Hello, I'm Isaiah Everin Cooper, a Senior Game Designer at Crystal Dynamics. I hold a Professional Certificate in Game Development (Level Design) from SMU Guildhall. I am also a graduate of Columbia University, holding a BA in Creative Writing and Film Studies, with a background in Film Production.
Professional Summary
I am a designer with 9 years of experience on multi-platform AAA and AA projects, consistently recognized by peers and managers as an indispensable lynchpin. I've been promoted quickly in every role I've held, which I attribute to my ability to make major contributions to workflows, tools, and project management while simultaneously crafting compelling gameplay content and systems. I "work smarter, not harder" to achieve all of this within a balanced 40-hour work week.
As a designer, I maintain a holistic gameplay vision and rapidly execute on it in engine with care for fun and coherent player experiences. As a team member, I educate new and current devs on best practices and also passionately commit to creating and supporting strong tech and tools. With a portfolio including a wide range of game genres and numerous narrative projects, and having collaborated with major IP holders, I can design content that supports a variety of core player experiences, taking into consideration both moment-to-moment engagement and broader narrative immersion.
I've designed and implemented a wide range of gameplay systems and content, including enemy archetypes and abilities, player and AI stealth systems, AI behavior systems, combat development systems, missions, levels, minigames, and interactive cutscenes. I've also made major contributions to the tools that make content creation within all these systems not only possible, but enjoyable and efficient. Lastly, I've done all of this with high attention to detail and a balanced focus on engaging gameplay and strong technology.
Personal Interests
From childhood, I've always been enraptured with the creation of imaginary worlds, which transitioned into developing a variety of fictional fantasy settings and stories throughout my adult life. I run various TTRPG campaigns, including D&D with an original setting that includes a 200,000-word wiki of world-building.
Socially, I tend to rant about how much I love something and then completely tear it to pieces for what didn't work, and I'm generally compelled to share analysis that is both honest and thoroughly considered, which led to work on my new YouTube channel, Signals and Light. For my own inspiration, I look to hundreds of games, movies, shows, bands, comics, and books, and I'm not satisfied unless I constantly have something of high creative caliber to enjoy and analyze in my downtime.
Favorite Games
Exploration of locations, systems, and concepts is at the heart of what I care for most in media. I enjoy this quality of gaming so much that I consider foreknowledge of encounters, levels, or mid-game mechanics to be "spoilers" that would disrupt what I gain most from playing a game.
I deeply analyze the structure of how content is presented, and I find much of my pleasure in the sensation of surprise, of seeing something unique or a synthesis of ideas that I did not expect. When structuring content or stories, I aim to build ideas into a sequence of compelling discoveries, combining the inherent joy of the moment with a sense that the player or reader has discovered something new and exciting.
I have played hundreds of games, and my favorites tend to fall into certain categories.
-
Games with a huge range of interdependent mechanics and challenges that allow for player creativity, like Dishonored, Metal Gear Solid V, or Horizon: Zero Dawn.
-
Action combat games with fluid and tough but fair mechanics where learning enemy patterns is core to the experience, such as Hollow Knight, Monster Hunter, and Sekiro.
-
Narrative adventure games with incredibly well-executed stories and character writing, as seen in Disco Elysium, Pentiment, The Beginner's Guide, and The Alters.
-
Unique, exploration-driven puzzle games with strong gameplay married to gorgeous art, such as Antichamber, The Witness, The Talos Principle, or Opus Magnum.
-
Deep multiplayer PVP games with a broad range of mechanics and varied forms of player combat interaction, like League of Legends, Nosgoth, DotA 2, and Overwatch.
-
Platformers that focus on fluid locomotion and deeply engaging level design, like Super Mario Odyssey, Ori and the Blind Forest, and Rayman Legends.