GAME DESIGNER / SYSTEMS · QUESTS · PROGRESSION · TECHNICAL
MARIO
MERGOLA
I am a game designer with an engineering degree. I take unformed ideas and unfinished parts of a game and make them work together: quest states, mission logic, progression rules, branching outcomes, design documentation, and the databases used by multiple departments.I write the specs and then implement them. On the open-world MMORPG, Scars of Honor, I organized player verbs into 12 quest archetypes to protect against repetitive content, and rebuilt the design-facing quest database so Design and Engineering worked from one source of truth. On Ascend, I built the climb around the five stages of grief, with zodiac puzzles gating the player's ascent past the people trapped there before them.I came to games from technical design, where I delivered projects north of $50M. That is where I learned that constraints are the design, not an obstacle to it.What follows is not a highlight reel of finished screens. Each piece shows how I think about gameplay as a system: player actions, state changes, conditions to check, the failure modes, and how a team implements it without guessing.
Each piece opens into a breakdown of the logic underneath: what the player does, what the system checks, and what engineering receives.
Game Design Portfolio -- Technical, Systems, Quests, Progression
What My Portfolio ShowsMy strength is being a key liaison between Design and Engineering. I thrive in: implementation, mission logic, quest systems, progression structures, player-facing rules, branching outcomes, documentation, and data structures that hold critical data from which the team can build.I am not only showing finished content in my portfolio. I am showing how I think through gameplay as a system: player actions, state changes, conditions to be checked, potentially bugs and errors, and how the team can implement it smoothly.
UNDER CONSTRUCTIONMy portfolio should be formatted properly shortly, but here are the individual links:
MASS EFFECT 2: MISSION LOGIC RECREATION
Scars of Honor (In Development) -- Quest Designer / Systems Designer / Encounter Designer
Impact Snapshot: Designed and structured MMORPG quest/content systems across 18+ quests, 120 phases, 100+ NPCs, 23* quest items, and major spreadsheets tracking 500+ content entries and 700+ enemy types/variations.
Challenge: MMO Quest Scalability
Solution: I treated quests as systems, not one-off content. I built multi-step quests with clear states, branches, and conditions, and supported them with shared quest data that other departments could reference through our shared server setup. I worked closely with narrative, systems, and level design to make sure quests fit naturally with combat, exploration, and world progression.
Result: The quests were flexible, replayable, and easier to extend without rework. Shared data reduced back-and-forth between teams and made iteration faster, helping establish a cleaner, more maintainable quest pipeline for the project.
Technical Design Proof: Created MMORPG quest content around objectives, quest states, triggers, conditions, NPC and object references, branching outcomes, and shared data used for implementation, testing, and cross-discipline collaboration.
Ascend (Shipped) -- Narrative Director, Game Designer, Content Designer
Impact Snapshot: Helped ship a puzzle-adventure game with a distributed team of roughly 20 contributors, connecting narrative progression, puzzle logic, player guidance, and implementation-ready documentation from concept through release.
Challenge: Risk of Narrative-Gameplay Misalignment
Solution: I designed story beats, puzzles, and progression together instead of treating narrative as a separate layer. I worked closely with the Creative Director to prototype puzzles that supported the themes of the world, and I kept documentation focused and practical so other teams always knew what was needed and why.
Result: The final game delivered puzzles that supported immersion instead of interrupting it. Clear documentation and early alignment reduced iteration time and helped the team ship on schedule with a consistent narrative and gameplay experience.
Technical Design Proof: Designed puzzle and story content around player guidance, clues, interaction states, progression gates, and scripted logic so the puzzle advanced the story without confusing the player... as well as rewarding the player with a sense of accomplishment.
Pandora: Chains of Chaos (Shipped) -- Narrative Designer, Game Designer, Content Designer
Impact Snapshot: Helped ship an open-world action-adventure game with a small remote team of roughly 10 contributors, supporting mission structure, narrative triggers, quest flow, and Unreal implementation across design, programming, and level design.
Challenge: Open-World Narrative Pacing
Solution: I designed mission structures that allowed player freedom while protecting narrative pacing. By working closely with Programming and Level Design, I aligned narrative triggers, quest flow, and gameplay systems in Unreal Engine so story beats fired reliably and supported player flow.
Result: The game delivered a clear narrative arc within an open world. Story and gameplay supported each other, helping maintain player engagement and emotional continuity throughout the experience.
Technical Design Proof: Aligned open-world mission pacing with quest triggers, narrative conditions, level flow, and reliable story-state progression so players could explore without breaking the intended main arc.
The Tūn-Gāst of Oakshaw (Not Released) -- Lead Game Designer
Impact Snapshot: Led an 11-person design team while working in-engine to prepare reusable level structures, object placement examples, workflow standards, and implementation templates for other designers.
Challenge: Scale and Team Growth
Solution: As Lead Game Designer, I focused on setting clear design direction and feedback loops. I ran live design sessions, mentored designers through hands-on reviews, and shared prototypes through GitHub to keep work visible and collaborative. Design decisions focused on long-term engagement rather than short-term, episodic content.
Result: The team delivered cohesive systems while improving collaboration and individual skill growth. Designers gained confidence and ownership, and the project benefited from clearer workflows and more consistent, player-focused design decisions.
Technical Design Proof: Worked in-engine to prepare level structures for other designers, setting up playable spaces, layout logic, object placement, and workflow examples and templates that helped bring high-level direction into a format the team could use to then build within the project’s design standards.
Writing Sample -- Narrative Designer and Game Writer
This cutscene sample would play at the start of a mission in a Mafia/Payday-style open-world crime simulation game. The playable character is Rafael and the player has been briefed about the particulars of the mission, including the presence of glass-break sensors.This scene underwent three iterations based on feedback from professional narrative designers.