AI-powered platform for ethical and sustainable game narrative design, enabling real-time impact analysis and responsible storytelling.
Srh University, Berlin, Germany
August, 2024
#WebDesign #Branding #UI/UX #Visual Identity #Logotype #Animation
NarrateX is an AI-powered platform designed to help game developers create ethical and sustainable narratives. By analyzing story elements in real time, NarrateX provides insights into their societal impact, ensuring that games promote responsible storytelling and social innovation. Whether for indie developers or major studios, NarrateX bridges the gap between creativity and ethics, fostering meaningful and engaging gaming experiences.
NarrateX faced a key challenge: developing an intuitive and user-friendly platform that balances creativity with ethical storytelling. The goal was to design a seamless and engaging interface that caters to diverse users—game developers, narrative designers, and educators—while ensuring accessibility and usability without overwhelming complexity.
To create a seamless and engaging experience for NarrateX users, we developed a thoughtfully structured interface grounded in intuitive UX principles. The design integrates a modular layout that simplifies navigation while ensuring flexibility for diverse storytelling needs. A clean, contemporary typography system enhances readability, balancing professionalism with creativity. The strategic use of color gradients and dynamic visual cues guides users through complex workflows without overwhelming them. This approach positions NarrateX as an innovative, accessible, and efficient tool for game developers, narrative designers, and educators.
UX Research
Objectives
Design a digital platform to support narrative designers, educators, and storytellers in creating and exploring ethical, sustainable narratives for various media.
Facilitate seamless collaboration among users, allowing them to build, share, and refine narrative projects with a focus on user-centered design.
Integrate educational tools and interactive elements that help users understand and apply ethical storytelling principles in their projects.
Research Questions
What are the key challenges faced by game developers, narrative designers, and educators when designing narratives, particularly in the context of sustainability and ethical storytelling?
How effectively can NarrateX address the diverse needs of its user personas, including indie developers, narrative designers in large studios, and educators, and how can the platform enhance their workflow, creativity, and collaboration?
What features and design elements can be implemented to ensure that the platform is accessible, intuitive, and scalable for users with varying levels of technical expertise, from beginners to experts?
Qualitative research, including user interviews, contextual inquiries, and a competitive analysis of existing narrative tools, was used to deeply understand the pain points, preferences, and goals of the target audience. This research helped identify user personas and their specific needs in the realm of ethical storytelling, narrative complexity, and collaboration.
Quantitative research, through surveys and usage data analysis, provided insights into user expectations, preferred features, and how narrative tools are currently being used across different industries. This informed the design decisions and prioritization of features in the NarrateX platform.
Objectives
Industry Trends: Understand narrative design tool trends, especially in ethical storytelling and collaboration.
Evaluate Solutions: Assess the strengths and weaknesses of current platforms.
Unique Value Propositions: Identify what sets NarrateX apart.
Insights for Design: Gather insights for app features and UX improvements.
Ideation
Innovative Features:
Address market gaps with features like ethical storytelling templates and collaborative writing tools.
User-Centered Design:
Focus on the needs of game developers, educators, and narrative designers with intuitive interfaces and customizable tools.
Cultural Adaptation:
Ensure NarrateX is adaptable to different cultural contexts, with language support and relevant templates.
Sustainability and Scalability:
Build for long-term growth with modular architecture and cloud integration for future scalability.
Criterias for evaluation
First Impressions: How users feel when they first use the platform.
Interaction Design:
How easy it is to navigate, access, and flow through the platform.
Visual Design and Branding:
How the design reflects the brand and creates a consistent look.
Content and Messaging:
How clear and engaging the content is, and whether it communicates the platform's values effectively.
Results & Finding
User Preferences:
Users prefer simple, easy-to-use designs with clear navigation.
Feature Interest:
Users are interested in tools that show the ethical impact of their game narratives, particularly AI-driven prediction tools.
Pain Points:
Many users find current narrative tools too complex, especially when adding ethical and sustainability features.
Content Feedback:
Users want more content focused on ethical storytelling and responsible game design.
Using the User-Centered Design (UCD) methodology, insights from qualitative and quantitative research define game designers' and storytellers' needs as platform users. Tools like empathy maps, user personas, and user stories help understand their experiences, challenges, and opportunities for enhancing narrative design with ethical and sustainable storytelling features.
User persona
Main pain points
Lack of Ethical & Sustainability Tools
Existing platforms don’t offer built-in assessments for ethical storytelling and sustainability.
No AI-Driven Impact Prediction
Lack of tools to analyze how game narratives influence players and society.
Complex & Unintuitive Interfaces
Many narrative design tools are either too simplistic or overly complex, leading to frustration.
Limited Collaboration Features
Difficulty in coordinating with teams, writers, and developers in real-time.
Brain storming
User Flow
Information Architecture
NarrateX Design System
The NarrateX identity is built around a vibrant and purposeful color system, reinforcing its mission of ethical, sustainable, and engaging storytelling. The design blends bold gradients and loud colors to inspire creativity while ensuring an intuitive user experience.
Lack of Ethical & Sustainability Tools
Existing platforms don’t offer built-in assessments for ethical storytelling and sustainability.
No AI-Driven Impact Prediction
Lack of tools to analyze how game narratives influence players and society.
UI kit
Grid system
Wireframing
Prototyping
