Cinder Ridge
Designing Intuitive Crew Control
Role:
Designer/Developer
Team:
3 Engineers, 1 Designer, 1 Concept Artist
Platform:
Game for PC and Console
Designing crew control that feels like leadership and teamwork, not micromanagement
Cinder Ridge is a game about forestry in the future, where players lead a small crew to restore and maintain a forest.
Players plant trees, clear brush, build trails, and manage the health of the forest ecosystem.
To emphasize themes around teamwork and leadership, we wanted the player character to both manage and participate in the work being done - all through an intuitive controller interface.
Through iterative testing, the design coalesced around a basic insight: the metaphor of "directing the crew" should support player goals, not get in the way.
Players cared about what gets done, not who does it
Players need to switch seamlessly between precise action and efficient large-scale work
Crew behavior must be intuitive and predictable
The final system seamlessly blends direct control with strategic delegation, letting players fluidly shift from hands-on work to team coordination.
Prototyping
Walking Single-File
To capture the feeling of hiking and climbing in the mountains, we wanted the game to feature rugged terrain that could be traversed with some light platforming.
Single-file movement worked because it leveraged familiar real-world behavior—people naturally form lines when navigating challenging terrain together.
Dialogue-Based Delegation
This interface modeled English sentences: "Ask [person] to [perform action] at [location]."
Although this interface was intuitive and had an immediate appeal, testing showed that character selection added too much friction.
Players cared more about what gets done than who does it.
Coordinated Movement
In this prototype, players could group crew members together, and then instruct them to line up to “sweep” an area, moving in unison to scare wildlife out of the brush.
The “line-up” mode had obvious utility and immediate appeal, but the indirect control scheme was awkward when performing coordinated movements.
Players wanted to participate directly in the action, especially while coordinating with their crew.
Seamless Switching Between Precise and Mass Selection
For complex tasks like building infrastructure, I explored a system where crew members attempt to copy the player’s actions on nearby targets.
This was a great compromise that allowed the player character to participate directly in the work while making it useful to “scale up” with more crew.
Smart, contextual target selection and a seamless control for mass editing made eliminated the tedium of big jobs while helping the crew feel lively.
Action Selection:
Who Does What?
Equipment-Based Action Selection
Brief exposition on the importance of equipment to crew control - from character selection to tool selection
critique of linear cycling as second-order decisionmaking. Original idea about multitasking with party members became less useful when other methods of delegation sta
Equipment Defines Who Can Do What
Players can configure character equipment from a conventional menu interface.
Choosing Tools, Not Characters
Players quickly select from among tools held by their crew, reducing the cognitive load of managing many characters at once.
Tools Filter Available Actions
Each tool works on specific objects in the environment, limiting user error.
Players can manage their equipment and other items with a compact menu interface
Exposition on first pass of equipment - how having more crew improves your ‘carrying capacity’.
critique how the simulation approach / assumptions of the old inventory system were a misstep, added bad friction that got in the way of player goals
Insight about focusing in on player goals rather than simulating annoying logistical details
Next Steps
Replace Linear Cycling with Instant Selection
Holding R2 / RT reveals a radial menu where tools can quickly be selected with a flick of the right stick.
This interface removes the friction caused by linearly “cycling” through tools, allowing players to make their selection instantly, with an intitive compound input.
One Tool A Time
The entire crew holds the same tool type; everyone in the party is either holding the active tool, or holding nothing and standing by.
Separate Collectibles & Consumables from Equipment
Tools are their own category, separate from consumables, collectibles, and other items.
Selection and Placement:
Who does what, where?
First Pass: Direct Character Control, Indirect Placement
In my initial implementation, the player controlled their character's position directly, with the character always facing forward in the direction it moved. Selection and placement were handled through a spherical trigger volume positioned in front of the character.
The character-focused interface I’d developed was actually an indirect and cumbersome way to specify where an action should be performed.
Testing showed that direct control of the character’s position wasn’t relevant to the strategic decisions players wanted to make—what really mattered was precise selection and placement.
Making Selections and Placements with Greater Precision
Cursor-Based Movement
I switched to a system where the player directly controls the position of a cursor, and their character follows closely behind.
This allowed much more precise placement and selection by removing the indirection of character positioning, while preserving the sense of embodied movement through the world.
Enable complex planning with precise cursor-based drawing
Players can draw construction plans directly in the world. A modifier button enables on-the-fly snapping for precision, with the first placement aligning to cardinal directions and subsequent additions snapping relative to existing structures.
This allows players to communicate complex intentions that crew members understand as coordinated tasks, moving beyond simple point-and-click targeting.
Feedback and Rotation Control for Placement
Orientation is mapped to camera control; the item faces the camera and rotates as players orbit around, enabling direct and intuitive rotational control.
Contextual Crew Coordination
How can players quickly shift between precise control and coordinated group work?
Formation Menu
Players needed seamless transitions between two different mindsets—'I am working alongside my crew' versus 'I am directing my crew's work'—without jarring interface changes.
To reduce the number of decisions players had to make, I implemented a menu that organized crew coordination behavior and selection modes into three 'formations.'
Arbitrary Categories vs. Player Intent
Players had to break out of the game world to access formation options that didn't align with how they conceptualized their crew's work.
The formation categories felt arbitrary rather than meaningful to players' actual decision-making process. Players were more concerned with whether they needed precision control or wanted to coordinate their crew on larger tasks.
I reworked existing features into a streamlined, context-driven interface with a quick toggle between Solo and Together modes
Solo allows players to queue up precise actions by assigning the next ready crew member to a specific selection
Together uses smart multi-selection to assign nearby targets to all available crew
Coordinated movement modes—like lining up to mow a field with the brush cutter—activate only when using relevant tools together
These were major improvements, but players still had difficulty understanding the state of the crew
Next Steps:
Clearly communicate the state of the crew with a dynamic camera and streamlined, character focused UI
Closeup
The camera pulls in tight to frame the player character and the first crew member in line.
Letterboxing creates a clear visual distinction between the two modes, as well as a more cinematic composition.
Wide Shot
The camera pulls back and frames all crew members holding the active tool.
Centering the Crew
In both cases, the camera is centered at the midpoint of all relevant crew members, rather than just the player character. This:
Creates more dynamic / cinematic visual compositions
Emphsizes the feeling of working together.
Makes crew member’s facial expressions and state more readable.
Scheduling and Automation
How can players scale up their operations without losing the collaborative feeling of hands-on work?
An early idea for player progression was that players could gradually recruit additional crew members with expertise in different areas.
However, testing revealed diminishing returns beyond about 8 crew members—there are only so many objects and work areas within range of the player, so controlling additional characters doesn’t add as much benefit.
The challenge was to create a progression path which:
Supported themes about leadership and teamwork
Improved the player's operational capacity in meaningful ways
Maintained the feeling of collaborative work and embodied participation
Burnout provides incentives to give crew members rest days
Characters get burnt out if they go too long without a rest day. A weekly calendar interface allows players to manage their crew’s schedules.
Recruiting additional crew then allows players to spread the work out among more people, balancing work related goals with the wellbeing of the crew.
Assignments reduce tedium and shift focus to big-picture strategy
Assignments allow players to delegate complex tasks to groups of characters, freeing them up to consider big-picture strategy.
This provided detailed control while eliminating repetitive micromanagement, but produced tension between scaling up and staying connected to the work.
Schedule work with a map based interface
A map-based interface expanded on the existing project planning tools, letting players schedule work at specific sites as needed.
These systems did provide compelling ways to manage the crew at a higher level, but diminished the importance and immersive feeling of direct collaboration.
Next Steps:
Encourage direct participation through meaningful collaboration rewards
Participation Rewards
The player character provides buffs to NPCs and builds stronger relationships through direct collaboration, creating meaningful reasons to sometimes join scheduled work.
This approach lets players focus on high-level decisionmaking while making direct participation a meaningful choice rather than a hard requirement.
Building a Trail Section
How does the complete system feel in a real workflow?
Blazing a Trail
The player needs to clear a path for a new trail through dense forest. Shrubs, trees and fallen logs crowd the intended path - exactly the kind of multi-step task that showcases both precision control and collaborative teamwork.
Tree Clearing: Solo to Coordinated Work
Tree Clearing: Solo to Coordinated Work
The player starts alone but quickly gathers her crew when the job proves too big. In solo mode, each press of A sends the next available crew member to fell a selected tree, letting her maintain precision while scaling up the work.
Processing Fallen Log: Contextual Axe Actions
The same axe tool automatically removes branches when targeting the log, then cuts it into smaller sections. The system recognizes the context and provides the right action.
Moving Log Sections: Coordinated Movement
Log pieces are too heavy for one person. Multiple crew members automatically coordinate to lift and carry each section together.
The player controls the entire crew’s movements directly, and places the log carefully off to the side of the work area.
Planning and Scheduling
The player sketches the trail route directly in the world, then schedules tomorrow's brush clearing work before heading home.
Joining the Work
Joining the Work
The next morning, the player chooses to work alongside her crew as they build the planned trail.
Result
After two in-game days, a major trail section is complete. The player seamlessly shifted between hands-on work and strategic coordination as the situation demanded.
Conclusion
Impacts
The final system transforms crew management from a series of explicit decisions into contextual, fluid interactions.
Where the original prototype required players to think "Ask [Character] to perform [Action] at [Target]" - creating decision fatigue around character selection - the equipment-based system lets players think more naturally: "I need to clear these trees" or "This log needs to be moved."
Cognitive load is reduced significantly. Players spend less mental energy on crew assignment logistics, and instead focus on the work itself.
The instant toggle between solo and coordinated modes eliminates the friction of the old formations menu, letting players adapt to changing situations without breaking their workflow.
Most importantly, the system delivers on the core design goal of leadership that feels collaborative rather than managerial. Players naturally shift between working alongside their crew and providing strategic direction, supporting the game's themes around teamwork and leadership through the mechanics themselves.