top of page
Responsibilities:
UX | UI design
Tools:
adobe xd
Adobe Illustrator
adobe photoshop
Project type:
Personal
It's a rainy and gloomy afternoon in 1955.
You play detective James (Jimmy) Buchanan,
a worn-down P.I. who is compelled
to take on a missing person case.
Let’s crack this case, shall we?
Investigation
Background & Motive
The usual suspects
These people are suspected of being potential players
of my game, so I interrogated them:
Evidence of competition
My investigation led me to conclude that in today's market,
there are a few games out there that do similar things.
But none of them provides the full experience that my game does.
Targets
(except for making a super fun kick-ass game)
Set the players free!
Help them unglue themselves from the couch
and roam freely in the world, exploring the designated sites the game sends them to.
Save some dough!
Instead of spending a lot of money
on escape rooms, the player can
buy this app for a few bucks
and enjoy hours of game time.
Develop unusual gameplay!
Create impactful immersive gameplay that seamlessly combines the digital world with the practical one.
design
A good game requires the perfect balance between looks and content. After I wrote the script for this game, it came clear to me that
the design should correspond with the 1950s style.
Icons and buttons
It was important to me that the design be simple, easy to understand,
and reflected the game theme. Therefore, I used wooden textures
and elements (camera, notebook, etc.) from the 1950s.
Guidance & tutorial icons
tutorial/hints
guide
Highlighted
tutorial/hints guide
location
arrow
Highlighted
location arrow
zoom in
zoom out
rotate
item
tap TO
pick up
double tap
to flip
drag down
to store
action buttons
Inventory
Tutorials &
objectives
Map
Camera
General
button
Clues
Normal
Enabled
The transition from concept to design raised some issues
that needed to be solved. I’ll address 3 of them.
The Challenges
1. Buttons
At first, I wasn't sure how many action buttons I should have and where to place them.
I presented some options to potential players and asked them what worked for them and what didn't.
Option 1
Option 2
Option 3
Solution
I minimized the number of action buttons to free up screen space and placed the buttons
at the corners of the screen so players could reach them easily using their thumbs.
Final design
2. Game interactions (how players interact with items in the game)
I wanted to put all of the game interactions in the lower menu (like classic games did).
But then I realized it caused 2 main issues:
-
It filled almost all of my inventory bar and left little room to store the items.
-
The button size had to be big enough to allow the players to press them easily, which caused the lower menu to take up 30% of the screen (which is critical in an AR game).
UX design
UI design
Solution
Using hand gestures instead of buttons for interactions cleared all unnecessary buttons
from the screen and lower menu, which is now designated only for inventory use.
Final design
3. Tutorials
Tutorials can be a hard nut to crack. How could I teach the player to play
without interfering with his experience?
Solution
I integrated tutorials little by little as the game progresses and even attached a tutorial guide,
which the players can look at whenever they want during the game.
Final design
bottom of page