going to die.
Get ready for her funeral, figureout what you're going to do.
all we can do is just waitbecause are not working.
no treatments are working for her.
And my parents are like, allright, well, all we can do is pray.
So that's what they did.
They were just praying.
And one of the doctorshad this brilliant idea.
He's like, listen, I've been taking thesenew courses at medical school, where

(01:20:43):
they're indigenous, oils that they areworking on just indigenous medicine.
And they're like, let's try.
I'm not going to guarantee.
I have no idea that it's going to doanything, but let's try it to see if we
can improve blood circulation so that wecan minimize amputating her arms and legs.
And maybe we can amputate less.
So they did that for a little while.

(01:21:04):
And then my mom and the nurses literallywould run these like indigenous,
like oil mixes with herbs and stuff

John (01:21:10):
you gotta be some CPD in there.
I'm

Elaine (01:21:12):
E I'm.
Sure.
I was like arms and legsand it was constant.
But with that came also scrapingthe dead skin off because gangrene
it dries everything up at Tribbles.
Right.
So if you're trying to improve bloodcirculation, y'all also have to
remove whatever dead skin is coming.
And apparently my mom told methat that was very painful for me.

(01:21:32):
And I would cry and the nurse, the
nurses would not touch me.
They didn't want to see me crying in pain.
So my mom not being a nurse oranything like that, she would
be scrubbing it in like to thepoint where I would bleed right.
To remove all this stuff.
Long story short.
the oils, indigenousoil concoctions worked

(01:21:53):
the prayers and they only have toamputate like the very tips of my
fingers and some of my toes of like myfull arm, like half arm and a half leg.
So since that, right, I had to gothrough physical therapy and all this
other stuff, but I have amputations.
Right.
And one of the things I'm a pediatriciansold, my mom was like, do you

(01:22:15):
think that Elaine's handicapped?
And my mom said, no, like,Elaine would only be handicapped
independent if you make her that way.
So allow her to learn how to tie hershoes, to button up her shirts, how to
read, how to write, allow her to do thaton her own so that she can be independent.
That's where the independent came from.

(01:22:36):
Because my parents, my parents,literally would allow me to struggle
and cry it was hard for me to dosome things with my amputations.

John (01:22:45):
Yeah.
Uh, specifically at three years young.

Elaine (01:22:48):
Yep.
I had to grow up and mature a lotquicker than, somebody, my age would,
you know what I mean And I'mthe oldest of my siblings, app.
So

John (01:22:57):
weren't easy on you.

Elaine (01:22:58):
Oh, Yeah,
One, 100%.
But that in the sense of independencecame from that, because my parents
fostered that from me from an early age,
because they were like, even thoughyou have been through this, even
though you are different than everybodyelse, you are capable of doing
everything that everybody else can.

(01:23:19):
And that, that was it.
So I've always

John (01:23:22):
yeah,

Elaine (01:23:23):
a go getter and always been super independent.
And I can do things on my ownbecause since I was little,
that's my parents taught mefrom going through all of that.

John (01:23:31):
It makes all the sense in the world.
Thank you so much forbravely sharing that story.

Elaine (01:23:38):
No worries.

John (01:23:39):
Like how you.
Exists six months plus in a shittywork environment without telling
anybody or whatever, then lookingfor work for a year, trying to
leave this shitty workplace and

Elaine (01:23:54):
Yep.

John (01:23:55):
for the put on for the referral, for the resume review, for the mentoring, for

Elaine (01:24:00):
Yep.
Exactly.

John (01:24:01):
makes sense.
respect you.
I have a lot of family membersthat you remind me of, glad that
you have learned a little bit
to invite, go, to, to ask people
helping hand, right?
Like I love to see the growth,

Elaine (01:24:20):
I definitely, I can say that during the pandemic,
I have experienced the mostself-growth of my life.
And it's not because necessarily becauseof the isolation or the fact that, um,
you know, like we're all stuck athome and I can't do anything else.
It's not so much that isalso that I wanted to do it.

(01:24:40):
Like I self reflected on me and I waslike, what are the things in my life?
Or personality traits that Ihave that I don't really like.

John (01:24:50):
um,

Elaine (01:24:50):
and how can I improve on those things?
So one of them was letting go andlike getting help and asking people,
questions, not being as blunt as Iused to be, because I was like, not
afraid of hurting people's feelings.
let me, I was
like, let me, tell you somethingstraight and you better listen to me.
I don't care how you take it.

(01:25:10):
Like, I love you.
And I care about you andThat's why I'm saying this.
And I would just lay people out, you know?
But at that end, yes.
But what I ended up doingwas like, you can push people
away I tried to control that.
I tried to control my frustration, likewhen I'm going through something at
work or whatever, it may be not takingthat out on my partner because I can

(01:25:30):
explode and it'd be like, let me tell you
something.
That's very Puerto Rican of me, but I'vebeen trying to correct that and be like,
you know what, let me take a breather.
I don't want to talk right now.
Can we talk in like 15 minutes when I
have
pulled

John (01:25:45):
Step away

Elaine (01:25:48):
And that has helped me in work too.
Cause then I behave the same way.
If somebody says something that I makes mefeel uncomfortable or like gets me upset.
I don't react in the moment.
Like I used to, I just breathe in,take some time and then reach out,
know?
And so all of that's interrelated,I feel in my personal life, we
use into my work life a lot.

(01:26:10):
And a lot of it has to do with how Itreat other people, how I speak with
other people, even in Latin X and gaming.
used to be the one where like,I should just lay people out.
Like the staff will be like, Idon't like this because of this and
this blah, blah, We can't do this.

John (01:26:26):
Yup.

Elaine (01:26:26):
like, Christina called me and she's like, bro,
like, you cannot be that way
people away.
People will find you intimidating.
And I was like, that'snot really who I am.

John (01:26:37):
I'm

Elaine (01:26:37):
to,

John (01:26:37):
intimidating.

Elaine (01:26:39):
literally I had to like change the way that I communicated with people
so that I I could still be understoodand try to have my point across, but
at the same time, still being mindfuland respectful of the other person
and how they're going to receive it.
Um,

John (01:26:55):
have Christina who is a person you love and trust, uh, be
able to kind of to you straight up,
right
And be like, Hey, these very factual.
Right?
It's like, these are your actionsand this is what they're causing.

Elaine (01:27:09):
Right.
Yeah.
Yeah.

John (01:27:09):
attacking anything.
It's just giving you the factsand the information for you to
interpret and be like, okay,

Elaine (01:27:16):
Yeah.

John (01:27:16):
do something

Elaine (01:27:17):
that's not easy, right.
That doesn't feel good when somebodyis like, you need to call them down.
And in turn though, in turn,that makes me comfortable.
Cause then I can go to her and be like,Hey, and like the way that you said
that thing and like, that's not okay.
Like maybe we can fix that.
And like we, her and I have hadconversations like that and it feels

(01:27:38):
good to be able to grow together.
But definitely personallyfor me, I can say that I have
grown a lot in the past year.
I'm happy that I did andit was not easy to do.
Some hurdles there there's somepeople that I lost along the
way in all of that happens.
Right.
But
it's,

John (01:27:57):
the life.

Elaine (01:27:58):
and it's life.
Right.

John (01:28:00):
Yeah,

Elaine (01:28:00):
long as I feel like, you know, I apologize to the
person, let my thoughts through.
If they want to come back in my life.
they're more than welcome to, but I'm notgoing to force anybody to care about me
or being in my life if they don't want to.
And that's okay.

John (01:28:13):
yeah,

Elaine (01:28:13):
You know,
yeah.

John (01:28:16):
We amen.
Uh, 20, 20, right?
It is what you made it.
And we're soon coming out onthe other side, stronger, better

Elaine (01:28:25):
I hope so.

John (01:28:26):
and bigger, better opportunities.
You were touching on, I was incollege getting my masters and
I think we were going to get to.
How you broke in at Elan.
I'd love to, finish that story oflike getting your masters at USC
and then getting in a line, how,any part of that, that you'd love
to share for people that are alwayslike, oh, how did he lane break in?

(01:28:49):
How did she become game designer

Elaine (01:28:52):
So I broke it in a really weird way.
Right.
So when I was in college, like I mentionedlike pursuing biomed engineering and
medicine, nothing to do with games.
None
of my rec, none of myrecs even transferred.

John (01:29:04):
Did you play games?

Elaine (01:29:06):
I did play games and I enjoyed them a lot.
And that was one of the reasonswhy, when somebody essentially
told me that the games?
industry was, viable option,
I didn't even know that's when Iwas like, Hmm, let me investigate.
Cause that sounds reallyinteresting to me.

John (01:29:21):
where did that come from?

Elaine (01:29:22):
So talking about representation matters.
it was one of my professors at my college

John (01:29:28):
Yeah.

Elaine (01:29:29):
he was Mexican American.
just saw, saw something in me.
He saw my potential, saw how likepassionate I was in his courses
and his courses happened to beabout like games and like social
informatics and things like that.
So I guess he saw my passion andhow well I was doing and like all
his li assignments and everything.

(01:29:50):
And he recommended me for thisresearch Institute called , which is
the ice school inclusion Institute.
I was trying to figure out right, whatmy major was after biomed engineering.
When I went to my Dean, what majorcan I do that would allow me to
graduate on time because I didn'twant to take extra two, three years

(01:30:13):
to finish.
So my Dean was like, there's a majorin this school called information
technology and informatics.

John (01:30:20):
Yeah.

Elaine (01:30:21):
it is a short major, it's only 29 credits.
and a lot of people are doing it andthey're, you know, getting good jobs.
So if you think you would be interested, Irecommend you take the one-on-one course.
And that's where I met the professor.

John (01:30:35):
Uh,

Elaine (01:30:37):
Sanchez.
Yeah.

John (01:30:37):
shout out to Dr.
Joe

Elaine (01:30:40):
he really changed my life because, it was not only his work,
he was into like heavy metal and punkand all that stuff, which is also what
I'm
into.

John (01:30:47):
interests.

Elaine (01:30:49):
he was a TA in the it 1 0 1 class, but he had like this
gnarly, braided beard, like it
was so long and it was like red.
and he had like, his ear stretchedand like a Mohawk and everything else.
Like this is the coolest TAI've ever seen in my life.
if he ever gives classes, Iwould love to take his courses.

(01:31:09):
And he was just like areally, he is a dope person.
after I took that, the one-on-oneclass, I, decided to major in
it cause I enjoyed it a lot.
So . I graduated with my it degreeand in my last semester or so, Dr.
Sanchez,
was like, Hey, Ilene, there's thisinclusion Institute that encourages

(01:31:30):
marginalized students to pursue graduatedegrees, whether it be masters or PhDs
in information technology or informatics.
I didn't know that.
Our school at the time I wentto Rutgers university, I didn't
know that our community school ofcommunications was part of this
thing called ice school caucus.

(01:31:51):
And I school just meansit's an informatics school.
And apparently I didn't knowthis, but it was one of the top
10 schools in the whole world.
so I was like, wow, like,this is, this is great.
And he's like, Hey, Elaine, ifyou want to go to this Institute,
can vouch for you you can get in.
And maybe there'll be a graduate programthat you may be interested in if you

(01:32:11):
don't think you're ready to go intothe workforce right after college.
And I always was thinking aboutdoing a master's and a PhD.
So I was intrigued.
I went through the application processand I got into the Institute and
it was the summer long Institute.
So we went to the university ofPittsburgh, all expenses paid like the

(01:32:32):
pay for the flights and everything.
And I literally got paid to, tobe in part of the summer program.
And what we had to do we had to committo a year long research project after
we concluded the summer program.
So we got, paired up with otherstudents from across the country.
and you had just had to writelike a thesis paper essentially

(01:32:52):
on a topic of your choice.
And my team decided to do a paperon representation of women in games.

John (01:32:59):
Oh,

Elaine (01:33:00):
Yeah.
So I wrote this whole like 40 pagepaper with three other students about
only characters and how they're depict,also the state of like gender roles and
things like that, representation in theindustry and in the gaming community.
So we looked at online harassment,we looked at, the percentage

(01:33:21):
of women who have rules in thegames industry and all of that.
And that really inspired meto be like, you know what,
I want to make a difference.

John (01:33:29):
Yeah,

Elaine (01:33:31):
And there was another students there that was pursuing
a masters of game design at, NYU.
And she was like telling me allthis stuff about the program.
And I was like, you know what?
I think that's what I want to do.
Like I want to get amasters in game design.
So she's like, I super recommend it.
I love it here, do some research becausethere are some other schools available.

(01:33:54):
So I did exactly what she suggested.
So I went online and saw thattop school at the time was the
university of Southern California.
And then in the top 10, it was NYU.
And why you would havebeen what's my first pick
because it was near home andI could have just stayed home.
but I only applied to two schools, USCand NYU, NYU rejected me and USC me.

(01:34:16):
So

John (01:34:17):
Eh,
maybe

Elaine (01:34:18):
up my bags I went and you know, my, my Dean at the school of informatics
at Rutgers, she wrote me a rec letter.
Dr.
Sanchez wrote me a recletter to go to USC.
And, know, there's a whole processwhere you have to like, write an essay.
Why do you want to come to the school and
all
that?
And I was just like, I wrote this big,long research paper on like the state

(01:34:40):
of the industry and wanting to makea difference as a woman, especially
a woman of color in the industry.
And if I can get an opportunity toget a degree that I can learn the
craft and actually get role, notjust be of game studies, but actually
be a designer or a developer wouldmake the world of a difference.

(01:35:01):
And then I got in,

John (01:35:02):
whoo.

Elaine (01:35:03):
that essay,

John (01:35:06):
I feel as though no, very little percentage of applicants come through
with like a thesis paper that long
that in depth about the curriculum.
I'm curious.
Do you remember back then,what the percentage was?
Do you kind of rememberoff, top ballpark figure?

Elaine (01:35:24):
Off the top of my head.
I don't know the exact number,but it was less than 5%.
Yeah.

John (01:35:30):
Damn.

Elaine (01:35:31):
this was looking at data in the 2010s.

John (01:35:34):
Yeah.
Yeah.

Elaine (01:35:36):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And when we were writingour paper, Gamergate had
started and all of that stuff.
So there was a lot of data that wewere able to use in thesis paper.
but that literally was what motivated me.
I just wanted to make a difference.
I wanted to be Puerto Rican gamedesigner, developer making a

(01:35:57):
difference where it counted and.
I dunno.
How long has it been now?
Eight years.
Eight years later.
11 years later here I am.
I'm again, designer at a studio.
Yeah.
So it's been a while.
The ride is, it took a lotof convincing from my parents
because they didn't understand it.

John (01:36:15):
my mom

Elaine (01:36:16):
why are you not majoring in engineering going to pre-med?
to be a gamer?
That's

John (01:36:22):
Yeah.

Elaine (01:36:23):
I was like, I'm not going to be a professional gamer dad.
Like, going to be a developer designer.
I did not click

John (01:36:31):
Uh,

Elaine (01:36:32):
until, they came to my graduation and I had the diploma that
said in interactive media and games.
feel like it didn't click until then

John (01:36:40):
yeah, sure, absolutely.

Elaine (01:36:42):
what?
I think she's going to be okay.
She has a diploma.

John (01:36:46):
And, and, and a graduate diploma at that.

Elaine (01:36:48):
Yes.
I'm the first in my family,who has a master's degree.

John (01:36:53):
Shout out.
I was feeling myself in the first,

Elaine (01:36:56):
Okay

John (01:36:56):
my, on the DSI to, with a bachelor's, but Hey, got
a master that's something
that was always daunting to me.
Right.
Like just the amount of researchthat goes into that damn
thesis at the end of it all.

Elaine (01:37:06):
I was lucky.
Cause at USC, we did nothave to write a paper.
We had to make a game for our thesis.

John (01:37:12):
Uh, okay.
Much, Much, cooler.

Elaine (01:37:15):
much cooler.
but it was a three-yearprogram compared to every other
program that's only two years.
So it was longer and more money.
So it has this pros and cons,
right?
Like at anything?

John (01:37:28):
Do you still have that game?
Is it like, does it run,

Elaine (01:37:31):
it runs, but it's really got, got, like, I wouldn't recommend it.
who I was at 25, 26 years old is
very different to who I am today.
So

John (01:37:42):
Hey.

Elaine (01:37:42):
the game definitely doesn't speak to who I am as
a designer and a person now,

John (01:37:47):
For sure.
Yeah.
I mean, I'll own it, right.
It's meant to give us something totalk about when we're interviewing
at companies with zero experience.
Right.
Like when
what it takes to make a game,

Elaine (01:38:01):
Yeah.

John (01:38:01):
that conversation flowing, right.
To just assess how minded you are,what types of ideas are you bringing?
And can we train you and willyou, accept learning on the job

Elaine (01:38:14):
Yep.
And Yeah.
I think that's a breast lane signme and That's where I am today.
so

John (01:38:20):
Yeah.

Elaine (01:38:21):
be anywhere happier.
I feel like it's the perfect fit for me.
That's what, uh, some friends havesaid they're like lean like the
perfect company for you and whatyou believe in it was like ordained,

John (01:38:31):
Uh huh.

Elaine (01:38:32):
destiny, really to be there's like, oh, thanks.
Y'all
really, I really struggled for a longtime to find a place to belong and a place
where I could grow and up in my, not onlymy professional career, but as a person,

John (01:38:49):
Yeah, I can't wait to see what you guys pop out, come up with
definitely want to bring you back,see how it's going in a year from now.
We're going to the MMO.
I hope that whenever the hell I cantravel back home to see my family,
that I can check out brass line or atleast like have lunch with some of the
people, see the studio, whatever is

Elaine (01:39:07):
Yeah.
Hell yeah.

John (01:39:08):
I'll take a let's get into the lightning round if you are ready.

Elaine (01:39:13):
I am ready.

John (01:39:14):
All right, mama.
No what is the lastgame that you finished?

Elaine (01:39:18):
Last year I finished was resident evils village.

, John (01:39:21):
what would you rate it?

Elaine (01:39:22):
If I were to give it a score at a 10, to be honest, I given like a seven.

John (01:39:27):
okay.
Okay.
Could be better room
for improvement.

Elaine (01:39:31):
but it's not that it was a bad game.
It's just as a game designer.
Now I'm just super analyticalabout everything that I play
and I just dissect thecrap out of everything.
So it's just my game designer perspective.
There's a lot of flaws.

John (01:39:47):
which affects your enjoyment for
sure.

Elaine (01:39:49):
really, really, does.
Yeah.

John (01:39:51):
What is one thing you would have changed or would've liked to have seen
done differently out of curiosity,
up.

Elaine (01:39:59):
of the things that I did not like was the pacing of the game.

John (01:40:03):
Um,

Elaine (01:40:04):
if you were to play, the game is divided into essentially four zones.
first and the fourth zone are light.
I feel like much morethought out they're bigger.
Like lot more content was weavedinto it yes, but the second
zone was like super quick.
Like, it felt Like,there was no substance.
It was like PAF, Stover.

(01:40:25):
it was so short and like the boss fightlike legit wasn't you in a boss fight.
You look for something a few times andthen you stab it and then you're done.
just like what anti-climactic I was

John (01:40:36):
yeah,
yeah

Elaine (01:40:38):
mad.
. Yeah.

John (01:40:39):
is your favorite franchise or a game?

Elaine (01:40:44):
My favorite franchises, legend of Zelda
franchise.
And my favorite game of alltime will be Ocarina of time.

John (01:40:53):
Oh, that's good.
That's the right one.
That's an internal 64 1.
Absolutely.
Ah, that's such a special one.

Elaine (01:40:59):
I definitely have to say that Ocarina of time has influenced
me a lot as a game designer.
I grab a lot from thedesign of old green of time

John (01:41:09):
all good things, right?
Like level design,

Elaine (01:41:11):
ramping up a skills.

John (01:41:13):
progression.
Pacing,

Elaine (01:41:16):
Yes.

John (01:41:16):
character development, right?
Like even the, even though, like, Iremember it was all like story and not
that much of it, but they have the benefitof having the same story every time.
Right.
Like warrior awakens

Elaine (01:41:29):
Yeah.

John (01:41:29):
to save the princess who can like stop darkness and evil.

Elaine (01:41:34):
Yeah.
One of the things I think that is mostinfluential, that I have spoken to a lot
of game designers and developers about, Iloved about Korean of time is the way that
in each level that you go to you learn,like a new weapon or an armor something,
but there are a set of mechanics thatyou are taught throughout the dungeon.

(01:41:55):
And at the end, in the epic boss fight,you need to combine all those skillsets
things that you learnedthroughout the dungeon.
You combine them all to defeat the boss.
And to me, that is so super smart.

John (01:42:10):
At its best, any mechanic that you give a player, you do your best to
teach it to them as quick as possible.
And then just challenge themover and over and over like all
the different ways you can use

Elaine (01:42:22):
Exactly.

John (01:42:23):
And to be fair, it's kinda cheap.
But when you have an entire dungeondedicated to this one thing that
you now have fucking awesome.
Right?
Like you, you

Elaine (01:42:33):
Yes.

John (01:42:34):
the time, like getting to the thing, getting to the big chest with the key,

Elaine (01:42:37):
Yes.

John (01:42:38):
and then once you have it, you're like fucking up that dungeon
left around like, oh yeah, I

Elaine (01:42:43):
Yeah

John (01:42:43):
over there and I can cross over the thing and I could burn the thing.
And just when you feel like abadass, then you got the boss
at the end waiting for you.
Right.
Like

Elaine (01:42:51):
Yep,

John (01:42:52):
necessitates the new tool.
And, it's just all nicely packaged, right?
Like it's simple.
But getting to that simplicity isa lot of hard work and iteration.
Right.
And

Elaine (01:43:04):
Right.

John (01:43:05):
those Nintendo motherfuckers are so good at.

Elaine (01:43:07):
They really, really
are.
Like, they're just, there'ssomething about their process
that I need to figure out
what is it that they
do again, that Polish really?
Because it feels like a lot ofthought was put into things and
the way that they were created.

John (01:43:24):
What is the last book that you read?

Elaine (01:43:27):
The last book that I read was called.
design and play a detailedapproach to iterative game design.
So it's a book by ColeenMacklin and John Sharp.
And know Colleen is aprofessor at NYU game center.

John (01:43:46):
I bet that shit is going in my car.

Elaine (01:43:49):
Yeah.
So I read that one.
It was pretty good.
was a little wordy.
So if folks out there whodon't like super wordy,
books,

John (01:43:58):
Written by

Elaine (01:43:59):
it was good Yes.
But it was pretty good in breakingdown some game design concepts and then
going in on iteration the way that youiterate properly on certain things.

John (01:44:11):
Okay.
I got to check it out.
Yeah.
Because putting some of thesethings to words and stepping
someone through challenging.
I find, so it's alwaysinteresting to see how people
have approached breaking it down.
Thanks for

Elaine (01:44:24):
so I enjoyed it.
You're welcome.
I like to read a lot of, game designbooks just to keep myself up to date
on what other people are thinking
I mean, I always tell people, Hey,like doctors have to renew their
licenses every certain amount of time.
Like, why shouldn't we also do the same
thing?
And we're even just refreshing ourselveson like, what are the fundamentals of game

(01:44:47):
design or game developing and what is thedifference between good and bad design?
Like all of that is super informative.
you don't waste anythingby just refreshing,
um, all that knowledge.

John (01:44:59):
Yeah, to your point earlier, too, you mentioned how much you love game jams.
Game gyms are a great tool to connectwith other people, try different mechanics
that you've seen other games, see whatit might take to put those together.
And I like too, that it letsyou even flex other muscles.
I'm going to be the artist or the audioperson or the programmer, even though
I would never dare do this for my real

Elaine (01:45:20):
Right?
Exactly.

John (01:45:22):
what is the thing that you enjoy the most about what you do?

Elaine (01:45:26):
I love researching.
my favorite part of what I do, because nomatter what type of design I'm working on,
can always do like a comparative analysis.
So I can play other games thathave that feature or have a similar
mechanic or a similar system.
And I can compare and contrast andget inspired by and just analyze and

(01:45:50):
critique lot of games and things.
And then I can do a little bitof digging specifically into
whatever project I'm working on.
So I love doing that I really lived.

John (01:46:00):
That is one of the many fun parts of the job, right?
Is the excuse to go play somegames that you might not have
played, been meaning to play or hasbeen recommended to you because.
Similar themes, similar
mechanics okay.
I guess I'll go playsome games now, you know?

Elaine (01:46:18):
Right, exactly.
And it's like games that I had the timeto play and I can actually to play them.
And I always recommend to students oryoung game designers, you don't need to
play the full game through to understandhow it was designed or how it works.
A good two, three hours will be in a.

(01:46:39):
To understand the systemsand how they weave together.
What's the game loop.
That's a pretty good standard time.

John (01:46:46):
Yeah, Have you a little notebook or whatever take notes every step of the way.

Elaine (01:46:51):
I just started a brass line.
This is my third week.
Right.
And there was a lot of documentationthat I had to catch up on.
Right.
And I can tell you every single documentthat I read, have notes on my game design,

John (01:47:06):
the,
wow.

Elaine (01:47:09):
helps me to write things down.
It helps me rememberand absorb information,

John (01:47:13):
Yeah,

Elaine (01:47:14):
but also if I just read something, I'm not gonna absorb all
the, information, you know what I mean?
Like I can easily sure gothrough like a 10 page document
and be like, okay, I read it.

John (01:47:24):
yeah.

Elaine (01:47:24):
I actually understand and remember anything that I just read?
So I literally took copious notes,every single document that I,

John (01:47:34):
Uh, he's such
a good student.

Elaine (01:47:36):
a lot.

John (01:47:37):
That's good.
It keeps designers happy whenpeople read their documentation.

Elaine (01:47:42):
It really does, but it's good to be on the same page.

John (01:47:44):
Absolutely.

Elaine (01:47:45):
that way I don't have to be like, well, are we going to have this feature?
Like, what is the direction of X, Y, Z?
And like, don't have to wastepeople's time because I read
and I I'm on the same page.
And I can literally juststart designing right away.

John (01:48:00):
yup.

Elaine (01:48:00):
to do that.
I already started designingnow on my third week of
being in

John (01:48:05):
it's got a feel good.

Elaine (01:48:06):
it does feel good.
Yeah.
But

John (01:48:08):
Hm.

Elaine (01:48:08):
because I took the time to read all the documents.
And now that I readeverything I'm, caught up.
Now I can research on featuresthat I have been assigned

John (01:48:18):
Okay.

Elaine (01:48:18):
and go out and play games that have those similar
features and be like, Okay.
what is it that we want to do?
What has been called out alreadyand all the previous documents
what can I bring that's new,
you know?
really has thought off yet orsomething that will set our game
apart from the competition, quote,
unquote,

John (01:48:38):
man.
Try to break new ground or makesome and match some things that

Elaine (01:48:43):
exactly.

John (01:48:43):
been done before in that job.

Elaine (01:48:46):
Or things that have been done in like a first person game.
And it's common first person, but havenot really been adopted to like an MMO,
things

John (01:48:56):
What are common tools that you work with in your day to day?

Elaine (01:48:59):
So something that I like to use, cause I really hate writing and then
people don't read, okay, people don't

John (01:49:05):
Nope.
Yep.

Elaine (01:49:06):
just said it like designers get really happy if you're either a document.
I like making collages.

John (01:49:12):
Ooh, very visual, huh?
Hmm.

Elaine (01:49:15):
like references, screenshots, even like links to YouTube videos and
stuff, that I could really call outon the things that I'm talking about.
And then I described them andlike little boxes like, kind
of like digital post-it notes.
So I use a software called pure ref.
that allows me to make a call a collage.
I use Pinterest to likeput up all my pictures.

John (01:49:37):
sounds like.

Elaine (01:49:38):
and then what else I do use like, like slides sometimes it's
better to make like a PowerPoint

John (01:49:45):
Yeah.

Elaine (01:49:46):
explain something versus a two page three page document

John (01:49:50):
Yep.
There's

Elaine (01:49:51):
and I've

John (01:49:52):
and

Elaine (01:49:54):
Yes.

John (01:49:54):
you very sequentially, right?
Like start here, then build on it,then build on it, then build on it.
Right.

Elaine (01:50:02):
Right,

John (01:50:03):
It's easy.
for people to follow because it's

Elaine (01:50:05):
right.
Exactly.

John (01:50:07):
Um,

Elaine (01:50:07):
like a lot of people respond better to visuals.
Um, rather than texts doesn'tmatter if you're a designer,
an executive, a programmer,everybody just really likes visuals

John (01:50:18):
yeah,

Elaine (01:50:19):
texts.

John (01:50:20):
Yup.

Elaine (01:50:21):
So that's what I'm, I've been trying to do lately.

John (01:50:24):
That's a great call.
Nobody is going to love yourdocument as much as you do,

Elaine (01:50:29):
Yes.

John (01:50:30):
the information still has to get out there.
And you can't trust thateverybody's going to go through
everything with a fine tooth comb,

Elaine (01:50:38):
Right.

John (01:50:39):
you can at least hold them accountable to be
like, yo, I sat you there.
I stayed into your eyes.
I presented you.
The thing and

Elaine (01:50:45):
and his Like
um, here's the gist of what I'mtrying to present, but, what I'm
going to actually start doing now.
So I made that, like I made acollage, gave a gist of information
now I'm going to go into a properdocument bring all that stuff
into Right.

John (01:51:02):
deeper.

Elaine (01:51:03):
want to have multiple options.
So like, if you are an artist or a programor whatever, can look at the, PowerPoint
and be on the same page as if you wereto read the document, you know, but
the document just provides a littlebit more detailed, a little bit more
granular, granular in certain areaswhere, for example, if we were to

(01:51:24):
pitch to executives or may be, theymay want to read that document to
see your head at, is it really?
That you're, what's yourintent and purpose with this,

John (01:51:35):
important, right.
To the high level to establish,some common vocabulary.
And

Elaine (01:51:39):
right.

John (01:51:39):
can go deeper for the people that are going to be very dependent
on those systems or mechanics orstory, or what have you right to go.
Oh,

Elaine (01:51:48):
okay.

John (01:51:48):
That's how I got to hook in.
Or got to sit with youand meet about this thing

Elaine (01:51:52):
Right.
Exactly.
So that's what I have learnedand I really enjoy it.
thing that I like to dois a lot of a UX design.
so even though I'm not a UI artistor a UX designer, I really enjoy it.
And I find it valuable.
So I do like to createwireframes and things
when I have the opportunity to,
I took a few courses online on UX.

(01:52:13):
and now I know likebasics like fundamentals

John (01:52:17):
Yeah.

Elaine (01:52:17):
create a wire frame and being like, okay, let's say we wanted
to come up with some type of menu.
For whatever reason can put somethingtogether and I could have it react
on clicks and things like that.
using something likeAdobe XD, InVision, Figma,
For example, in beyond blue, thegame that I worked on at Elan,

John (01:52:39):
That's your first game, huh?

Elaine (01:52:41):
my first like full professional fifth

John (01:52:43):
Yeah.

Elaine (01:52:44):
So in that, when a post release, I design photo mode for it.
how did I do that?
We'll I'll use envision,which like a UI UX software.
mocked up, what would different typesof menus look like for photo mode?
do we anchor it on theleft or on the right?
What is it going to look likeon console and PC versus iOS?

(01:53:04):
we,
were multi-platform so how is thatgoing to look like and how are the
direction is going to be different?
Right?
you know, like a mouse click is a littlebit different and on iOS, cause the
screen is much, much smaller we may haveto do do things a little bit different.
all of that concept thingin UX, design myself,
um, almost softwares and thenwe shifted and I was really

(01:53:25):
happy cause people liked it and

John (01:53:26):
you got on all the platforms and
Hey, I got some awards to peoplecalled out like the feeling, I guess,
right in, at the end of the day, ifyou can make somebody feel something
from something you made, right.
That's a huge win

Elaine (01:53:40):
Yep.
So I was really happy.
I was able to work on thatand I learned a lot too.

John (01:53:44):
you never forget your first and then now you're onto bigger and better things.
Is there anywhere that peoplecan connect with you, reach out
to you what you're working on?
anything like that?

Elaine (01:53:57):
I'm mostly active on Twitter.
and I check my DMS andmy mentions every day.
So if there's any like junior or younggame designers and developers or people
who want to get into the industryor people who would like to know
specifically about some things that?
I have done or whatever it may be, thatwould be the best avenue to contact me.

(01:54:18):
my Twitter handle is Tula testsix and tastic like fantastic.
So that's pretty much myhandle on All my social.
So including discord,
I'm in the Lennox in gamingserver as a staff member.
So if people do ask me forwhatever reason I do respond,

John (01:54:35):
All right.

Elaine (01:54:36):
Twitter I also respond very quickly to emails.
So my personal email iselaine@elaine-gomez.com.
you can actually go to my portfolio.
Elaine Ms.
Dot com and the contact will havelike a, a form that you can fill out.
And it goes straight to my email.

John (01:54:56):
That's awesome.
is brass line hiring?

Elaine (01:54:59):
Yes.
Breslin is hiring fora bunch of positions.
And I think right now we're looking at alot of programmer and technical positions.
So if you are interested in anyof that and maybe even a few
art positions, but I'm not sure

John (01:55:12):
Okay.

Elaine (01:55:12):
me on that,

John (01:55:13):
Check the website.

Elaine (01:55:14):
yes.
Check the website.
to see what we have available, becausewe are hiring and our team is amazing.
I cannot about it enough.
Everybody is super kind, inclusive,mindful of like your mental health
and like your personal life.
So Yeah,
place to work.
And the project is pretty, pretty dope.
So.

John (01:55:33):
that's key, man.
If the people a good, the projectis good and the pay is good.
Then this is a, this is a winner in my
book.
Fantastic.
And don't say, I'llshare that link as well.
So that's breath line,entertainment.com/careers.
That'll be in the show notes.
And finally, last questionof day, and then you can go

(01:55:55):
about the rest of your evening.
Who do you nominate tofall out of the play area?
If you feel so inclined,

Elaine (01:56:03):
I nominate my good friend tele game designer.
Sandra hunting men see is I came tocenter and one of my good friends
been very excited to see onceI moved to New York city again.

John (01:56:17):
shout out to Sandra.
She was also on the Latin X gamefestival panel that we did the

Elaine (01:56:24):
Yes.

John (01:56:25):
panel.
So that'll be cool to catch up with her.
See what she's been up to

Elaine (01:56:28):
Yeah she She's Awesome
She's good people.

John (01:56:31):
when I hit the heck.

Elaine (01:56:32):
Yeah.

John (01:56:33):
you so much, Elaine.
Is there any last wordsbefore we wrap this up?

Elaine (01:56:38):
You're welcome.
No, thank you so much for havingme and letting me talk a lot.
I'm happy that you gaveme a space in the time.
And I hope that folks who listened, wereable to grab just a little something to
take with them and apply to their lives.
And yeah.

(01:57:02):
yes, you're welcome.
My grandmother used to say?
that all the time.
Bye.

John (01:57:10):
what a brave soul, what a class act, what a creative spirit,
the next generation in this industryis looking mighty, mighty bright.
I really love some of the things shetalked about there, where you can kind
of see the timing was everything right.
She was looking for work forawhile and she found her dream one.

(01:57:30):
I know a lot of us loosepatients when we want something.
We want it here now.
And her story is a Testament to.
Good things coming to those who wait.
Another thing that's essentialfor us is to stand up for our
teammates and, call out wheneveranybody's coming out of their face.
She spent way too long in a toxic cultureand environment that was allowed to

(01:57:53):
persist by the leadership over there.
And I'm so happy that shewas able to escape that.
I am going to hold her to her wordof giving me a tour of breast line.
Whenever the heck I get back home.
Which to be honest with this damnOmicron variant, uh, I think me and
the rest of the Diaz clan are goingto hunker down and stay in isolation.

(01:58:14):
And we'll just catch up witheverybody virtually until things
get a little bit more under control.
definitely take down somenegotiation tactics, right?
Whenever you're looking to make a jump.
If you could line up a bunch ofoffers, That just kind of makes
you have a stronger bargainingposition to get yourself the best
compensation for your time and skills.

(01:58:34):
another gym was her resume, right?
Like the difference it can makewhen you change your resume or
able to add new skills to it.
Right.
All these are great tips offinding work when you're looking
for opportunity out there.
On the next episode of out ofplay area, episode number 23,
debuting in a couple of weeks.
We are going to sit down with JohnnyWu, a QA director at riot games.

(01:58:57):
Who's been in thisindustry for a long time.
Coming through QA up and down.
He was a development directorat respond on apex legends.
He was the QA director for king.
Before that he was at SINGAand he's got a lot of tales and
experience to share with you all.
make sure to follow us so that youdon't miss out on that episode.

(01:59:20):
Thank you for listening, Deb.
If you found this episode informative,I ask that you pay a link forward to
a developer to help grow our listener.
If you're a game developer with astory you think could help a fellow dev
out, please go to out of play area.comand click on the Calendly link at
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Elaine Gomez | Game Designer @ Brass Lion Entertainment | Ep 22

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Elaine Gomez | Game Designer @ Brass Lion Entertainment | Ep 22