294: Designing UX for Games (feat. Tea Chang) (& Endgame Discussion)

This week, we welcome Tea Chang, a UX Designer working on League of Legends at Riot Games, to talk about designing user experiences for gamers. At the end of the show, Tea sticks around for a long, spoiler-filled discussion of Avengers: Endgame. In Follow-up, we read and respond to your feedback regarding the cover art concept from last week. And as always, we share a few cool things, like a video series about movies, some state-specific branding, and a little indie film about superheroes. Spoilers spoilers spoilers. Spoilers. Sponsor: >> Want to become a sponsor of Design Details yourself? Email [email protected] or [email protected] to get started :) This week's episode is brought to you by Abstract Abstract is design workflow management for modern design teams. With Abstract, you can bring your design workflow into a single, unified place for designers, developers, and stakeholders to collaborate and keep work moving forward. Sign your team up for a free, 30-day trial today by heading over to abstract.com. And if you tweet at @goabstract and @designdetailsfm, with the phrase “improve my design workflow” you’ll be entered for a chance to win a $500 credit to their Business plan. Follow-up: Last week, we tweeted out a first draft of the new cover art Video: "The Foundations - Build Me Up Buttercup" Brett Yanoski likes the mask idea but thinks the execution needs work Ryan Morrison and Luca Orio gave us their seals of approval Alex Binder likes the graphic Ds Chrish Dunne would prefer a better logotype and more abstract Ds Follow us on Twitter and stay tuned for more versions of the cover art Mskellybrooks left us a very nice iTunes review You can leave one for us, too :) Interview: Check out Tea Chang on Twitter and at her personal site League of Legends is a wildly popular multiplayer online battle arena game from Riot Games Video: "Playtesting - How to Get Good Feedback on Your Game - Extra Credits" Literally unplayable is "an expression—often sarcastic—indicating that a video game is so badly broken that it prevents a player from progressing or enjoying the experience" Vivi Rosenstein's stance on assigning blame for suboptimal design has matured over the years Banner blindness is "a phenomenon in web usability where visitors to a website consciously or unconsciously ignore banner-like information" Article: "Get ready to see more ads on Google’s traffic app Waze" Adobe XD is "the fastest way to design, prototype, and share any user experience" Video: "The Magic of Making Sound" is a great peek into foley, an art which, when done well, goes unnoticed The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild forces you to use a wide range of weapons by making them both easy to find and quick to break Video game design is "the process of designing the content and rules of a video game in the pre-production stage" Article: "'Mortal Kombat 11' Requires More Than $6,000 to 100%, According to Early Estimates" We talked about the interface and game design of Apex Legends on episode 283: Deadly American Idol In the gorgeous game Gris, "light puzzles, platforming sequences, and optional skill-based challenges reveal themselves as more of Gris’s world becomes accessible" Video: "Portal 2 Intro", in which a tutorial is hidden behind a funny, story-driven calibration test One Cool Thing: Brian shared Patrick H. Willems, a YouTuber who makes videos about movies Check out the Patrick Explains series, especially the one about The Fast and the Furious Gabriel Valdivia introduced Brian to the channel Tea shared the team page for Mayor Pete Buttigieg, which has some really nice branding for each US state Shepard Fairey is famous for his Obama Hope poster (and the Obey clothing brand) Marshall shared Avengers: Endgame and discussed it with Tea and Brian in a segment called... Endgame Discussion: !!! SPOILERS !!! Video: "Every Avengers: Endgame Easter Egg", in which 209 easter eggs are enumerated Video: "Rocky Training" is the prototypical montage sequence showing a protagonist's improvement over time The Dark Night of the Soul is "a moment, usually at the end of the second act of a three-act story, where all seems lost and the protagonist must confront 'a collapse of perceived meaning'" r/inthesoulstone !!! SPOILERS !!! Design Details on the Web: We are @designdetailsfm Brian is @brian_lovin and [email protected] Marshall is @marshallbock @Sarahberus and @Luperdev make us sound smarter than we are Join the conversation on Spectrum or leave us a review on iTunes BYEEEEE!