Akil Hooper is a developer who worked at Obsidian Entertainment on Fallout: New Vegas as a designer. He was laid off in April 2011.[Ext 1][Ext 2]
Biography[edit]
Hooper attended University of California, Berkeley from 1995 to 2000.[Ext 1]
Career[edit]
Prior to joining Obsidian Entertainment, Akil Hooper worked at Sony Online Entertainment working on Everquest I and Everquest II. He worked at Obsidian from 2008 to April 2011. Afterwards, he returned to Sony Online Entertainment, and worked at a variety of other video game companies including Something Wicked Games, and Disney Interactive.[Ext 1]
Fallout Series[edit]
Hooper worked on Fallout: New Vegas, specifically being credited as an area designer on the base game and a producer and additional area designer on the DLCs.[1]
He worked on all of Primm[Ext 3] which included writing Primm Slim's dialogue, as well as the story of Vikki and Vance.[2][3]
He also worked on the REPCONN Test Site, specifically the upstairs area with Jason Bright, the launch sequence[Ext 3] and was partially responsible for designing Come Fly With Me,[4] and Vault 3.[5]
Additionally, he worked on Hoover Dam, specifically the NCR side of the second battle, as well as on the Boomers, including the quest Volare!. He created the sequence where the player is bombed by artillery as they try to get to the gate of Nellis Air Force Base.[Ext 3][Dev 1][Dev 2] For the artillery barrage, he worked on it with Robert Lee who created the prototype for the sequence and did the final polish, while Akil worked on the script to have it increase its accuracy as time went on.[Ext 4]
He wrote ED-E,[Dev 3] named the Q-35 Matter Modulator and designed the REPCONN HQ.[Dev 4] Additionally, he worked on Gomorrah and the Omertas.[Dev 1]
Employment History[edit]
| From | To | Company | Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| May 2008 | April 2011 | Obsidian Entertainment | Designer |
Credits[edit]
Fallout Series[edit]
| Year | Title | Credited |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 |  Fallout: New Vegas | Designer |
| 2011 |  Dead Money | Producer, Additional Area Design |
| 2011 |  Honest Hearts | Producer, Additional Area Design |
| 2011 |  Old World Blues | Producer, Additional Area Design |
| 2011 |  Lonesome Road | Producer, Additional Area Design |
Other Work[edit]
| Year | Title | Credited |
|---|---|---|
| 2002-04 | EverQuest | Game Designer |
| 2005-08 | EverQuest II | Game Designer / Design Supervisor |
| 2007 | Legends of Norrath | Rewards Designer |
References[edit]
- ↑ Fallout: New Vegas Credits
Fallout: New Vegas Credits - DLC - ↑ Joshua Sawyer Formspring
- ↑ Who wrote the Vikki and Vance story and Primm Slim? Funny stuff.
Joshua Sawyer: Akil Hooper.
(Josh Sawyer Formspring answers) - ↑ Who designed Come Fly With Me? It ended up being one of my favorite quests.
Joshua Sawyer: A number of designers worked on it, primarily Jesse Farrell and Akil Hooper.
(Josh Sawyer Formspring answers) - ↑ Who in particular comes up with the indivual stories for each vault? Chris Avellone? The whole team? Obviously some have movie inspirations. But others seem just.. Fucked up and bizarre :/
Joshua Sawyer: I wrote the basic concepts for F:NV's vaults but individual designers fully fleshed the concepts out and implemented them. Vault 3: Akil Hooper, Vault 11: Eric Fenstermaker, Vault 19: Sydney Wolfram. Vault 21: Jorge Salgado. Vault 22: Jesse Farrell, Vault 34: Sydney Wolfram.
(Josh Sawyer Formspring answers)
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 Joshua Sawyer: "Writing duties are split up among designers. Not all designers write, but the majority of us do. Some do a larger share than others. I'll miss some here, but notably:
Akil Hooper - ED-E, a lot of Primm, the Omertas, some Hoover Dam, some Boomers"
(Fallout: New Vegas Developer Statements - Miscellaneous; Joshua Sawyer: Main Game Credits, 2012 June 23 - ↑ Who thought up the Boomers, Nellis and the "Volare!" mission? They're by far my favorite faction and mission)s of the games. Great job guys.
Joshua Sawyer: John Gonzalez came up with the Boomers. I came up with the basics of Volare! and Akil Hooper did the actual development of the quest.
(Fallout: New Vegas Developer Statements/Joshua Sawyer Formspring posts; 8 May 11) - ↑ Chris Avellone: "For FNV, Josh Sawyer took this role and then each of the companions was delegated to other designers (Travis Stout for Raul and Lily, Eric Fenstermaker for Veronica and Boone, Akil Hooper for ED-E, Jesse Farrell for Rex, I did Cass and Ulysses, and Josh himself for Arcade) divided the work."
(Fallout: New Vegas Developer Statements; Unmasking the Gamers: Chris Avellone - Part 3) - ↑ Question:""Is the Q-35 Matter Modulator from F:NV named after the Illudium Q-36 Space Modulator?""
Joshua Sawyer:"I believe so. That item was named by Akil Hooper, who designed REPCONN HQ."
(Fallout: New Vegas Developer Statements - Weapons; Joshua Sawyer: Q-35 Matter Modulator Name, 2012 March 24)
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Akil's LinkedIn
- ↑ Akil Hooper:"I worked on Fallout: New Vegas and the DLC for that game and got laid off from there."
EverQuest Former Developer Stream - Chatting with Akil Hooper; 20:49 in - ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Question:"How much Fallout: New Vegas did you work on?"
Akil Hooper:"I worked on a good bit of it. So, for the launch of the game, I was a designer. I did all of Primm. I did the REPCONN Launch Facility, that was actually our vertical slice and so the whole team worked on that but I did the upstairs area with Johnathon Bright
, the glowing ghoul. And I did the actual launch sequence and a couple other things in that area. Then I did the other REPCONN facility. I did, I can't remember what the vault number was, but I did the vault with the Fiends in it. I did the Boomers storyline so anyone who played Fallout: New Vegas and had to dodge the bombs. That was me and I'm sorry. Not the best idea and not the best executed but I thought the rest of it was fun. I worked on half of the Hoover Dam battle. I worked on the NCR half of the Hoover Dam battle. I did ED-E's storyline, his companion quest stuff...I rememeber the other thing. I did the Gomorrah hotel. There were a bunch of hotels on the New Vegas strip and I did the one with the Omertas."
EverQuest Former Developer Stream - Chatting with Akil Hooper; 44:38 - ↑ Fallout New Vegas Developer Interview: Robert Lee Part 2