Graphics design keynote

KEY NOTEAaron Newbigging

Tuesday, 24 June 2014

My analysis of App Store icons


Five things which make a good app store icon

The platformer logos where good as it was easy to show the core mechanics of the game within the logo, such as having

boxes you can hit to break and also having the main character in the centre of the logo looking like they are about the

break the boxes or hit them. This shows that having elements from the game shown in the logo works well.

• The best logos I have seen are ones that effectively use the colour wheel theory as they look a lot better than others that

do not use it, such as the skateboarding game logo, it looks nice and the complimentary colours is pleasing to the eye.

• Having the main character in the logo has proven effective, especially for the platformer and shooting games. This almost

instantly sets up a connection with that character and also people may recognise the character, for example if someone

made an app and in the centre of the app was Mario they’d instantly know what kind of game it is because of that

character.

• Simplistic logos with the title of the game on them works well as well, especially the “2048″ logos, this game has become

quite popular and just seeing that number tells many people what the game is about almost instantly, this could work well

with other games that have similar short titles that could easily fit and be visible in the logo.

• The art style is important in the logo, some of these logos are obviously vector art so in theory the game should be in a

similar style to that, then others are a bitmap images and you expect the game to be a bit more cartoony and old

fashioned with a different style of graphics than others.


Three things that make a bad app store icon

One thing I noticed is people trying to make logos that are so simple that it’s impossible to tell what the game is about, this seems to happen a lot with card games I’ve noticed, as all the card game apps I have seen just have images of cards rather than actual gameplay or something saying what kind of card game.

• The objectification of women doesn’t work well for logos, it doesn’t accurately depict what kind of game it would be, the example we have below it doesn’t really suggest a card game.

• Sometimes the logo will be to vague and not give people the impression it should be, an example of this is the construction game logo, where all you see is a bridge and really nothing suggesting construction.



Why those games are placed in those locations on my graph

EVE was placed in the top left being more of a Niche and Core game because it has a very small target audience, due to the complexity of the game. It’s not the kind of game you can pick up and start playing straight away.

Titanfall is in the top right being a Mainstream and Core game because of its vast target audience, it’s the kind of game you can pick up and start playing without much thought, which contributes to its popularity.

Don’t Tape The White Tile is a Niche and Casual game, it’s a musical game where you play a piano but you can only touch the black notes, due to the difficulty curve in this game and its small target audience appeal it is a Niche game, but it is the kind of game you can pick up and start playing straight away so it is a casual game.

Dragoncity is a Mainstream and Casual game, it’s a social game which can be played on Facebook which contributes to its popularity making it more mainstream, it’s mechanics are similar to that of Farmville and other Facebook games, it is simple and easy to use and people usually play it in their spare time, making it a casual game.

Squidiverse is a Niche and Casual game, but is almost into the core category. The style of gameplay and the mechanics makes it more of a casual game than a core one, though it can be quite difficult it is mostly played casually, it is more of a Niche game than a Mainstream game due to its odd themes such as sci-fi themes which aren’t very Mainstream. It is close to the core category due to the difficulty of the game, it’s not to difficult but some may class it as more of a core game because of it though.


5%20%

10% 65%

Achievers KillersExplorers Socialisers

5%5%

60%

30%

70%5%

25%

I’ve created 3 pie chart above to compare my game to other games currently in the market, Titanfall is a Mainstream Core game and Dragon City is a Mainstream casual game.

If you look above you can see how Squidiverse is different from these two games in the type of audience that it attracts, Squidiverse mainly attracts achievers and also some explorers, whereas Titanfall attracts more

killers and also some achievers as well, Dragon City attracts mainly Socialisers and some achievers also.Squidiverse is more appealing towards achievers as the main objective is to complete the level no matter what it takes, unlike the other two games here you must complete a level, advance to the next and complete that

one and continue that cycle, this appeals to achievers because the drive themselves to achieve well at a game.


How would could increase Killer and Socialiser interest in our game

As seen in the graph on the previous slide the game doesn’t really appeal very much to both socialisers and killers, below are two ways we could appeal more to killers and socialisers:

To appeal to killers we would have to get some sort of scoring system into the game and have a leader board to display the highest scores, this is probably one of the biggest attractions for a killer as it allows them to become much more competitive and challenge their friends and also people online.

To appeal to socialisers we could have Facebook and Twitter integrated into our game which could allow you to share you scores or share what level you got up to so maybe your friends could give you some tips on how to pass that level, we could also have rare collectables which possibly give you a power up for a little while which you can also share to your friends on Facebook or Twitter, similar to the Facebook game “Bejeweled Blitz” which allows you to share your power ups with your friends.


I have created this mock up of an iPhone home screen to show what apps our potential target audience may have on their iPhone, these are mainly casual games, shopping apps, apps for watching videos and apps for fun such as the songify app and the xbox smartglass app.

Our potential audience is likely to be casual gamers so I have found some of the most popular casual games on the iPhone app store, including: Angry Birds, Temple Run, Tetris, Minecraft and Doctor Who. Minecraft is a casual game and for a while was quite Niche before its popularity drastically improved, though tetris was a very popular game on the app store it is quite Niche as not many people have it on their phone, so this can relate to our game.

Many of the apps on the homescreen point towards a geeky character, with the Marvel and DC apps and also the Doctor Who app, our game is mainly aimed towards sci-fi fans so it only makes sense that our potential audience would have these kind of apps on their phone.

Also our target audience is geared more towards the younger audience, so games such as Angry Birds and Minecrafft fit well into the image of our target audience as these are games that younger audiences enjoy.

Since our audience will typically be into sci-fi it only makes sense to have apps for watching videos and movies such as Netflix and YouTube, Netflix can be used to watch movies and TV shows, this app is quite mainstream because it has a wide variety of content which can suit many people with different interests. YouTube is very mainstream and hosts a large variety of content also.

Since our target audience may typically be into sci-fi they likely collect items from sci-fi shows, this is why there are Amazon and eBay apps on the home screen, they’re likely to want to keep up to date with anyone they are wanting to purchase so these apps work well for them.


Gameplay/ScreenshotCharacter/Action Iconic

Language-as-Image Title-as-Text Symbolic/Thematic


Gameplay/ScreenshotCharacter/Action Iconic

Language-as-Image Title-as-Text Symbolic/Thematic




I’ve decided to use this logo as my final design.

Certain improvements that need to be made are: Removing the stroke around Squid, adding to the background to make the logo a bit more interesting and change Squid’s stance or add a rock to show that he is throwing an item and to show the core mechanic of the game.

I’m choosing this design as it clearly shows the character to a potential audience and also sets the moods and themes of the game effectively. This design was very well received during the feedback.

I may get the glow from the other design I got feedback from since I made that glow separately rather than using the blending tools and use that instead, as it looks a lot nicer and stands out more than the subtle one I have right now.


App Store Ratings

Preschool Playmat: Farm Fun

Battle Monkies

Battle Supremacy

The Mystery Of The Opera


Drugs There are no drugs or references to show in our game.

Imitable BehaviourSquid throws rocks at crabs killing them, rock are easy to get hold of and

throwing this is easy to imitate.Falling from heights has no consequences in the game

Language There is no bad language in our game.

NudityThere is no nudity present in our game, Squid wears a hoodie

and jeans and the other characters in the game are sea creatures.

Sex There are no references to sex or sexual behaviour in our game.

ThreatThe plot is threatening as Squids father has been kidnapped, this can be

troubling for younger audiences. There is also the threat of death if you fall off the map, though death is not shown and you have multiple lives.

ViolenceThere are situations in the game where violence is needed, such as throwing a rock at a crab to progress through the level, the violence is at a cartoonish

level and there is no detail.


1 2 3 4

Before making my colour design I’ve made some grayscale versions of what my potential design could be, I used Squid in different poses to try find the right one which looked the pest and for each one I tried him in a few different position on the grid.

Designs 1 and 2 are of him in his idle pose, it’s not very exciting and that was probably my biggest problem with it, for a logo it needs to be exciting and reflex the gameplay and if I were to stick with that design people would think the gameplay is boring, though I still put him in two different places on the grid, from this I have deduced that it looks best when Squids eyes are within the inner circle, and that I need a more exciting pose for Squid. For Designs 3 and 4 I went for the original pose I used for my draft design, this pose is a bit more exciting and reflects the gameplay a little better, the problem is that if I were to use this model I’d have to fit a rock somewhere into the design which would be quite hard to see as a small icon on the iPhone home screen, despite this I did some more tests on the positioning of Squid

and decided that the position of his eyes in design 4 is a lot more eye catching and looks more in place.After much thought I decided to use the jumping pose instead, it looks a lot better as an icon and also reflects that the game is a

platformer and makes the game look a lot more exciting because of this.


5 6 7 8

Once I found a pose I liked I made 4 different versions of the same pose, putting Squid into a different position on the canvas for each one and making him different sizes, the idea was that doing this I could compare all 4 of them and using the grid I’d find the one that worked the best and was the most eye catching. Design 1 was my initial design idea, again I had the same issue with the eyes not be within the

inner circle which is something I wanted in my design, though this design was pretty much in the centre of the grid which is what I wanted, I decided to experiment and try making Squid bigger to see if it were more eye catching. After making Squid bigger in design 2 I noticed it was more eye catching than the first design, but when I overlaid the grid onto it the eyes were not in the position I had wanted, I wanted his eyes to be in the inner circle completely and if I moved him down he wasn’t centred enough. So I decided to make him a bit smaller and move him into a position where his eyes were within the inner circle, he was also as centred as I wanted him to be, none the

less I decided I’d see what the design looked like if I made it a similar size to the original, doing so I noticed it was a lot more eye catching than design 3, even though it was smaller than design 3 it was more in the centre of the grid and didn’t come out of the white

background.


Colour wheel theory

Using the colour wheel theory I’ve used yellow as the background as it compliments purple, the logo

looks good as the colours compliment each other, but the yellow is a bit overpowering, the biggest problem though for me in this colour scheme is that it really doesn’t reflect the themes of the game as much as

I’d like.

For this design I used the triad theory, using three colours that are of a equal distance away from each other, I’ve used orange, green and purple, the colours

works well together but not with the black background, if i were to choose this design I’d have

to have a more colourful background so it doesn’t look to out of place, again not reflecting the themes of

the game that much.

This design also uses the triad theory here but the green is more dominant this time, this works better than the other design as orange really doesn’t fit a space theme very well, this design fits a lot better than the other but I still feel like it doesn’t fit very

well for the space theme, though it is more appealing and eye catching than the other colour tests, I don’t think this is the right colour scheme for my design,

though it is close to what I want.

This design using the analogous theory, it’s the idea of using 3-4 colours that are next to each other on

the colour wheel, it is thought that this type of colour scheme is more pleasing to the eye. This is more of the colour scheme I was going for, the

colours work well together and convey a space theme effectively, the green glow works well with the blue backdrop and the blue backdrop stands out well from the black background. This will be the colour scheme

that I will use for my final design.


From the tests I did in the grayscale designs and the colour wheel tests I’ve created a colour design, I made it from design 8 as I deduced that was the best design from my tests.

The logo I’ve created follows the colour scheme and themes from the game and feature various improvements over the original design I got feedback on, for one I’ve removed the stroke from Squid so it doesn’t have the cut out feeling, I’ve also added the new glow behind Squid, it doesn’t use the blending options, I’ve used lighting effects within Photoshop to create a glow instead and works a lot more effectively, it makes the logo more unique rather than using the normal generic glow, also it gives it a more spacey feel than the old one. I have also added some

more stars into the background, though they are subtle, I’ve made them so it looks like they’re only visible because of the glow around Squid and this works well.

I’ve used a different pose for Squid, a jumping one. I’ve done this to give the impression that this game is a platformer and to make it looks like he is floating in space to give the idea that he is lost, which hints towards the

fact he must find clues in order to rescue his father in the game.


The colours are more fadedSquid has a stroke around himLooks like Squid is throwing a

rockPlain black background

Colours are more vibrantThe glow is overlapping

over SquidSquid pose is a jumping one

Stars in the background


Feedback From ClientI have received feedback from my design I had made, the feedback was mostly positive which I am happy about, the colour scheme is liked so that shows all my colour wheel tests paid off.

There are two things I need to change, the first being that the client felt that the glow was in the wrong position, so I’ll have to move the glow so it covers Squid’s head a bit more, also there is a white patch behind Squid which makes the design look messy and unprofessional so that will need to be corrected also.


I have now updated my design to what should now be the final version of the design, I have removed the white bit behind Squid’s head that was making the design look messy and looking at it now, it just catches your eye when it shouldn’t do. I have also moved the glow but in a certain way, I tried moving it but I didn’t like how it looked when it was offset from the centre, I then tried smudging the glow more towards Squid’s head but that didn’t look very good either, in the end I just duplicated the glow, added a mask to it with a radial gradient from white to black from that certain area, this proved to be the most effective way to move the glow into that position.

Another thing changing the glow allowed me to do was to make the glow a little less intense where his hand is, if you look at the old design you can see the glow looks very harsh there compared to the rest of the glow, using some masking has allowed me to lessen the glow around that area and spread it out a bit more.

All these changes have really improved my design for the better, I’m very happy with how it looks now and I think it is an effective app icon.

Old New


This logo works well as it clearly represents the themes present within the game, this is done by effectively using a colour scheme to reflect these themes. Also the design of the logo plays a key part in this process, the main character ‘Squid’ is right in the centre of the design drawing more attention to him, which makes the design a bit more eye catching.Also another thing that makes this design more eye catching is that the part that stands out the most is Squid’s head, it is the only purple in the design and it is quite central also, this is effective in making the design work well.

Below is approximately the size that the icon will be on the iPhone home screen, it is still effective as the

purple stands out and makes it easy to see what the logo is. I’ve made Squid big enough so that anyone looking at

the logo will know what it is.


Graphics design keynote

Entertainment & Humor

mainstream game

kind of game

niche game

musical game

social game

mainstream core game

mainstream casual game

construction game logo