Sea of Thieves

UX Design / UI Design / Game Design

Overview: I was part of the team handling Microsoft Rare's unique live service experience, Sea of Thieves, from season 7 to season 10 and beyond, including the Monkey Island cross overs, UX overhaul and ease of life improvements made during this time. I had a hand in various UI and UX solutions across a variety of different game areas, including promotions, progression, navigation and more.
Platform: PC / Console / Handheld
My Role: UX / UI Designer
Tools: Photoshop, Illustrator,  Figma, Unreal 

https://www.seaofthieves.com/

The Legend of Monkey Island Crossover

Quest & Location Banners - UI

I designed of many icons and banners which appear when the player reaches a new location or starts a new quest.
​I deeply studied the artwork of the game to adopt the style myself and was lucky enough to be able to learn directly from the illustrator who originated the art style in the early seasons of the game, which went on to define and inspire a lot of the UI and game art that has come since.

Commendations - UI

A large portion of my interface contribution were the many distinctive icons for numerous achievements, or commendations as they are known in-game.
​These were similar in style to the banners but in much more focused detailed segments, with the intention to feel like badges or mementos of the player's adventures.

Battle Banter & Dialogue Improvements UX / UI

I redesigned the dialogue interface and functionality for the Monkey Island Battle Banter mini game, where players and opponents must throw insults at one another and then respond with the appropriate retort. I designed the bespoke UI for this mini game and defined the ruleset for how this works on screen, showing the player new insults and retorts they learn from enemies. 
​Previously the player only had access to 4 options in the dialogue panel, my solution included a scrolling panel, allowing devs to theoretically add an infinite amount of dialogue options, and these improvements were carried over into the wider game going forward..

Promotion & Progression UX

As part of the ease of life improvements made to the game during the UX overhaul, one of the problems I was tasked to solve was the improvement of the promotion and progression systems in the game, as they were very clunky due to being built on incrementally from the early seasons of the game. After liaising with the game creator I solved the problem by designing a new clear menu system for where players gain promotions, commendations, access faction shops and acquire emissary flags. Player levels and progression were made much clearer with the Promotions system now being prompted to the player and made into a much bigger and more celebratory event.