From Teddy Bears to Tac Maps

I once went from debugging an AR teddy bear in the morning to debugging a Warzone menu that night. Nothing says “career whiplash” like arguing over a bedtime story flow at 10 a.m. and a loadout flow at 10 p.m.

Weirdly enough, those two worlds — soft bear hugs and sweaty gulags — taught me the same lesson: clarity saves lives. (Or at least sanity.)

From Parker to Playlists

Back in the day, I worked on Parker the Bear — an AR experience where parents set things up, but kids drove the play. Adults had to get through accounts and permissions without rage-quitting. Then kids needed a world simple enough to explore without reading instructions.

Fast-forward to Raven Software, where I build UX for Call of Duty. Millions of players, menus on menus on menus, and about 10x the screaming. The contrast sounds absurd, but the lessons carried over.

Raven LOL:

Honestly, the only crying now comes from grown adults stuck in the Gulag.

Cognitive Load = Brain Pain (For Everyone)

• Kids with too much on screen = meltdown.
• Adults with too much on screen = rage quit.

Brains don’t magically “level up.” If a screen is noisy, cluttered, or confusing, people bounce — whether it’s Parker’s bedtime loop or a Warzone loadout menu.

Raven RIP:

Shoutout to the time I spent 30min lost in Warzone settings, only to discover I didn't even fix the thing I opened them for.

Attention is a Currency (Everyone’s Broke)

Parker design = short attention spans. COD design = split attention spans.

Warzone players juggle minimaps, footsteps, squad comms, ammo, and UI. If you surface everything at once, they’ll process none of it.

Spicy Callout:

That perk tooltip you buried mid-lobby? Yeah, no one's reading it. Ever.

Feedback Loops = Player Confidence

Parker’s loop was gentle: tap → sparkle → success. COD’s loop is sharper: ammo drops, hit markers, loadout confirmations.

Different pacing, same principle: reassure the player instantly so they don’t second-guess.

Raven HYPE:

That dopamine hit when your custom loadout shows up exactly how you expect it. Clean. Crisp. Chef’s kiss.

Toddlers, Tacticals, Same Brain

Working on Parker made me ruthless about clarity. That discipline shows up in Warzone every single day. Because here’s the dirty secret: under stress, everyone turns into a toddler.

If your UI can’t survive a tired adult with a beer, a squad screaming in their headset, and a collapsing zone timer? It’s broken.

What I Learned (So You Don’t Repeat Me)

• Simplicity isn’t “dumbing down.” It’s survival.
• Setup should be painless, or people quit before they even start.
• Flows teach better than tooltips.
• Attention is a scarce resource, not a guarantee.
• Whether it’s Parker or playlists — clarity always wins.