A selection of work
for Bloc Media
My first ‘proper’ job was working for one of the world’s top 50 digital agencies, Bloc Media. A mix of building websites, coming up with game concepts, designing levels, writing music, etc. I began managing client relationships not long after starting, delivering pan-European campaigns.
The Games List, Jet Bike Steve, and the hung parliament
TheGamesList was one of Bloc’s IPs, with the goal of becoming the best flash (RIP) games portal around. I was given the task of increasing traffic towards the site.
I came up with the concept of creating a Youtube channel. I lead the team in designing and setting up the page in under a week and populated it with game reviews, trailers, and walkthroughs, reaching over half a million people in the process.
My biggest achievement was creating a game in under a day based on a character invented by the actor Simon Pegg called Jet Bike Steve on Twitter. I came up with the concept in the morning, assembled a team, and had the game live by the end of the day. Mr. Pegg retweeted the link and our servers failed because of all the traffic. Not bad for a game made in a day.
Another game we made was during the UK general elections at a time when people were learning about the hung parliament. As a play on words, we decided to make a (somewhat dark) game in which the player gets to hang the different parliamentary candidates.
Snackville
Snackville is an online healthy-eating game for the British Heart Foundation that I took on from the initial brief. I played a key role in the game’s concept, direction, and development as well as being the main point of contact for the client throughout. I essentially created the game within a spreadsheet before this data was used to build the game itself.
During gameplay, the player designs vending machines and stocks them with healthy snacks, growing a business empire. Packed full of fun vending machines to buy and stock, crazy schools to unlock and hundreds of stock items to choose from, SnackVille is a joy.
itvWild
itvWild was a massive project for ITV Studios developed by Bloc to host all of ITV’s wildlife footage. It also housed the “World’s Wildest Quiz”, a flash quiz game with over 1,500 animal-related questions, 3 levels of difficulty, and a number of mini-games in between.
My initial role was as a web developer, building the static pages of the website. Once live, I was brought back onto the project as a creative producer and liaised with ITV continually over the website’s lifecycle.
Smokey Joe
TIM & KYM Stub Out the Diabolical Smokey Joe was a platform game for the British Heart Foundation, warning children of the dangers of smoking. It was taught in schools to kids during key stages 2 and 3. Players would collect tips about smoking whilst cleaning cigarette butts and jumping on the heads of smokers across 4 different levels. They would then use the knowledge they had gained in a quiz at the end of each level. Success would unlock the final level in which you had to defeat the evil Smokey Joe.
My part in the project was brainstorming, creating levels, creating music, testing, and building the web page.
Formula 1
I developed creative concepts for the Formula 1 2011 and 2012 games by Codemasters. I built the websites and came up with a series of mini-games that users could play and challenge their friends on. as well as creative development I also managed the project and dealt with all client communication, scheduling, and budget management.
We integrated Facebook so that players could easily see other players’ scores as well as increasing replay value as users came back to try and beat their peer’s scores. Users can either connect to Facebook or play as a guest, increasing the accessibility of the game.
