The Video Game Industry was Broken
NOR was developed because the video game industry was broken. Gamers knew they were being exploited by studios, game developers were frustrated with the need to integrate loot boxes, and financiers didn’t understand why Candy Crush made them oodles more money than any other game or platform.
The truth is that neither developer, nor gamer, nor financier was to blame. It’s the things between them—the old way things were done. And it was time to destroy the way things were and build something new. That’s NOR.
NOR is not a game, nor is it a platform for games. NOR is what connects those two worlds together. The platform experience takes inspiration for the meta-game from real-world sports, where players play the sports and team owners play a game of their own: amassing wealth through smart trades, deals, and contracts. This is NOR’s meta-game, the “game of games,” a virtual business empire built with real money for real stakes, where broadcast rights, team ownership, real estate, advertisements, pro tournaments, and sponsorships are part of their own ruthless competition.
It’s monetization for video games without being in the games themselves.
DESIGNING THE NEXT ERA
For the NOR identity, we focused on a core idea that inspired NOR—the Eternal Return. The endless cycle of rebirth and destruction. This is visualized in the NOR mark. It’s broken yet, a connected chain link—a connection to something new and an endless loop. The NOR link is the same if it’s flipped or viewed from another angle.
The Brand identity needed to feel familiar to the gaming industry but add a new layer of sophistication. A brand identity that could support any game and any creative asset. A neutral esthetic, to be the foundation of everything and elevate it. With Golds and Reds, the NOR identity stands out from the rest of the magenta decentralized industry and the bold in-your-face design systems plaguing the game industry.
NOR is solely focused on play, so the team developed a platform architecture that made it simple to build your empire. The team designed and developed the platform around five key design principles that help create a unique interactive experience. With complex financial systems at the core of the NOR platform, we designed the player experience to be simple and intuitive, with a simple guided experience for new and advanced players. The team had a detailed understanding of the players through personas, player journeys, and elaborate user flows.
We also developed a robust 120-page requirements document outlining the interworkings of NOR and giving both the development and design teams a solid foundation to build on. NOR created a new meta-game platform and developed a new economic decentralized Token called FATE. NOR’s economy is based on utility and the active participation of its players, featuring a dynamic system that runs exclusively on FATE tokens.
Designing the future of play
The requirements document, user journeys, and personas were used to establish and design out the UX of player experience for the NOR platform. A design system was developed to support all devices and was demoed through clickable prototypes in Figma.
Player journeys were designed to inform UX and auction house design for NOR marketplace.
Apple Vision Pro Game Hub
Developed concepts to bring NOR experience to AR/VR headsets. Experiences designed for Apple Vision Pro: A virtual hub for Meta-Gamers to manage Gaming-Athletes.
TV App and Console Game Hub
I developed the NOR game hub experience for TVs and consoles.
The platform concept and development helped the team secure the initial round to start building out the platform and the first game, FASTER.