Jumping Right Into It: The Process

Rapid Ideation and Planning: With time as our most precious resource, we bypassed traditional design phases and dove straight into high-fidelity design. Crafted a streamlined sitemap based on client discussions, serving as a blueprint for both mobile and desktop platforms.

‍Agile Design Approach: Developed quick wireframes to establish core layout and functionality. Iterated rapidly, focusing on building a robust foundation for the marketplace. Adopted a phased development strategy, initially hiding certain features for later implementation.

The Mission

• Main Objective: Create a cross-platform marketplace for Deepspace.

• Timeline: Less than one month (talk about light-speed!).

• Team: Myself as Lead UI/UX Designer and a front-end developer.

• Creative Freedom: Full permission to go wild, be original, and push artistic boundaries.

The Challenges

• Tight Deadline: With less than a month to deliver, time was our most precious resource.

• Limited Resources: A two-person team meant wearing multiple hats and maximizing efficiency.

• Cross-Platform Compatibility: Ensuring a seamless experience across various devices and platforms.

• Balancing Creativity and Functionality: Creating an over-the-top design while maintaining usability.

•Comprehensive Design Scope: Designing for both mobile and web, plus creating all necessary graphic assets.

Design Deep Dive: Home Page

Key Design Elements:

Swap-Liquidity Ships Page

Maintaining the Space Theme

As we progressed with designing the marketplace, our focus was on maintaining a consistent "vibe" throughout the user journey. We wanted users to feel as if they were looking through a "screen" in space, enhancing the immersive video game experience.

Into the Design

Outposts and Inventory

The Outposts and Inventory page stands as a cornerstone of the Deepspace marketplace, offering users a streamlined interface to explore, purchase, exchange, and swap ships. Recognizing its critical role, we designed a clean, tabular layout that presents all available ships at a glance. To enhance user experience and facilitate effortless navigation through the vast array of options, we implemented a robust filtering system – a feature suggested by our client and seamlessly integrated into the design. This page exemplifies our commitment to user-centric design and our collaborative approach, balancing functionality with intuitive navigation to create a powerful yet accessible hub for Deepspace's virtual fleet.

Key Features

• Designed a streamlined page showcasing all available ships for users to purchase, exchange, or swap.
• Implemented a table layout to organize and display ship information effectively.

Enhancing User Experience

• Recognized as one of the most crucial components of the marketplace.
• Incorporated a filtering system based on client suggestion to improve usability

Design Approach

The design for this page prioritizes functionality and ease of use. By presenting the ships in a clear, organized manner and including filtering options, we've created a user-friendly interface that facilitates efficient browsing and decision-making.

Collaborative Design Process

This page exemplifies our collaborative approach, incorporating valuable input from the client to enhance the user experience. The addition of the filtering feature demonstrates our responsiveness to client insights and our commitment to creating a highly functional marketplace.

Future-Proofing and Project Handover

View the Marketplace In Game

Designing for Future Expansion

In designing the rest of the Marketplace, we took a strategic approach to accommodate upcoming features:

• Implemented "hidden" buttons for future "shipyard" and "equipment" sections.
• This design decision allows for seamless integration of new features as the game expands.

Project Status at Handover

• At the time of the design handover, Deepspace was in its beta version.
• The design was crafted with the expectation of further game expansion.

Flexible Design Architecture

By incorporating hidden elements for future features, we created a flexible design architecture. This approach ensures that the marketplace can evolve alongside the game without requiring a complete redesign, demonstrating foresight in user experience planning.

Conclusion

The Deepspace marketplace project showcased our ability to create an immersive, functional, and forward-thinking design within a tight timeframe. By balancing immediate needs with future expansion plans, we delivered a product that not only met the current requirements but also laid a strong foundation for the game's growth. This project exemplifies our commitment to creating designs that are both visually stunning and strategically sound, capable of evolving with our clients' needs.

Contact Luz

Deepspace: Crafting a Cosmic Marketplace

Overview