GameDev–Brand Identity & Web Design Project

In 2020, gaming quickly emerged as one of the most popular leisure activities during the outbreak of COVID-19. User engagement and spending surged in this sector, particularly with younger audiences, Gen Z and Millennials spent more time on gaming as a convenient way to spend time during lockdowns and social distancing.

The history of gaming is much richer than recent months (those who marvelled at Super Mario Bros. and Sonic the Hedgehog will agree), but the pandemic has ignited exceptional growth, as people look for escapism in an uncertain world.

The GameDev community lives in a world of pure imagination. Their current brand didn’t capture the unique energy of their business and felt dated. Our brief was to make a modern, engaging brand to suit the essence of the company values: fun, creativity, community, escape, fairness, and teamwork.

But gamers and game creators don’t always look the way you’d expect. Their motivations are a rich blend – from relaxation, to socialising. We needed to make a brand to appeal to a relatively young market, male and female, one made by a bunch of creative people, for a bunch of creative people.

The main assets for the brand included: the visual identity (fonts, logo, character illustrations, colours) brand guidelines, digital assets, creative (and sustainable) merchandise, and website style guide.

We used a bright, bold, and engaging colour palette to appeal to the younger market, with innovative characters inspired by the history of gaming (back to the Pac Man days), and a logo that used a classic gaming console shape, merged with a superhero mask theme. Our characters (flo, hugo, rooster, hattori, and axel), represented different personality types, and diversity of gamers and creators. Our characters animated, fought together, played together, and were designed to interreact with customers as part of a fun, playful brand experience.