He may not be the “dirtiest player in the game,” and it’s questionable whether he is “stylin’ and profilin’,” but Jesse’s boisterous appearances at the ping pong table have earned him the title of “Ric Flair of Ping Pong.” We’ll let him explain.

Why are you known as the ‘Ric Flair of Ping Pong’?
Ric Flair is the single most decorated world champion in the history of wrestling. He is in a class of his own, steamrolling his opponents with a wave of masterful execution, leaving them begging by the wayside for mercy. Winning is all that he knows how to do and he does it with impeccable style and magnificent grace. I’m pretty sure this is the comparison that most people draw with my Ping Pong skills. That, or I happen to yell “Wooo!” at the top of my lungs at random intervals of play.

How did you get started with Game Design?
I like to think that I was born with a controller in my hand. I’ve always been a gamer, and I will always continue to be one. So, as a young lad, I thought to myself, “Why not combine my biggest passion with my need for monetary sustenance?” Haven’t looked back since.

What kind of work did you do before coming to Blue Frog Gaming?
Well, straight out of school I did a bit of freelance character design work. Soon after, I was hired as a Level Designer at a small startup company called ‘Kiz Toys’. I spent about a year there, eventually working my way up to the role of Game Designer after only being there for a few months. After that, I migrated to the bitterly cold climate of Ohio to lend my talents at Blue Frog Gaming as their resident Game Designer. Also, I did some bartending before all this – I can make a mean Cosmopolitan.

What do you do as a Game Designer for Blue Frog Gaming?
My position mainly consists of trolling the developers as much as possible, ‘researching’ the latest and greatest social and mobile games, and blasting Dubstep playlists on Spotify into my eardrums. In my free time, I’m usually drawing up some crazy new game mechanics or trying to break existing game systems so that I can hand the devs some shiny new bugs to fix.

What projects have you worked on at Blue Frog Gaming?
A majority of my work belongs to Stardrift Empires, Polar Puzzles, and the occasional smaller endeavor, like Ghost Chicken. Currently, I spend most of my time working on a super-duper top-secret undisclosed mystery project that shall not be named or have its existence confirmed, but it’s going to be awesome.

What’s the biggest design challenge you’ve been faced with at Blue Frog Gaming?
There certainly have been a lot of challenges that I have faced here at Blue Frog Gaming. The biggest, so far, has probably been implementing enemy NPCs into Stardrift Empires. There were a lot of player expectations, requests, and outright demands going into it, so I definitely felt a lot of pressure to deliver something that would be viewed as both fun and fair to a universe where the slightest change can potentially cause devastating reverberations to the game balance and economy if not done correctly. Once we introduced the NPCs, we were able to respond quickly to player feedback, adjusting and iterating to ultimately provide something that I feel accomplished its intended goals of expanding upon the existing universe and giving the players additional targets to seek out and destroy for their enjoyment.

What’s your favorite Blue Frog Gaming game?
I have a soft spot for all the love and care that I put into Polar Puzzles. As the first title that I worked on here at Blue Frog Gaming, it kind of feels like my baby. Despite it not reaching the breakout hit status of casual games like ‘Angry Birds’ or ‘Cut the Rope’, I still view it as an extremely fun, challenging, and addicting puzzle game.

Anything else you want to share?
Yes. Woooooooo!

For the latest news and information from Blue Frog Gaming:
      

It’s time to go behind the scenes at Blue Frog Gaming and meet some of the Artists that make our games look good! First up, Wendy Fedan. We’ve previously shared postings from her Blue Frog Art Blog, but now it’s time to learn more about her!

How did you get started doing digital art / game related art?

I started out in college working more traditionally using colored pencils, inks, illustration board, etc. These days, though, the only people who do not use the computer to do their art are basically fine artists (and even many fine artists use the computer for their art). Anybody doing commercial illustration or graphics needs to create their art on the computer. Digital art makes it easy for a professional artist to make revisions, bottom line. I still use pencil and paper to do my sketching, but I always end up scanning my sketches and working in Photoshop and/or Illustrator to finish up the job. I am the only artist in our Blue Frog art team who uses pencil and paper on the job! It was funny – when I was hired, they actually had to order paper and pencils for me! I’ve never before worked in such a purely digital environment. Very different for me.

What kind of work did you do before coming to Blue Frog Gaming?

I was at American Greetings designing Christmas Ornaments for 10.5 years (designing Opus and Bill ornaments was a pretty great part of that job). After that I was lucky enough to have a few years experience working at home experiencing the life of a freelance illustrator/graphic artist while raising my two babies (now ages 4 & 6). During that time I really experimented a lot with my own creativity and dream-building, and launched my own creative website that is finally coming into fruition, CreateAWayToday.com (website facelift launching soon). I enjoy producing nurturing events where creatives can be inspired and in turn inspire others. Awww… sweet, eh? I focused on this a lot during my freelance years, and continue to make time for it while maintaining my awesome full time career at Blue Frog “with the guys.” Do I talk about warm fuzzy creative stuff with the guys at work? Heck no! We focus our intellectual discussions more upon cinematic masterpieces like The Three Amigos and Galaxy Quest. I can quote these films beginning to end which helps me fit in with the guys (now, if only more of them could quote Monty Python and Fawlty Towers with me)!

What are some pieces you have worked on at Blue Frog Gaming?

I have favorite pieces that I’ve worked on in all the games I was lucky enough to be a part of: Polar Puzzles, Ghost Chicken and Stardrift Empires. Here is a collection of my very favorites!

What is the biggest challange you have faced at Blue Frog Gaming?

Definitely ANYTHING I’ve done for the Stardrift Empires game. Realistic digital painting is not my niche, and realistic digital painting of sci-fi subject matter is even farther from my niche. Polar Puzzles and Ghost Chicken were definitely more within my comfort zone as an artist (I love drawing the cute stuff), but I have to say that the work I did for Stardrift has really helped broaden my artistic skills. I am thankful for that!

What is your favorite game you have worked on at Blue Frog Gaming?

I think Polar Puzzles has to be my favorite at this point because it was just so darn fun to work on. There were challenges, just like anything, but I learned a great deal while working on that game. And what a thrill to finally try my hand at animation (a childhood dream come true). Polar Puzzles was my baby project for a while which was totally awesome. While everyone else was working on Stardrift, I was working on Polar Puzzles – it gave me a strong sense of project ownership which gave me a great deal of pride for the work I was doing.

Make sure to check back often, or follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and/or Google+, for the latest look behind the scenes at Blue Frog Gaming