I help game studios create great experiences, and solve gnarly game dev challenges.

RIOT GAMES
EPIC GAMES
ProbablyMonsters
Marmalade Game Studio
UXisFine!
Trailmix
Gurushots
Janeious games
Monumental games
Iron Horse Games
Happy Finish

Game dev can be tough.

"How do we ship a mobile version of a live PC product - and give the same quality 'experience' across the board? Oh, and console?"

"We've got a vision for our game but it's hard to translate that down into tangible design criteria - especially because we're pioneering something new"

"Players are confused - they don't understand the crafting system at all"

"We want to give our players loads of juicy rewards, but we also want to make sure we also don't create loot fatigue..."

I can help in a few ways…

UX Vision

I help translate your Product and Game vision into tools that guide design decisions.

  • Exercises and outputs that establish clear targets and priorities for the game's UX

  • Codify player motivations - then where and how your game pays out on these experiences

  • Understand your biggest risks and challenges - and how this might affect adoption, engagement, and retention

  • Understand where your existing product or build is meeting your vision, and where things aren't quite hitting the mark

  • Guide roadmap decisions with confidence that resources are focused on the right features

UX Design

I design flows, systems, and Interactive wireframes to deliver on your game's intended experience.

  • Individual features have clear purpose: how they support your Loops, and motivate players to play, pay, and stay.

  • Not just interfaces - but aligning UI and the systems they represent with gameplay goals.

  • Experience goals give designs clear attitudinal and behavioural success criteria

  • Integrating and collaborating with game designers to ensure that the emotional and psychological motivations and experiences they want to give players are delivered to the highest extent possible.

  • Clear, interactive wireframes with dev notes that solve technical challenges and eliminates guesswork for Artists and Engineers

  • Highly iterative, collaborative process as an extension of your team, reducing waste, mitigating risk, and making implementation more efficient/effective

Experience goals lead to clearer design decisions and feature sets

BONUS!

Creative Direction and UI art

Whilst not a core service, I provide holistic Creative Direction, as well as UI art that ties together the intended experience.

  • Create coherence across each aspect of a player’s experience in your game

  • UI art/design underpinned by solid UX/Design System approach.

  • You don't always get people who take the time to understand all the angles, and Sam definitely is one of those folks. Would work with again, for sure!

    Paul Bellezza - Director of Creative Game Production - League Studio @ Riot Games

  • "You'll never meet a UX Designer with a more holistic understanding of game design and product that applies it directly into their process."

    Neil Edwards, Founder & Head of UX @ UXisFine!

  • "Sam not only led interaction design of many major UI systems for our project, but also contributed significantly and regularly to the design of major gameplay systems as related to UI/UX."

    Aaron Sumski - Lead Technical Experience designer @ Respawn Entertainment

  • "We worked together on a couple of projects and he was always there to provide guidance and helped me improve my skills and learn."

    Piotr Kopertowski - Senior Visual Designer, VALORANT @ Riot Games

  • "Sam really embodies the idea that UX is much more than UI - it's a mindset that focuses on producing the intended experience in the player, no matter whose discipline that experience is being created by: gameplay, art, audio, narrative, you name it."

    Antony de Fault - Senior Narrative designer @ FISHLABS

Contact me

If you’re keen to talk, you can reach me using the form or find me on Linkedin, or Discord.