Tech Animator · Unreal Engine 5 · Shooters
Animation
systems
for Unreal.
I'm Diego Balarezo. I architect gameplay animation for 1P/3P shooters — modular systems where one setup drives every character, and the headroom to run 100 of them on screen.
LEGO Fortnite
Niagara-based VFX creation for LEGO versions of Fortnite emotes, adapting visual effects to the LEGO visual style.
No More Room in Hell 2
Implemented gameplay animation systems for player characters and AI in this cooperative multiplayer survival horror shooter.
Metal Eden
Developed gameplay animation systems for enemy AI characters including humanoid enemies, robots, and mechs.
Nyan Heroes
Built the full gameplay animation system from scratch for a multiplayer shooter featuring cats controlling mechs.
Nickelodeon Kart Racers 3: Slime Speedway
Contributed as Technical Artist handling shaders, tools development, art optimization, and lighting.
Unannounced AAA Projects
Senior Technical Animator on AAA multiplayer online shooters under NDA, building gameplay animation systems and multiplayer pipelines.
Tech anim
reel.
How it
works.
Locomotion
architecture
I don't build animation blueprints — I build the framework other people build them in. The base graph owns logic and transitions, not assets. Weapons and archetypes plug in through layer interfaces, so animators ship new behavior without opening the base graph.
Modular
cosmetics
Body parts, weapons and attachments as swappable layers with their own dynamics — ponytails, capes, backpacks, wings — the way Fortnite ships cosmetics. Built so an outsourcing team can feed content without touching the core setup.
100 on
screen
A co-op zombie shooter running up to 100 characters. Significance drives which features stay on per distance, and animation sharing carries the background crowd. I didn't own the significance pass — I built the setup so the team could toggle features without touching animation.
GAS-driven abilities, motion warping and runtime IK — so gameplay intent and animation agree on where the character actually lands.
Humanoids, robots and mechs sharing a single animation system instead of one per archetype. New enemy types stop being new work.
How many capes and ponytails a character can afford is a mode decision, not a taste one. 5v5 is not 50v5. I run that analysis before anyone rigs.
Unreal-native
technical
animation.
I'm a Technical Animator & Tech Artist in Lima, Peru, focused on Unreal Engine 5 and first/third-person shooters. I build the systems that let character content scale without the team scaling: one setup driving every character, and pipelines an outsourcing team can feed without a technical bottleneck.
My process is the same on every project: architecture in Blueprints for speed, then nativized with engineering for performance. Fast to prototype and iterate with animation and design, then convert the hot paths to code once the design settles — buying back milliseconds without ever stalling the team.
There is no default answer. Dynamics and character count depend on the mode: 5v5 is not 50v5, and local single-player is not massive multiplayer. I build on Unreal's standard instead of against it — custom means waiting on people, standard means the next character is someone else's afternoon. The same instinct runs on the team side: a shared source of truth for priorities and ownership, plus clear written communication, so remote teams stay aligned without waiting on me. Shipped with Reikon Games, Torn Banner Studios, Bamtang Games, 9 Lives Interactive and Epic via Agora Studio.