Game Designer · Software Engineer

Michael
Wahba

Game designer who ships the code. I direct and write games, and I build the tools and systems they run on, currently at EA Maxis. My work has been recognized at Augmented World Expo, SIGGRAPH, and the Game Devs of Color Expo.

See the work Resume ↗
Now Software Engineer at EA Maxis · The Sims tools 2024 →
Based Calgary, Alberta Canada
Education MFA, Interactive Media · USC 2024
Awards AWE Best in Show, The Immersive Archive 2024
Gerald Lawson Scholar, USC & Sony Interactive Entertainment 2024
D.I.C.E. Scholar, Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences 2023
Shipped Egregore 2024
Atrio: The Dark Wild 2023
Michael Wahba

Featured work

Four projects, four disciplines.

Design and narrative proof: Egregore, Atrio. Engineering proof: Maxis, The Immersive Archive.

Maxis (Electronic Arts)2 shots

Software Engineer · 2024 →

Maxis (Electronic Arts)

Building the tools and content pipeline behind The Sims: desktop apps in WPF/C#, web tooling in React/TypeScript, used daily by the Maxis dev team.

C# / .NET WPF React / TS
Egregore5 shots

Creative Director · USC MFA Thesis

Egregore

A graph-based adventure mystery in modern-day Cairo. I directed a 20-person team and extended an open-source Unreal dialogue plugin in C++ into a custom graph-driven narrative system. Shipped on Steam, exhibited at Game Devs of Color Expo.

Unreal 5 C++ / Blueprints Dialogue Systems Team Direction
The Immersive Archive3 shots

Technical Lead · AWE 2024 Best in Show

The Immersive Archive

XR preservation research at USC's Mobile and Environmental Media Lab (MEML), recreating seminal VR works in Unity. Best in Show at AWE (Augmented World Expo) 2024, exhibited at SIGGRAPH 2023, published in IEEE.

Unity OpenXR Research
Atrio: The Dark Wild2 shots

Lead Writer · Shipped on Steam

Atrio: The Dark Wild

Survival-automation game with narrative at its core. Designed the lore, dialogue system, and branching player-reactive story for a commercial Steam release.

Narrative Design Branching Dialogue Worldbuilding
Radio Exurbia

Personal project · 2022

Radio Exurbia

Driving game with a world-swapping radio. Built the core gameplay systems and narrative triggers from scratch in Unreal.

Unreal C++ / Blueprints
The Virtual Garden3 shots

Personal project · 2023

The Virtual Garden

Gaussian splatting experiment running in the browser, built with Three.js. A look at rendering photoreal captured spaces on the web.

Three.js WebGL Experimental
· More on itch.ioExperimental games and prototypes. Itch.io → · More on GitHubPrototypes, simulations, and side projects. Open source →

Michael Wahba

Engineer · Designer · Educator

Resume ↗ LinkedIn ↗ GitHub ↗ Itch.Io Email ↗

I work across engineering, design, and narrative, and I see games across the finish line.

By day I'm a software engineer at EA Maxis, working on the toolchain behind The Sims creating tools for developers and Simmers alike.

Before EA, I was Creative Director on Egregore, my MFA thesis at USC's Advanced Games Program, one of 10 projects selected from 50+ pitches by a panel of industry veterans where I led 20+ students to develop a paranoia-fueled adventure in modern-day Cairo, now on Steam. I was the Technical Lead on The Immersive Archive, an XR preservation project that won Best in Show at AWE (Augmented World Expo) 2024 and Lead Writer on Atrio: The Dark Wild at IstoInc, a survival-meets-automation sim praised for its funny yet sincere story.

Background: BSc in Computer Science with a concentration in Game Development and an Embedded Certificate in Creative Writing (Calgary), MFA in Interactive Media (USC), and a stint in synthetic biology that left me biased toward systems thinking. I also teach Unreal Engine and game design at Circuit Stream.

Press & Media

Circuit Stream · Aug 2025

From Biology to Game Design Excellence

An instructor spotlight on the path from synthetic biology to shipping games.

iGEM Blog · Nov 2023

From SynBio to Game Design

How competing in iGEM shaped my path to an MFA in Interactive Media.

The Logic · Jul 2021

Top Prospects: Class of 2021

Among Canada's most promising emerging tech and creative talent.

CBC News · Nov 2020

Recruited as a Game Writer in School

Picked up by a professional studio while still completing a degree.