Hi, I'm Kay
I am a communicator who strives to make my favorite spaces more open and welcoming to everyone. Over the past fifteen years, I've helped gaming and fandom companies communicate their passions, values, and grow their communities. I have experience across a wide range of skills, including community management, project communication, moderation, production, livestreaming, public speaking, hosting, and more. When not at work, I nurture my own communities. I stream video games, run charity TTRPG games, speak at conventions, cast resin dice, and work on my living shiny Pokédex.
About Me
I have built and grown communities for more than fifteen years. I excel at crafting creative, out-of-the-box ideas, and do my best work when I can collaborate with a team to bring those ideas to life. When not at work, I nurture my own communities. I GM and perform in TTRPG campaigns, create cosplay outfits, attend conventions, and am forever working on my living shiny Pokédex. Ultimately, I am a communicator striving to make my favorite spaces more open and welcoming to everyone.
Awards
Avalanche Appreciation Awards - 2021
- New Arrival of the YearThe gameHERs - 2020
- AAA Community Manager of the Year finalistDeviantArt - 2012
- Distinguished Service AwardDeviantArt - 2007
- Helpdesk Hero AwardDeviantArt - 2004
- Deviousness Award
Games
Member of the team that designed and developed Contraband, a co-op smugglers' paradise game set in the fictional world.Platforms: PC, Xbox Series X and Series S.
Created with the Apex Engine.
Consulted, alpha, and beta tested on Ooblets, an adorably weird game about farming, creature collection, and dancing.Platforms: PC, Switch, Epic, Xbox Series X and Series S.
Created in Unity.
Contact
Please contact me at:ALPurcell@gmail.comThank you!
Projects
I've had the great fortune to be part of a number of amazing projects and companies, including DeviantArt, Red Bull Gaming, Avalanche Studios Group, and Gaming Trend. I've also consulted on indie games, collaborated on a number of charity events, and worked on various projects I found exciting. My experience is vast, varied, and hard to summarize; please check out a small sampling of some of the projects I've worked on and contributed to over the years!
Contraband E3 Annoucement
Avalanche Studios Group announced its newest IP, Contraband, during E3 2023. Published by Microsoft and dripping with 70's style, this ambitious co-op, open world smuggling game takes place on the fictional Southeast Asian island of Bayan.
My Responsibilities:
Lead the internal communications plan for launch
Organized viewing parties for both Avalanche and Microsoft stakeholders
Secured verification for social channels, including Discord and Twitter
Advised on trailer
My Responsibilities:
Identifying, connecting with, and managing talent and the off-camera opposing team
Creating communication plans and social assets to drive awareness and viewers
Identifying and connecting with off-META communities, Discords, and opinion leaders
Moderating Twitch chat and reporting on viewer sentiment
Creating and managing Twitch trivia and polls
Working cross departmentally to identify and create social assets to feature show highlights, key moments, and host personalities
Red Bull League of Legends Metamorphosis
A show which challenges top League of Legends influencers and streamers to break the META by testing new strategies, builds, and characters in League of Legends. Featuring Ovilee May, Hai, BunnyFufuu, Trick2G, LL Stylish, UmiNoKaiju, and KayPea, this live remote production series earned headlines in Dot Esport, Blog of Legends, Shack News, and more.
Pacific Rim Uprising Interview
DeviantArt partnered with Universal Pictures to create a fan art contest, which was judged by Pacific Rim Uprising director Steven S. DeKnight. I hosted the campaign's livestreamed interview with director Steven S. DeKnight. The conversation included Pacific Rim's anime influences, Guillermo del Toro, working with John Boyega, and the subtle on-screen romance between Newt and Hermann Gottlieb.
My Responsibilities:
Assume the role of brand voice and host of the interview
Deliver all messaging and required disclaimers on behalf of DeviantArt and Universal Pictures
Research and prepare questions for the stream
Monitor Facebook Live chat, select the best questions, and present them to the guest
My Responsibilities:
Create, manage, and monitor the campaign and donations page
Identify, connect with, and recruit talented and diverse players, personalities, and game masters to appear in the project
Help manage schedules, conflicts, and the unforeseen challenges of such a large project
Provide feedback around graphics, layouts, and advertising materials to ensure a high, consistent quality
Moderate chat and help ensure an active, exciting Twitch chat experience
Monitor and celebrate donations and milestones
The Rainbow Roll Charity Project
The Rainbow Roll Charity Project
A four-part stream benefitting The Trevor Project, which raised over $2,000 for charity. Created as a collaboration between Candace the Magnificent, Kay Purcell, and Todd Moonbounce, the Rainbow Roll celebrated queer stories and voices during Pride 2022, and featured the talents of Naomi Kyle, Connie Chang, Bee Zelda, TSL creator April Kit Walsh, PrincexCalamity, and many more talented players and storytellers using the Thirsty Sword Lesbians system.
Red Bull and the ESA Foundation Presents: Unidos Online
Made in collaboration with the ESA Foundation, Breaking Out! is a round table discussion designed to help inspire, educate, and equip aspiring Latinx developers to successfully launch their careers in the gaming industry. Created for the Latinx in Gaming's celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month, and featuring leading industry talent from Twitch, Youtube Gaming, Ubisoft, and superstars of the indie scene, this panel and our initiatives received a feature in Venture Beat.
My Responsibilities:
Sourced experts for panel
Outreach and relationship management
Reviewing submitted questions and assigning those questions to panelists with the most relevant expertise
Managing deadlines and late submissions
Collecting, compiling, and editing video via Adobe Premier
Building and delivering Run of Show
My Responsibilities:
Collaborate with Shen to create brand guidelines for comics and characters
Create character personalities and profiles
Review and provide quality control for scripts and completed comics
Write scripts for more than twenty comics
Write website copy and character profiles for Rage Quit Comic website
Create and execute launch strategy for website and social posts
Red bull Rage Quit Comic
Made in collaboration with Shen Comix, Rage Quit Comic is Red Bull Gaming's first webcomic. This became Red Bull Gaming's most successful social series, accumulating over 2.2 million views, 90k engagements. An average post performed 28 times benchmark. Rage Quit follows the lives of Gav, Noel, and the mysterious No Mic, three quirky characters with radically different personalities, and tells the story of their misadventures in gaming.
Red Bull and Anne Munition at PAX East
We created a uniquely high quality IRL stream event for Red Bull Gaming athlete Anne Munition at PAX East. Anne brought fans at home to the PAX floor, where she demoed indie games of all types, visited with her sponsors, and met with her fans. The resulting stream and recap video have been incredibly well-received, and collectively have received more than 750,000 views.
My Responsibilities:
Leverage my network to identify and connect with indie games and developers to secure appointments, interviews, and filming rights, including the only screen recording of Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout at PAX East
Built and managed the show schedule
Found and secured additional appointments and interviews day of when extra time became available
Managed filming wavers, ensuring signatures from anyone who appeared on camera
Assisted the crew with navigating the venue, managing crowd control, and managing filming equipment, batteries, etc
Served as primary point of contact for Red Bull Gaming at PAX East, managing all day of introductions, explanations of the show format, etc
My Responsibilities:
Collaborated with Twitch to create and implement the first large scale test of the new Twitch Poll system
Wrote, ran, and was responsible for polls and trivia used during the stream
Monitored the stream and community sentiment
Assisted behind the scenes, helping deliver computers, equipment, information, and more to ensure a smooth run of show
Red Bull's Ninja New Year
Tyler 'Ninja' Blevins sent 2018 out with a bang and a 12 hour livestream from Times Square in New York City. This star-studded event featured Fortnite, streamers such as Tim The TatMan, as well as costumed Fortnite dancers, a themed indoor miniature golf, a mechanical Loot Llama, and the now infamous scene of Ninja Flossing on national television.
Team Liquid PrideFest 2021
We created a uniquely high quality IRL stream event for Red Bull Gaming athlete Anne Munition at PAX East. Anne brought fans at home to the PAX floor, where she demoed indie games of all types, visited with her sponsors, and met with her fans. The resulting stream and recap video have been incredibly well-received, and collectively have received more than 750,000 views.
My Responsibilities:
Craft the messaging and series narrative
Consult on graphics, voice over, and Finals talent
Interfaced with hosts and players during finals, managing needs and requests while ensuring that schedule was followed and that interviews were available when needed
Moderate Twitch chat for both days of the Finals stream
Identified overwhelming positive community sentiment towards the Conquest Finals playlist, used the opportunity to work with the music department to provide and promote playlist, increasing their metrics and helping them meet their goals
Red Bull Conquest Finals 2019
Red Bull Conquest is an original Fighting Game series featuring where the top players from eight different regions compete to prove who is the best region in the FGC. Each region must show their mastery of three games: Street Fighter V: Arcade Edition, TEKKEN 7 and UNIST (Under Night In-Birth Exe:Late[st]). The original series Red Bull Conquest Road Trip tells the stories of the players and communities behind the competition, and laid the foundation for Class in Session: Anakin's TEKKEN Dojo. Red Bull Conquest received coverage in Dot Esports, Shack News, the Esports Observer, Dexerto, and more.
Christmas Cookie Caper
The Christmas Cookie Caper was an original D&D 5E charity game which raised $2,300 for Extra Life and the Children's Miracle Network. Written and run by Kay Purcell and David Lee, it featured the talents of Holly Conrad, Dungeon Glitch, David Tilstra, Calamity, Candace, and Lemar, and put a satirical fantasy twist on the events of the latter half of 2022.
My Responsibilities:
Co-write the adventure and serve as the on-camera game master
Selecting cast members, leading all communications and outreach
Creating and maintaining the charity campaign, including the creation of donation incentives and monitoring donations in real-time to incorporate them into the game
Creating social media assets and clips of the most memorable, marketable, and hilarious moments.
Collaborating with graphic designer to create additional social media assets and overlays
My Responsibilities:
Assist with identifying, vetting, and contacting potential players
Create social and promotional copy
Work cross departmentally to identify new formats, promotional concepts, and tournament opportunities
Red Bull and GrandPOOBear FallMania
FallMania is the Internet's most popular Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout tournament, created by speedrunner and Twitch Rivals Fall Guys grand champion GrandPOOBear, AKA David Hunt. FallMania pits sixteen legendary competitors against each other in a winner-take-all extravaganza, which has racked up more 400,000 views and been featured in Dot Esports, GamesRadar, Talk Esports, and more.
Red Bull and the ESA Foundation We Are E3 2019
We Are is an initiative created by the ESA Foundation in partnership with Red Bull designed to connect women with diverse backgrounds in the video games industry, to educate on the impact of women in the community and the legacy they have achieved, and to inspire new voices and talent to contribute passionately to video games. E3 2019 featured a large booth that included a virtual reality confessional, a photo booth, a gaming lounge, a hidden bar, and a robust suite of programming, featuring guest speakers such as Janina Gavankar, Naomi Kyle, Anthony Tran, and Samantha "Persia" Hancock.
My Responsibilities:
Creating copy, descriptions, and messaging for all panels, meetups and events
Building and maintaining event pages, managing signups, guests, and schedules
Identifying, connecting with, and scheduling speakers, panelists, and events
Identify and work with an artist to create the VR confessional booth
Organizing and building guest lists for industry happy hours and meetups
Identifying titles and creating a space to feature new indie games within the booth
My Responsibilities:
Panel moderation, including panelist introduction, panel prep, collecting and incorporating questions, and managing time
Lead live a live, 20 minute Q&A session
Selecting and outreach of panelists
Primary contact for PAX; worked with con organizers to adjust the panel's start time in order to accommodate the schedules of panelists
Panel panning and prep
Maintained communication lines and messaging between all panelists
HOW TO TAKE PEOPLE'S MONEY*
(and give it to charity)
A wrong-answers-only-style PAX Unplugged panel on how to run successful TTRPG streams for charity. Moderated by Kay Purcell (Godplane, Chaotic Wholesome) the panel featured Gabe Hicks (Dimension 20, Mythic Grove), Holly Conrad (Acquisitions, Inc), Brain Gray (Rivals of Waterdeep), Saucefire (Mercy Road), and Candace the Magnficient (The Rainbow Roll) who had collectively raised more than $50,000 for charity. A PAX Together pick, it focused on diversity and inclusion, planning, fundraising, project management, and more.
Red Bull Dragon Ball FighterZ Final Summoning
Red Bull and Bandai Namco collaborated to celebrate the culmination of the DRAGON BALL FighterZ 2018/2019 world tour. Players and fans from around the world converged in Los Angeles at The Majestic Downtown to battle it out at Red Bull Final Summoning. This event streamed live on Twitch, and featured hopefuls battling it out at the Last Chance Qualifier on January 26, before the most tenacious competitors faced off at the World Finals on January 27.
My Responsibilities:
Ideate and incorporate community and cosplay elements into the run of show
Work with players and back of house to ensure a smooth run of show
Work with communication and production teams to monitor schedules and secure interviews with players
Monitor and report on community sentiment
My Responsibilities:
Managed the first influencer program for Red Bull Gaming, featuring Nicki Taylor, UmiNoKaiju, Chelsea Bytes, Hai, and PanunuLOL
Worked cross departmentally to develop videos and social assets to drive participation
Created website copy for the US website, apparel line, and FAQs
Applied learnings from Red Bull Power Spike to craft better tournament rules, FAQ entires, and to create clear and effective copy
Created, verified, and managed the official US Red Bull Solo Q Discord
Monitored and reported community sentiment across Discord and social media
Collaborated with Battlefy to update and further elaborate tournament rules, FAQ entries, and to create additional messaging
Developed and executed communication strategies to promote Solo Q assets and drive participation
Red Bull League of Legends Solo Q
Red Bull Solo Q puts a twist on a typical League of Legends match, pitting player against player in a bracket of 1v1 duels. In addition to the four tournaments, Red Bull Solo Q also features a Leaderboard activation, and the top eight will duke it out in a Top Lane brawl for the right to represent their country in the world finals. This unique tournament received coverage in the Esports Insider, Shacknews, the Esports Observer, and more.
Dragon Quest XI with Ross Draws
Artist Ross Tran of RossDraws celebrated the release of Dragon Quest XI with a first look at gameplay, an interview with Neil Pabon, Square Enix Product Marketing Manager, and Samantha Reinert, Dragon Quest Community Manager, and a fan art session featuring Jade.
My Responsibilities:
Gather character information to help Ross pre-plan and start his drawing for the session
Planned community involvement for the segment, gathering questions and community sentiment around Dragon Quest XI ahead of the stream
Be the brand voice and host of the interview
Deliver all messaging and required disclaimers on behalf of DeviantArt and Square Enix
Research and prepare questions for the stream
Monitor Facebook Live chat, select the best questions and present them to the guests
Supported the guests by providing information about the history and lore of the series
Xsolla Diamond Club Community Managers Roundtable
This deep-dive featured an all-star lineup of experienced community managers, including Victoria Tran (Among Us), Joe Tirado (System Era Softworks), Evan Berman (NBA 2K), Kay Purcell (DeviantArt, Red Bull, Avalanche Studios), and moderator Lynn Richter (Knockout City). Focused on the importance of community, this panel took a deep dive into tips and tricks, tools of the trade, how to build safe and diverse community spaces, and how community managers can create boundaries and advocate for their own mental health and wellbeing.