EA Sports

After wrapping up my work on the Xbox One X program and relocating to Texas in late 2017, I joined a satellite team at Electronic Arts in Austin supporting development of the ‘EA Sports Madden NFL’ franchise. The team was looking for embedded QA specialists who could operate inside a fast‑moving, interdisciplinary environment, and I stepped into the role to support testing, validation, and feature iteration for one of the industry’s most established annual sports franchises.

The Austin team was primarily responsible for shipping the game’s “Franchise” mode while also providing support to the main Florida-based studio developing the flagship “Longshot: Homecoming” story campaign packaged in with that year’s scheduled release, ‘EA Sports Madden NFL 19‘. Our QA group was intentionally small - just three analysts - which meant we operated with a high degree of ownership and autonomy. We were accountable for validating platform compatibility, gameplay systems, UI/UX flows, audio, input, and asset iteration across the full ‘EA Sports Madden NFL 19’ experience. Because of our proximity to design, we were also pulled into early feature development, contributing feedback and support for the new “Player Archetypes” progression system overhaul and assisting with updates to player rating attributes.

This role was a pivotal step in my growth as a cross‑functional collaborator. I worked daily with engineers, designers, artists, producers, project managers, and game directors across multiple studios, aligning on quality expectations, surfacing risks, and ensuring that our testing efforts directly supported feature goals. It was my first experience operating inside a live annualized development cycle, where tight timelines, rapid iteration, and constant communication were essential to delivering a cohesive product.

As the ‘EA Sports Madden NFL 19’ development cycle neared completion, our team began contributing to early roadmap and feature planning for the next year’s title, ‘EA Sports Madden NFL 20’, giving me valuable exposure to long‑range planning and pre‑production workflows for game development at AAA scale. By the time my contract concluded, I had gained a deeper understanding of how large, distributed teams coordinate to ship complex sports titles on a yearly cadence.

I ultimately chose not to renew my contract for the following year’s cycle, as I had been offered a more challenging opportunity with Bungie back in Washington. Still, my time with EA Sports in Austin played a meaningful role in shaping my production instincts: it strengthened my ability to collaborate across disciplines, operate within tight delivery windows, and support feature development from both a quality and systems‑thinking perspective. Those lessons continue to influence how I lead teams and drive clarity in AAA game development, XR, and tech‑focused environments today.

Portfolio Links:

• EA Sports Madden NFL 19

• EA Sports Madden NFL 20