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My name is Viljar Sommerbakk. I’ve worked in the video games industry since March 2000, on PC, consoles and mobile.

I got my start doing hands-on level design and world building. This included creating and populating large playfields with art assets and gameplay from start to finish, blocking out levels, visual scripting, events, item placement and enemy encounters.

Later I got more involved with the wider aspect of game design: core systems, player feedback, controls, player movement, NPC and boss design, as well as player progression, onboarding and direction of the player experience. I have written concepts and designs on many projects, providing high level as well as detailed game, level and technical specifications.

I've been part of developing action gameplay on several projects, and have also done game- balancing and tuning, trying to maximize the fun in existing features.

I am experienced as a lead designer and team lead, providing direction, mentorship and management to teams of designers as well as cross-discipline teams, communicating design goals, challenges and solutions.

I am currently working as a game director and am mostly involved with strategy and direction of features and experiences rather than detailed design and implementation.

My all-time favorite game is Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem on the Nintendo GameCube.

Planner

I’m a “Planner” according to this test on the What Kind of Designer Are You? website.

"When the details are still fuzzy, you’re great at making a plan that people can understand and implement. Without getting too close to a final solution, you’re able to set the boundaries for a project so that everyone on the team knows what to do and can pull in the same direction.

Key traits:

  • You enjoy making decisions and working towards the end result
  • Your work informs the final design
  • You often want to work alone to think things through
  • You like decisions to be based on data or insight


Watch out for:

  • Have you fully explored all of the possible options?
  • Have you done enough to help people visualize what you have in mind?
  • How could other people build on your work or help you spot problems?
  • Have you thought about the things that can’t easily be measured?"