Phase 10 mobile game
Phase 10 is a rummy-type card game, not quite the household name like UNO, but has a small, devoted fanbase. Existing marketing data indicated the core players were women aged 20 to 40 years old who played casual strategy games. We wanted to make sure we did not lose these players.
Approach
Starting from scratch, Phase 10 team was run with a small team on a lean and agile methodology, and my initial role was to be the lead creative, responsible for art direction, hiring, and UX. After the initial ramp up on production and the game launch, I evolved to have more a focused role on player research and delivering insights to the game team with actionable goals.
Early on, I worked with the product team to establish three experience goals.
Player retention and new player appeal
The game needed to be authentic to the game’s fanbase, yet easy enough to attract new players. I knew that new players would come from UNO and wanted to create an intuitive onboarding experience.
Play anytime, anywhere
We proved this with reduced play sessions of 3 to 5 minutes, offline arcade mode, and portrait orientation. Using wireframe concepts, I proved portrait orientation can work, knowing players could play with one hand during a meeting or on the bus.
Continuous usability testing
Run quick tests with real players at critical milestones before and after launch. Player insights were provided to the game team and tracked in the next design sprint.
Global team collaboration
I hired and built the art team comprised of an animator, an UI designer, and a concept artist. The hiring requirement was artists were able to integrate their own art directly into Unity and work closely with engineers.
With art and engineering in Hangzhou and UX in Los Angeles, close collaboration and communication was essential to reach our deadline. Using Invision, we were able to provide concise direction by calling out specific areas in the design and creating rough interactive prototypes.
Before any production started, I worked closely with the Mattel brand team in Los Angeles to finalize the style guide to achieve visual parity between mobile game and physical card game. The final style guide reduced the review time, and gave the artists a framework to be creative.
Social Interactions
Phase 10, being a table game, needed to have deep social interactions with players and friends. In our player research, Phase 10 players often did not feel comfortable playing with strangers and preferred playing with family and friends, just like the physical card game. After working on the wireframes, I art directed the UI artist to create the following storyboard below.
Players can start a game with their friends by inviting them to a game room
The host player can do three actions:
1) Select number of phases
2) Invite Friends
3) Emote with quick phrases and emojis
Tapping the ‘Edit’ pencil icon allows players to change the number of phases. We wanted to limit the number of phases allowed since the full ten phrases between three players would be difficult to complete.
Tapping on the ‘Add Friend’ icon at the top will prompt ‘Invite Friends’ popup. Inviting online friends would appear first in the list.
Offline friends will receive a server-side push notification asking them to join the game.
Invited friends would receive a drop down notification to ask them to join. If they miss it, the message will be in their inbox.
Once the invited friend joins, they will need to wait for the host to start the game. Meanwhile they can chat with other players.
Though we missed our launch date by one month, Phase 10 achieved all the experience goals we set forth to accomplish. To prove this out, I tested ten players one month after the launch: five experienced Phase 10 players and five novice players. This is what we learned.
Retention
Despite quite a few difficult levels, 8 out of 10 players played at least one to two hours per day. All leveled up quickly in the month.
Onboarding
After going through the lengthy tutorial, all players understood the basic objective, terms, and rules of Phase 10. More experience players wanted the option to skip, even if it meant not learning critical gameplay.
Art style
All players said that the art style was relaxing, clean, simple. Very fitting for a casual game and easy on the eyes.