Michael Compton headshot

Michael Compton

I specialize in delivering high-impact experiences across complex, multi-disciplinary environments. At Electronic Arts and Sony Interactive Entertainment, I owned back-of-the-box features like Stadium Creator and Road to the Show while directing presentation and cinematics. At Sky Elements, I animated large-scale drone shows for world-class clients while simultaneously architecting the in-house add-ons and pipelines that enabled the team to scale to the next level.

What sets me apart is my ability to bridge dependencies—aligning design, art, engineering, and production to consistently ship flagship features and major live productions under pressure. My track record has been defined by turning bottlenecks into strengths, and delivering results that elevate both the product and the people.

Work Experience

Sky Elements — Developer, Animator

2024–2025

At Sky Elements, I served as both a developer and animator. On the technical side, I engineered a Blender-to-Unreal workflow that streamlined the proccess down to a one-click transfer, optimized our import/export processes which reduced turnaround time from hours to minutes, and built algorithmic toolsets for curve-based designs, dynamic formations, and complex color animations. These innovations empowered the team to handle larger, more complex shows with speed and creeative flexibility. At the same time, I animated full productions for clients including Lost Lands, Blizzard, MrBeast, Boots in the Park, and our flagship holiday show — consistently delivering under tight deadlines while leading the development of tools the team relied on every day.

Electronic Arts — Senior Game Designer

2022–2023

At EA, I was the principal designer of the dynamic opening cinematic for Super Mega Baseball 4, a feature that set the game’s tone from the first moment. I also designed the Legends feature, producing over 200 authentic character likenesses from modular assets. I was responsible for reworking in-game cameras and presentations, modeling, texturing, and lighting the main home screen UI with dynamic character animations, and owning art and branding for Legends League teams. I also created a Dynamic Sky Generator tool that rendered all stadium skyboxes for gameplay environments. Much of this was done alongside marketing and operations, where I helped shape how the game presented itself both in and out of gameplay.

Mountain Concepts — 3D Rendering Specialist

2021

For Mountain Concepts, I produced architectural visualizations for David Spear, taking high-level design ideas and rendering them into compelling 3D experiences for potential clients.

Mountain Concepts visualization 1
Mountain Concepts visualization 2

Sony Interactive Entertainment — Senior Game Designer

2017–2021

At Sony, I was the principal designer of Stadium Creator in MLB The Show, the flagship next-gen feature that distinguished the PlayStation 5 launch. I also led Road to the Show’s interactive RPG storylines, directed in-game cinematics, and enhanced presentation systems to deliver continuity across long-term progression. As product owner, I drove the design of Diamond Pack openings and other high-visibility features, balancing clarity, excitement, and polish. I collaborated closely with engineers and artists to ensure gameplay presentation matched the ambitions of a top-tier sports franchise.

Sony Interactive Entertainment — Game Designer

2012–2016

Earlier at Sony, I contributed to pioneering new design tools that streamlined how gameplay and presentation teams collaborated, laying groundwork that influenced years of content creation. I directed annual broadcast-style presentation packages, cinematic cameras, and innovative replay systems that expanded how players experienced the game. I also mentored new hires and helped onboard them into cross-disciplinary pipelines. This period was where I learned to bridge art, engineering, and design in order to deliver features that became core to the product’s identity.

Education

Bachelors of Science - Audio Production

My background began in Audio Engineering and Sound Design, which continues to shape how I approach interactive experiences. Winning my place as the Sony Sound Design Intern in 2012 launched my career path. While I haven’t focused solely on Sound Design since then, it remains a major part of my identity and skill set.

Personal Projects

Superhive

I run a creator storefront on Superhive with 100% 5-star reviews and several hundred sales. It’s an outlet for delivering polished, useful tools and creative content, and a direct line to user feedback that informs my production work.

ArtStation

My ArtStation includes personal projects and older work, such as MIDINA — a complex polyphonic MIDI sequencer built with a dual-processor architecture.

Tabzoo

An algorithmic guitar chord inversion finder and fretboard scroller. Tabzoo lets you scroll a virtual fretboard to discover new inversions of defined chords, generate random chord sequences, save song sections, and preview chord inversions in real time.

Closing

Thanks for taking the time to explore my work. If you’d like to connect, reach me at comptonmc@gmail.com.