NICKELODEON EXTREME TENNIS
Nickelodeon Extreme Tennis is a competitive online tennis game released on Apple Arcade, bringing together multiple Nickelodeon IPs. I joined the project as a Game Designer working on core systems, game feel, balancing, competitive features and UX/UI, before later taking ownership of the game’s LiveOps direction and updates.
Growing from systems design into LiveOps Game Direction.
I initially joined the project as a systems-focused Game Designer, starting with a full audit of the existing design and helping refine its underlying systems and competitive experience.
Later in production, my responsibility expanded into LiveOps Game Direction: defining the direction of future updates with the client, communicating that vision to the team and continuing to work directly on systems and content.
Systems & Game Feel
Audited and redesigned core gameplay systems, refining balancing and game feel across different player skill levels and the game’s meta progression.
Competitive Features
Co-designed character passives and ultimates and led the design of trophies, ranking and matchmaking features while working within Apple Arcade constraints.
LiveOps Direction
Later defined the direction of LiveOps and updates, aligned it with the client and communicated the vision to the development team while continuing to design systems and new content.
Balancing Skill & Meta Progression
Competitive matches had to remain coherent across different player skill levels while progression systems continued to influence the experience around them. I worked on balancing those layers together rather than independently.
Moving From Design to Direction
The project marked an evolution in my responsibilities: from designing systems and features to defining the direction of live updates with the client and transmitting that direction to the team.
Ranking, Trophies & Matchmaking
I led the design of several competitive systems while adapting their implementation to Apple Arcade platform requirements.
- Roles
- Game Designer, LiveOps Game Director & Product Owner
- Studio
- Old Skull Games
- IP
- Nickelodeon
- Genre
- Competitive Online Tennis, Arcade Sports
- Platform
- Apple Arcade
- Design Areas
- Systems Design - Game Feel - Balancing - Competitive Design - Matchmaking - Ranking - UX/UI - LiveOps - Game Direction
- Years
- 2020-2021