Mohammad Alavi (game developer)

Biography

Mohammad Alavi was born in the 1980s in Tehran, Iran and left his homeland with his family after the Iran–Iraq War occurred. Alavi was raised in the United States and despite enjoying his life there and never returning to Iran since he left there, he calls himself "An Iranian inside his heart". Alavi attended Maggie L. Walker Governor's School for Government and International Studies in Richmond, Virginia. He then attended Virginia Tech, majoring in Biology and Chemistry before becoming a video game designer after being credited for creating some of the best modded games in PC Gamer magazine. He applied to and attended Full Sail University. He has two elder siblings, a brother and a sister, who are both physicians.

Career

Alavi's main field of expertise is design and cinematic gameplay scripting. His creations are described "thoughtful" and noted in terms of AI companion role.

Entering video game industry

During his college years, Alavi started to create mods for Duke Nukem 3D, Quake, Half-Life and Counter-Strike. His hobby was to work as a mapper and texture artist for mods. He later made a reputation for himself under the alias "BadMofo", when one of his works was published on an issue of PC Gamer. Alavi later entered Full Sail University to focus on programming, and applied for a Programming job at Infinity Ward following his graduation. Considering his resume as a modder, the company offered him a job as a level designer, instead of a programmer.

Call of Duty series

According to Edge, Alavi "is responsible for some of the most intense and memorable campaign levels in Call Of Duty history". PC Gamer called Alavi "the designer behind two of the most acclaimed missions in Call of Duty history ("All Ghillied Up" and "No Russian")".

Alavi created his first professional levels for Call of Duty 2, including the potato-throwing grenade tutorial.

The first level of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, "Crew Expendable", which is set on a ship on a stormy sea is also his work. His design for the level was initially rejected by the leads, due to technical complexities, but Alavi stayed after hours and worked 18-hour days for three weeks to secretly script the rejected level. Once the leads became aware of his work and saw his not quite done work, they were convinced to include it in the game.

The same went for a flashback mission called "All Ghillied Up", when he ended up writing the necessary code himself. His "tense and deliberately paced mission" was debuted in E3 2007. The mission marked the first time in the series that non-player characters were capable of stealth behaviours. The mission won significant critical attention, being described as "One Of Gaming's Best Levels" and "The Best Call Of Duty Mission Ever" in reviews. In 2011, Now Gamer ranked the level the 20th on its "Top 50 Gaming Moments". It was also ranked #13 in IGN's "Top 100 Video Game Moments". Alavi's script for AI in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, ended up having value and formed the template next title of the series, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.

"No Russian" controversy

Alavi was the designer of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2's controversial mission called "No Russian". The mission was described "Call of Duty's most controversial moment" by PC Gamer and GamesRadar named it "one of the 10 most shocking game moments of the 2000s."

Titanfall series

In 2010, Alavi co-founded Titanfall's team in Respawn Entertainment alongside other former Call of Duty developers. He served as the senior map designer for the studio, and shot some motion capture footage as an actor. According to PC Gamer, its difficult to know the details of Alavi's design and scripting in the game, however his influence is apparent in "how Titanfall's on-map AI allies support the player". In an interview, Alavi stated that he was heavily involved in different aspects of the project, including AI design, gameplay and level design. He also bore much responsibility for the game involving a narrative component at all, pushing for longer and different introductions to each campaign map. In order to convince that the feature can be achieved within budget, he designed an introduction for "Airbase" map in three days.

Alavi resumed his work at Respawn Entertainment by working on Titanfall 2.

Games