Genshin Impact

Summary

2021 - 2025

Genshin Impact is an open-world action RPG developed by HoYoverse. As a Level Designer, I worked across multiple game updates, designing and implementing content for open-world exploration, story dungeons, and limited-time mini-games.

Overview

Role

Level Designer

Responsibilities

Concept Development: Collaborated with a team of 4–5 level designers on gameplay concepts, narrative themes, and environment design for major updates.

Level Design: Independently designed open-world regions and dungeons, including exploration, combat, and puzzle mechanics.
Prototyping & Implementation: Built whitebox prototypes, scripted gameplay logic in Lua, and iterated based on testing feedback and player data.
Mini-game Design: Designed and implemented gameplay mechanics for limited-time events.
Cross-functional Collaboration: Worked closely with engineering, art, narrative, and QA teams from concept to final delivery.

Company

miHoYo

Years

2021 – 2025

Role

Level Designer

Genre

Open-world action RPG

Platform

PC · Console · Mobile

Team Size

1000+

Engine

Unity

Highlight works

Initium Iani - Sea of Bygone Eras

Open World

Sea of Bygone Eras is an underwater region in Genshin Impact, where players explore the ruins of a fallen ancient kingdom.

I worked on this open-world area from early concept development to release. What made this project special was its early exploration of environment-led guidance in Genshin Impact. I focused on gameplay-integrated camera design, helped drive the development of an in-editor real-time camera tool for level designers, and experimented with guiding players through the environment rather than relying on explicit quest instructions. The goal was to make exploration feel less like completing a checklist. The area achieved a high completion rate after launch.

Type

Open World

Version

4.6 （lanched at 2024.04)

Dev Time

2023.02 - 2024.03

My Role

Level designer

Canyon Traversal

Concept Development

Collaborated with a team member to develop a camera-driven parkour mechanic, drawing inspiration from Uncharted 4 and the cinematic camera work in Disney animated films.

Design & Implementation

Independently designed and implemented real-time camera behavior for underwater canyon traversal, and designed a parkour sequence featuring QTE mechanics.

Design Rationale

Reduced the difficulty of QTEs during traversal to minimize player frustration and maintain a smooth gameplay flow.

Level Design | Environment-led Quest Guidance

Environmental Storytelling & Guidance

Although this level follows a traditional 0/3 quest objective structure, I wanted to reduce reliance on text-based instructions and make exploration feel more immersive and natural.

To achieve this, I designed a visually striking Point of Interest (POI) to attract players’ attention, then used glowing chains as environmental cues to guide them toward the corresponding exploration locations.