The design of the UI for ‘Rise of the Tomb Raider’ conveys the style of the rebooted series: simple and modern with a survivalist flair. I worked with both art directors and designers to make sure the menus both fit the desired style (within the performance capabilities of the engine) and fulfilled the design needs.
My role included:
- Creating concepts and mockups in Photoshop for the basecamp, status screen menus, main menus, and maps
- Responding to user test feedback and proposing/implementing adjustments to improve comprehension and ease of use
- Working with art directors to define the style for UI, including updates to the ‘gritty’ reboot style with schematics and notes (inspired by Lara’s smart and resourceful nature)
- Working to help define the new style for maps – detailed ‘satellite’ style maps, instead of the simple vector map of the TR reboot
- Painting maps for all regions/levels as well as the world map
- Painting various sizes of ‘ink’ backgrounds for all UI
- Creating iconography for new icons in Adobe Illustrator, including icons for pickups, resources, skills, and other items
- Implementing all UI to be functional in-game using Flash/Actionscript/Scaleform along with proprietary systems, including the basecamp, maps, main menu, HUD, and status screens. Utilized 3D marker and bone attachment, Scaleform 3Di, and masking in Flash for animations
- Working to implement and verify UI localization in several languages, including Arabic