# Jay Stevens (@jaystevens.me)

Profile: https://sifa.id/p/jaystevens.me
Headline: Passionate gameplay engineer experienced in Unreal Engine | Respawn Entertainment (EA)

## About

Making games has been my passion since I was 12 years old, when I started designing custom fan-made levels for Halo: Custom Edition and Team Fortress
2\.

I got my start in the industry at Electronic Arts, working as a gameplay engineer on the Battlefield Mobile team in Unreal Engine
4\. I worked on the project for most of its lifespan, beginning by engineering the game's weapon handling systems. Later, I would become the engineer responsible for crafting the singleplayer tutorial experience through Antelope Canyon.

In 2023, I joined Respawn on the Star Wars FPS team, using Unreal Engine
5\. I built on my experience with the Battlefield Mobile tutorial to develop tools that support combat and level designers. These tools focused on controlling the flow of story-driven missions: managing AI spawns, objectives, and world streaming logic. As part of this, I built a user-friendly Blueprint editor for encounter scripting, handling complex cases like unlocking doors in unloaded World Partition cells.

When the Star Wars project was cancelled in 2024, I was recognized for my Unreal expertise and joined Respawn’s Central Technology group to assist with early-stage prototyping in UE5. As part of a small, agile team, I handled "a little bit of everything", from networked multiplayer gameplay systems to continued support for rapid iteration tools. I can provide more details about my time in this role upon request.

In 2025, I rolled onto the Apex Legends team as a gameplay engineer, supporting designers with prototyping new content for future seasons. I’ve also contributed incremental bugfixes starting with Apex Legends Season 27.

## Experience

- **Senior Software Engineer (Generalist, Respawn Central Technololgy) at Respawn Entertainment** (2024 – 2025)
  Did "a little bit of everything" for early-stage prototyping within Unreal Engine 5.
  
  Work involved both gameplay programming and basic design for a variety of online-networked gameplay mechanics, as well as basic tooling support within the Unreal Editor to help content creators prototype gameplay more efficiently.
  
  More details available upon request.
- **Senior Software Engineer (Meta Systems, Untitled Star Wars FPS) at Respawn Entertainment** (2023 – 2024)
  Enhanced Unreal Engine’s stock level streaming system to support seamless traversal between arbitrary levels, maintaining uninterrupted first-person control.
  
  Also created a designer-facing markup and tagging framework to define and visualize gameplay spaces for encounter scripting and dynamic combat design, later reused on subsequent projects for its speed and ease of use.
- **Software Engineer II (Meta Systems, Untitled Star Wars FPS) at Respawn Entertainment** (2023 – 2023)
  Worked on metagame systems on Respawn's Untitled Star Wars FPS project, using Unreal Engine 5.
  
  Extended the Unreal Editor with custom functionality to assist content creation roles in creating and managing singleplayer story-based missions (helpers for listening to events across world partition cells, reusable ways to trigger complicated functionality such as cutscenes, etc.).
- **Senior Software Engineer (Gameplay, Apex Legends) at Respawn Entertainment** (2025 – present)
  Provided gameplay engineering support for Apex Legends beginning with Season 27.0, using an in-house variant of Valve's Source Engine.
  
  Focused on prototyping and implementing gameplay updates in collaboration with designers for upcoming seasons.
- **Software Engineer I (Gameplay, Battlefield Mobile) at Industrial Toys** (2019 – 2021)
  I was responsible for working on getting the weapons of Battlefield Mobile looking and feeling good, working closely with the gameplay designers to get things up to their specs.
  
  I also expanded upon the assertion framework I built as an intern, integrating with our internal Slack.
  
  I extended Unreal's stock "BugIt" functionality to allow users to press a button to take a screenshot and send device diagnostics to an internal Slack channel for help with debugging.
- **Engineering Intern (Gameplay, Battlefield Mobile) at Industrial Toys** (2019 – 2019)
  Internship at EA Industrial Toys working as a Gameplay Engineer in Unreal Engine 4.
  
  During my time in this role I developed our internal bug report system which was used throughout the lifespan of the project to automatically create bug tickets whenever we had an assertion in gameplay code.
- **Attractions Host at Disneyland Resort** (2014 – 2019)
  Responsible for working as a team under the direction of an Attractions Lead to operate rides with a focus on safety, courtesy, show, and efficiency.
  
  Additional responsibilities include managing crowd control and guest flow, remaining flexible to solve sudden problems and ensure a smooth operation.
  
  Was named 2018’s Enchanted Tiki Room Cast Member of the Year.
  
  Awarded over 40 "Guest Compliments", where a guest commented to the Disney Company itself on the quality of my work.
- **Graphic Designer at Lauren Studios of California** (2013 – 2019)
  Responsible for designing ID cards, posters, and tickets for schools and colleges from around California. Listened to client feedback and provided professional-quality images with a fast turnaround time.
- **Editor at Murrieta-Temecula Friday Night Lights** (2013 – 2014)
  Tasked with training and managing other journalists and photographers.
  
  Collected and edited articles from coaches and journalists, then compiled them into a weekly newsletter. Responsible for updating website and emailing newsletter on time and without errors.
- **Volunteer Journalist at Murrieta-Temecula Friday Night Lights** (2011 – 2013)
  Responsible for reporting on 3 to 4 “little league” football games every Friday.
  
  Duties involved taking pictures, writing detailed notes of games, and interviewing both coaches and players. Articles had to be written and edited with a very short turnaround time.
- **Clerk at Lauren Studios of California** (2010 – 2013)
  Responsible for mailing out flyers, handling cash and making change at school dances, importing raw images and handwritten data into computers, and providing technical support on-site to photographers at schools.
- **Software Engineer II (Gameplay, Battlefield Mobile) at Industrial Toys** (2021 – 2023)
  Took ownership of the Battlefield Mobile First Time User Experience as we prepared for live service. Implemented a new tutorial with cutscenes and voice acting. Worked with a single level designer and studio production to create this "singleplayer" tutorial experience with detailed user telemetry data without requiring additional development resources.
  
  Used Sequencer and Unreal Blueprints to create in-game cutscenes for complex setpieces, including a first-person helicopter crash and skippable cutscenes.
  
  Our tutorial completion rate improved from ~30% to 75% in soft launch when compared to open alpha, exceeding target KPIs.
  
  After soft launch, I pivoted to fill a gap in studio audio needs. Learning Wwise on the job, I reduced audio CPU time significantly by improving efficiency of raycast calls. I also implemented performant audio occlusion and obstruction on mobile devices, plus I simplified designer audio workflow for faster iteration, taking the process from minutes to seconds. I worked closely alongside audio designers and writers to implement in-game voice-over and worked with external partners at Dolby to implement Dolby Atmos on mobile phones.

## Education

- **California State University, Fullerton** — Computer Science (2016 – 2019)
- **Chaparral High School** — High School Diploma (2007 – 2011)
- **Mt. San Jacinto Community College District** — AA, Social and Behavioral Science (2011 – 2015)
- **California State University, Fullerton** — English (2015 – 2016)

## Skills

- Squirrel
- Unreal Engine 5
- Unreal Engine
- Jira
- Confluence
- Blueprint
- Wwise
- Photoshop
- Game Development
- Game Design
- Writing
- Creative Writing
- Unity3D
- 3D Studio Max
- Level Design
- C#
- Maya
- Illustrator
- Source Engine
- Unreal Engine 4
- C++
- Python
- Linux
- Debian
- Ubuntu
- Windows
- Windows 10
- Microsoft Word
- Microsoft Office
- Microsoft Excel
- Microsoft Outlook
- Visual Studio
- Microsoft PowerPoint
- HTML
- Java
- JavaScript
- Jenkins
- Sequencer

## Publications

- Adventures in Designing a Model Railroad — blog.jaystevens.me (https://blog.jaystevens.me/3m3j33ohky22a)
- Hello, world! — blog.jaystevens.me (https://blog.jaystevens.me/3m37qwf7e6k2z)

## Volunteering

- Secretary at Group 160 NTRAK

## Honors and awards

- Walt Disney's Enchanted Tiki Room Cast Member of the Year

## Languages

- English (native)

## Other profiles

- linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jay2645
- website: https://jay2645.itch.io/
- github: https://github.com/Jay2645
- activitypub: https://mastodon.social/@EnglishMobster