This page outlines some core principles I bring to my role as an Art Director.

My aim is to deliver successful, beautifully crafted games with a healthy dose of innovation.

1. Connection is key

This diverse cast was created by the Playfish’s amazing art team. It captures the unique spirit of that team and how they created games. The studio reflected many principals I align with so I would like to share a few examples of how we worked.

Making games is a business and hard work. That’s the reality, can’t be avoided, it is what it is. But ideally the challenge should be a positive and rewarding process that fosters growth?

I believe we have to personally connect to the work and the journey in some way, and if we connect to the work I believe that passion will be transmitted to the players.

To cultivate an authentic sense of ownership, Playfish’s new games team set out to be a collaborative community exploring bold ideas.
Could the team find ways new to express themselves in a commercial project?

When Playfish joined the Maxis group in 2011, we wholeheartedly embraced their ethos of "Play with life" and the company’s passion for simulation. For this project, our goal was to develop a humorous experience that utilised both the game's urban setting and it’s engaging simulation gameplay. We wanted to emotionally connect with players, explore modern cultural complexities, and break away from game character clichés of the time.

The entire art team came together to brainstorm key characters, exploring every idea with open-minded multicultural creativity. Beyond being fun workshops, these sessions directly reflected the teams worldview. This approach produced charming, unique characters that the team wanted to build a game around.

2. Be brave and fail fast

Two example images that capture Playfish's experimental style explorations. The studio took innovation very seriously.

I’m a firm believer in blending conceptual innovation with mass-market appeal. How do we make a game feel special, or original? Can that give us a competative edge?

In my experience, visual and gameplay R&D is a critical component many game companies under budget and under value, yet personally it’s key to developing confident fresh strategies. R&D can uncover new creative directions, answer questions early in a project, and even accelerate development.

When it’s taken seriously we know it works, Nintendo’s constant investment in research has paid off many times over.

The images above showcase the most extreme “texture and visual depth” research phase of a tablet project. We considered a few wild visual solutions, and then quickly user tested them. Designed to drive visual innovation and explore players tastes, this fast iterative process generated a wealth of exploratory game designs and art, uncovering much more than one project’s worth of possibilities.

3. Be water, my friend 

Yes, it’s a quote, but it’s a powerful one from Bruce Lee that I wholeheartedly believe in.

This industry constantly presents new challenges, and today, AI is transforming the landscape. Change is inevitable, and it’s essential to embrace it and seize the opportunities it brings. A strong team should feel empowered to adapt and evolve, both creatively and technically. My priority is to cultivate a team mindset that’s brave and flexible, enabling them to accept and navigate the complexities of development, and thrive in our ever-evolving world.

The group below is an interpretation of the Sims Social character style. While Playfish was known for its charming, cute characters, we wanted to bring strong, adult-oriented personalities to this post-Sims Social project. The same art team from above, developed this more mature style in just three weeks, then moved on to character ideas. Again we focused on modern tropes and themes to help our demographic connect directly with the game’s setting.

4. Clarity and Consistency

At Playfish, I regularly gathered and shared all our prototyping work across character design, environmental art, and UI. Our goal was to make our creative journey visible to the entire team and senior leadership.

For me, creative transparency and regular, open communication between departments are the backbone of efficient game development.

Once a project moved beyond prototyping, I collaborated with the Lead Artist and UI Lead Artist to develop comprehensive documentation outlining every art-related aspect of the game.

Given the large scale of this particular project, these documents covered everything from an artistic style guide to a technical asset-importing guide.

This type of documentation is essential for setting expectations. It establishes a unified art style, reliable asset integration, and predictable delivery timelines. The goal is stability and consistency, reducing surprises and supporting a smooth, cross-departmental development process.

This way, we always know where we are — and where we’re headed.

The above is a very light overview and there's plenty more I'd like to cover but.... 

It’s locked away, as is most prototyping work we do sadly. Playfish was a particularly productive company, over a single year of tablet prototyping we created a wide selection of interesting game designs. Thanks for reading.