M+DEV

Caleb has been animating for video games for 17 years. He has touched many titles along the way, but the ones that stuck with him the most are Wolfenstein(2009), Call of Duty: Online, Warzone and PUBG: Battlegrounds. He started as a Motion Capture tech and is now the Animation Director at PUBG Madison.

Allison Salmon has been a software engineer for video games for over 19 years. From being a senior software engineer in AAA games, to analysis of games use in education, to leading a team developing live action games for kids, she has a wide range of experience in the game industry. She currently works at Filament games as a developer and an instructor for the Game Design and Interactive Media Major at University of California - Irvine.

Forrest Pando is a North Carolina-based lighting artist for Lost Boys Interactive, a studio recently acquired by Gearbox Software. Before becoming a lighting artist, Forrest was a filmmaker for seven years working alongside his wife. Forrest decided to switch careers at the beginning of the pandemic shortly after playing The Last of Us II, a game that made him realize he wanted to be a part of an industry which could tell such inventive and compelling stories. Leveraging his past experience as a filmmaker and the soft skills developed as a business owner, Forrest was quickly hired after grad school as an associate lighting artist and was promoted to staff within the first six months of employment.

Kayla Belmore a Senior Producer at Gearbox Software, most recently shipping “Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands.” Her first foray into the gaming industry was working as a Personal Assistant at Irrational Games, an opportunity she capitalized on to learn the ropes behind game production and pipeline management. From there she made the transition to Tech Associate Producer at FireForge where she optimized multiple facets of the business - everything from release management procedures to internal communication pathways between teams in multiple cities. In 2016, Kayla joined Gearbox Software as a Producer, working as an Art AP on “Battlebor” DLC, and eventually managing the content creation pipeline for “Borderlands 3.”

Morgan Brantner grew up in the midwest and attended UW-Stout for his undergraduate and postgraduate degrees. He is a generalist game designer and producer currently working in the motion capture industry. He has recently finished his MFA thesis on cooperative games with the culmination being his game project Abyss.

Kyle Abbate is a QA Analyst at Lost Boys Interactive. He was born with Cerebral Palsy and uses his unique perspective to push for accessibility in gaming. Kyle has talked and consulted about his accessibility needs for various companies including Netflix, Xbox, and Eidos Montréal.

Alex Loughran (He/Him) is a Game Designer who's worked all over the globe on myriad of different projects, including some in mobile, VR, and AAA. Now living in Madison, Wisconsin, he works remotely with Demiurge Studios based out of Cambridge, MA. He's currently fixated on trying to find different methodologies to ground game design decisions. When he's not working, he's either at a table playing some board games or at a woodshop making a bigger table to play even more board games.

Susan Cenci has spent 20 + years in the games industry where she’s worked on multiple projects as an Art Director and Lead Artist including the Saints Row and NASCAR franchises. She’s currently working at Lost Boys Interactive focused on Art Direction for the studio’s new unannounced title. Lost Boys Interactive is located in Madison, Wisconsin but Susan works offsite from Columbus, Ohio.

"Sarah is an artist, game designer, educator, and a fierce advocate for the kids who play our games. Sarah knows that kids won’t learn anything if they don't care. She makes sure we're designing games that are fun, beautiful, and compelling.

Sarah understands the importance of art in bringing our games to the public. She created our in-house art and communications team. She also leads game design projects and pitches concepts for new games. Her growing interest in Media Studies and theory influenced by the psychoanalytic tradition is the foundation of her focus on learning games and their role in society. "

"Rob began his journey in video games by trying to combine his love of music, sound, and games as a freelance sound designer. After completing one contract, Rob realized his passion for development extended beyond audio, and entered SMU’s prestigious Guildhall program as a level designer. After graduation, Rob worked on such titles as Bioshock Infinite, Batman: Arkham Origins, and Prey 2, all during his five years at Human Head Studios. His personal favorite title, however, was 2011’s cult hit Earth Defense Force: Insect Armageddon (during Rob’s time at Vicious Cycle Studios).

After working for three years in Silicon Valley for 21st Century Fox and Disney at Cold Iron Studios on Aliens: Fireteam Elite, Rob was appointed to the faculty of Purdue University in 2019. He is now a Professor of Practice in the Computer Graphics Technology department, teaching game design, level design, and game audio. Rob has also authored two books, ""A Career in Video Game Development"" published by eAcademic Press, and ""Game Design Fundamentals,"" to be published soon by Kendall Hunt. "

Shaina works as the Studio Operations director at Filament Games, primarily focusing on the production process, resourcing for project, and hiring. Additionally Shaina is responsible for directly managing the production and A/V and sound departments. She has worked in the game industry for 15 years both at Filament and in AAA.

"Dan Miller is a video game and web developer, busy making games for 2 years and developing professionally since 2016.

He is currently working as all roles developing a tower defense rougelite Seeb Defender, a game with procedural plant growth at its core."

Simon Hoffiz is an architect with a deep curiosity for everything related to design! Simon holds a bachelor’s degree in Environmental Design and a master’s degree in Architectural design and is currently working within the hospitality industry designing hotel buildings, in addition to serving as a professor of design studio at Kennesaw State University. Simon started diving into the field of Game Design in 2017 by collaborating in the development of multiple freeware games and participating in game jams, but what started as a “hobby” has now flourished into a theoretical game design model called “The Relational Joints Framework” that aims to help in the analysis and development of design experiences. Simon is also actively composing music for video games and other media under the handle Numinous Cry Project. Simon is originally from Puerto Rico but resides in Atlanta with his family since 2014. Reach out to Simon or see his full portfolio at simonhoffiz.com.

Ben Geisler is a Principle Engineer at Lost Boys Interactive. He also holds a PhD in Computer Science from Nova Southeastern University. Ben has been in the video game industry for more than twenty years, working on prolific titles such as Soldier of Fortune 2, Quake 4, Hulk Ultimate Destruction, Batman Arkham Origins, Rune 2 and others. He is now a principle at LBI working on a major AAA title. He enjoys artificial intelligence, gameplay and anything to do with game systems. As part of his doctoral work, Ben wrote a new language for UE4 called GAMESPECT and lead a team of independents creating a music based game on UE4. Ben is first and foremost a game developer, but he also enjoys teaching from time to time.

Nina Cammarata is a Senior Environment Artist and team lead at PUBG Madison where she is working on exciting new things for PUBG. Previously, she has worked on games such as Injustice 2 Mobile and Mortal Kombat X Mobile. At PUBG she has contributed to many maps, including Sanhok, Karakin, Haven, Deston, and many others. In her free time she is an active member of the game art community and likes to spend time honing her skills, particularly with materials and textures.

Krista-Lee M. Malone is a member of the teaching faculty with UW-Madison’s Game Design certificate and coordinator of both the UW Game Lab and the certificate. Her past research has included MMORPGs, the making of educational games in Taiwan (where she concurrently worked as a designer and consultant) and using game design in the social sciences, especially anthropology, and for community outreach. Dr. Malone is currently working on designing engaging serious games as well as experimenting with educational uses of Twitch.tv and Discord. She is also a board member of MKEsports, an alliance aimed at positively growing the culture and connectivity of regional esports groups, gamers, businesses, and community partners. If you want to geek out with her, she can be found on Twitter and Twitch under the tag “GamerAnthro.”

Jackie Cummings is a Lecturer and recent MFA graduate at UW Stout. She is teaching in Design Foundations. Her BFA is in Game Design and Development. Her masters research focused on project management, illustration and teaching.

Maxwell has been leading game development teams working across a broad range of genres for over 10 years. He's currently the lead producer on an upcoming title in the Aliens universe, and previously was one of the founders of Riot Forge, an indie publishing label at Riot Games.

Matt Forbeck is an award-winning and New York Times-bestselling author and game designer with over thirty novels and countless games published to date, which have won dozens of honors. His recent work includes Biomutant, Minecraft Dungeons: The Rise of the Arch-Illager, the new Dungeons & Dragons: Endless Quest books, the Shotguns & Sorcery roleplaying game based on his novels, and the upcoming Marvel Multiverse Role-Playing Game.  He lives in Beloit, Wisconsin, with his wife and five children, including a set of quadruplets. For more about him and his work, visit Forbeck.com. 

Mary is a game artist and designer at Field Day Lab, who finds passion in contributing to a more curious and playful world through the interactive experiences she creates

Kirsten is currently a product manager at PerBlue where she’s the product owner for Disney Heroes: Battle Mode. She has over 15 years of experience in gaming ranging from customer support and community management, to product strategy and production. From MMORPGs on Steam to free to play mobile games, Kirsten has worked at companies large (SEGA) and small (Three Rings and PerBlue) providing a range of experience and perspectives on product development, team success, and healthy life balance. Outside of work, Kirsten enjoys hiking and camping with her son, and reading books.

Karl Koehle (said "Kay-lee) is a Lecturer in the Game Design B.F.A. program at the University of Wisconsin - Stout where he teaches courses in 2D and 3D Game Design, and how to create, animate and integrate game art assets. His background in 3D Animation, and is currently pursuing a MFA in Design at UW-Stout.

Jenna brings a background of over 10 years of experience in sports marketing, brand partnerships and client development. She is a seasoned brand storyteller building smart, strategic business relationships between a brand and its consumer helping craft the business narrative for any discipline, vertical or industry. Her client work includes consistently working with brands to ensure they are maximizing opportunities with their existing consumers and driving new customer acquisition strategies through Version1 esports and gaming portfolio. Expertise in esports, sports, entertainment, experiential and loyalty marketing.

Jared Pace is a producer and game designer that has worked with GaaS and LiveOps for a decade. He's previously worked on World of Tanks Console and Rumbleverse, and is currently a producer for Lost Boys Interactive.

Jared Brooks is a QA professional with over 6 years experience working across various disciplines within Game Development. Despite this, his home is with Quality Assurance- where he enjoys the process of being a part of all facets of game development while seeking new ways of evolving the powers and abilities of Games QA. He has worked on titles such as Demon's Souls, Tiny Tina's Wonderlands, and Dreadnought, among others. Jared Brooks now lives in Houston, Texas. Working remotely with Lost Boy Interactive where he is a Lead QA Analyst working on exciting new projects with LBI.

Mike Dahle is a business teacher from Elkhorn teacher by day and the President of the Wisconsin High School Esports Association by night. He leads 100+ schools competing in organized competition to enrich the educational experience.

Brandon is one of Wisconsin’s most visible and respected executive leaders, exemplified through both professional and community efforts.

His organization, the MKEsports Alliance (www.mkeesports.com), has quickly risen to prominence in the area of regional esports development, through its efforts around esports friendly state legislation, creation of a groundbreaking workforce development program, launching of the Wisconsin Esports Summit and overall role in accelerating the connectivity and culture of esports in the state.

In the community, Brandon has been an active participant and contributor to a number of causes. Most notable is his work with the Salvation Army, where he helped develop and scale a prominent emerging professional group, Echelon, as well as lead the Milwaukee County Board of Directors for a number of years.

For these efforts, Brandon has been recognized in a number of capacities, including:

• 2021: “Power Broker” Milwaukee Business Journal

• 2019: “Philanthropic 5” United Way of Greater Milwaukee/Waukesha

• 2018: “40 Under 40” Milwaukee Business Journal

• 2017: “Graduate of the Last Decade: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (Alma Mater)

• 2016: “Mr. Milwaukee” Milwaukee Magazine

Eric Lang is an art director and game designer at Field Day Lab. A seasoned generalist, Eric works on each part of an iterative design process from conceptualization to high fidelity designs and finished product, as well as oversees the game branding and communication visuals of Field Day. As Art Director, He works closely with artists and developers to create fun, beautiful educational video games.

Gagnon is the director of Field Day at the University of Wisconsin - Madison, a game studio and learning research laboratory. Field Day has shipped over two dozen games that have been played over four million times in total. Gagnon is the co-chair of the GEE! Learning Game awards and a founder of the Play Make Learn Conference. Gagnon's research explores the use of game data and data mining to learn about game design, player thinking and experience, and the development of new learning theory based on large scale game play data.

"Dr. Christina Outlay is the Executive Director of Maydm, a Madison, WI-based nonprofit organization working to prepare girls and underrepresented youth for careers in STEM. Dr. Outlay is also an Associate Professor of Information Technology at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, where she has taught since 2011 in addition to leading multiple initiatives to support women and underrepresented students pursuing IT careers. She is the founder of colorcoded, Inc. Christina holds a B.A. in Psychology and M.S. in Information Systems from DePaul University and a Ph.D. in Management Information Systems from the University of Illinois at Chicago, along with 12 years of IT corporate and military experience and 13 years of academic teaching and research experience.

Christina has been a Project Management Professional (PMP) since 2002, ITIL Foundations certified since 2004, Certified ScrumMaster (CSM) since 2014, and Certified Scrum Product Owner since 2019. She is President of the Sun Prairie Police Commission, board member for Ghana Code Club, past board member for Collaboration for Good, 2019 Madison Magnet Impact Award finalist, 2018 UW-Whitewater College of Business and Economic Service Award recipient, 2017 Brava Woman to Watch, and 2013 UW System Outstanding Woman of Color in Education. She has been quoted in The Capital Times, Madison 365, and Wisconsin State Journal."

Chase is a design leader with over 20 years experience making high quality interactive experiences for a variety of audiences. He has helped companies teams, products, and even new technologies that push the gamin industry forward. During his career he has worked with some great industry leaders at a variety of studios including: Atlassian, Disney, Microsoft EA, THQ, Ubisoft and Take-Two Interactive.

Bobby Lockhart is an award-winning game designer based in Chicago, who specializes in educational and family-friendly games.

Ben Rassier works as a Business Development Manager with Spectrum Industries - a leading manufacturer of product and design in gaming arenas across all levels. After his personal skills in gaming peaked playing Halo at collegiate LAN parties, he transferred his energy into sales, product development and advocacy. His passion and belief in the benefits of both gaming and traditional sports are a natural combination for promoting esports in education and beyond. Based out of western WI, he has worked with groups across the country from k-12, collegiate, professional, public and private sector to bring their programs to the next level.

Austin is a Lecturer of Game Development in the University of Michigan’s College of Engineering, Co-Founder of the International Game Developers Association (Ann Arbor Chapter), maintainer of the Michigan Game Studios Database (https://michigangamestudios.com), and President of Arbor Interactive, a Midwestern game and software development firm (https://www.arborinteractive.com). A long-time indie developer, Austin got his taste of AAA game engineering with the release of The Sims 4, followed by stops at EA Mobile and Facebook. His students have achieved positions at Naughty Dog, Santa Monica Studio, Unity, 343 Industries, Epic Games, Riot Games, NetherRealm Studios, Deep Silver Volition, and Schell Games among many others. (https://ayarger.com)

Jacob Klein is a Software Engineer at Lost Boys Interactive. He graduated from UW-Whitewater in 2020, and was the President of the school's Game and Media Entertainment Developers (GAMED) club in his final years. He has been a part of many game projects of all sizes, and has attended multiple M+Dev conferences throughout the years.

Jenn Scianna is an administrative guru and producer at Field Day Lab. She oversees the intern program and works on logistics of integrating research, design, and collaborations. In her spare time, she enjoys hanging with her rescued ponies and cats. Her research work as a doctoral student focuses on how kids respond to games in the classroom.

Autumn Beauchesne is a game developer, programmer, writer, and currently the Lead Game Engineer at Field Day Lab. She's been working on educational games for the past seven years and is a strong advocate for development tools that empower the whole team.

Erik has been in and around the game industry for many moons. He's seen great projects, learning opportunities, teams of all types, and most importantly, been able to coach young talent that is currently working across the country making great games. There is a reality of making games, and Erik is constantly working towards it.

He is currently growing the Game Design Program at Dakota State University, tying the professional community to higher education in the Midwest. The program is unique because of the team development portion of the education, and Erik is always looking to improve it, and make it more appropriate and realistic for future development talent.

Grant Ervin is a multi-disciplined Game Designer at PUBG Madison whose team most recently released the new PUBG map Deston. Grant was one of the designers for the map’s unique loot, vehicles, and other gameplay elements. Along with his work at PUBG, Grant designs and develops solo projects ranging from mind bending Survival Horror and Action-RPGs, to light hearted board games.

Jay Johns is a Lecturer in the Computer Science department at Purdue University Fort Wayne. He has worked in the game industry since 2007, starting as a Quality Assurance Tester at D3 Publisher of America, Inc. From there, holding roles as a Programmer, Project Manager, and Design Lead. During the eight years of owning the technology company 3r Interactive, LLC, Jay focused primarily on User Experience (UX) and worked as a consultant as an On-Demand Chief Technology Officer for startup companies.