Rare - Sea of Thieve UI engineering
The Challenge
Joining Rare as a UI software engineer, I had the opportunity to contribute to Sea of Thieves: and the introduction of Guilds in Season Ten. This ambitious feature required close collaboration with the UI team, navigating a complex codebase, and implementing solutions to optimize performance across platforms.
The Solution
Guilds presented a multifaceted challenge. Firstly, it demanded tight integration between the Unreal C++ game engine and remote service APIs. This involved working closely with designers to translate Figma mockups into data models, defined using TypeScript. These models formed the data contract, ensuring seamless communication between the UI, engine, and remote services.
Secondly, the project required navigating and contributing to a large, established codebase. Adaptability and efficient problem-solving were crucial to ensure smooth integration and maintain code quality.
Thirdly, comprehensive testing was essential. I developed unit tests for UI functionality, meticulously tested across both PC and Xbox One development consoles, and conducted performance analysis to identify and address any bottlenecks.
Finally, streamlining workflows was crucial. I identified opportunities to improve UI development efficiency, notably by reducing unit test run-time by 90% and continuous integration UI test build times by 16 minutes.
My technical contributions included:
- UI development: Coding screens and components in TypeScript.
- Data Models: Defined and implemented data models in TypeScript, enabling smooth communication between the UI, game engine, and remote services.
- Unit Testing: Developed comprehensive unit tests for UI functionality, ensuring stability and quality.
- Performance Optimization: Identified and implemented optimizations to reduce unit test run-time and continuous integration UI test build times, streamlining the development workflow.
- Visual Styling: Using CSS, Sass and PostCSS to implement designs
Following the successful launch of Sea of Thieves Season Ten featuring Guilds, I transitioned onto the latest Rare game, Everwild. Here, I continue to work closely with designers, prototyping UI designs and exploring the capabilities of the Coherent Gameface middleware.