Hey everyone! Adam from Robust Games here, excited to be bringing you another Loco Motive development blog!
We promised a deep dive into the UI/UX of the game in our last blog, so award-winning UI Designer Edd Coates was kind enough to volunteer some time to run through his process.
UI Deep Dive
Hi everyone! My name’s Edd Coates and I’m the UI/UX Designer on Loco Motive!
I wanted to talk a little about my design process, as well as give you a small peek at what you can expect to see when the game launches this year.
Growing up with games such as Monkey Island, Sam & Max and The Dig, I've always been a massive fan of point and click games, which is why I was so excited to be working on Loco Motive.
I had three goals:
- Make the interface feel like an extension of the world and its characters.
- The game should feel as comfortable with a gamepad as it would with a mouse.
- Provide an intuitive gameplay experience that will feel both familiar to fans of the genre, while welcoming to new ones.
First of all, the interface was wireframed in greyscale. This was to ensure that the contrast and usability was spot on before adding colour and texture.
Art Deco patterns were sprinkled throughout the menus as a reference to the game’s 1930s setting. I was able to get really creative with these, some early designs even incorporated elements from the train such as the spokes!
We decided to go with a clean, vector-based art style for the UI (rather than pixel art) to give it some modern flair and ensure that it stands out from the rest of the game.
Traditional verb bars are replaced with a single context button and an inventory menu that can be recalled as needed. This streamlined user experience has you focused less on the nitty-gritty of navigating menus, and more on enjoying the world of Loco Motive.
We had relatively few challenges on the UX side, with many examples of well-refined Point and Click games to draw inspiration from.
We looked to titles such as Broken Age and Sam & Max Save The World as they had already solved many of the problems associated with making a point-and-click title playable with a gamepad.
This is just a small taste of what to expect from the interface of Loco Motive! I’m looking forward to you all seeing the UI in action when the game launches later this year.
Character Spotlight - Herman Merman
It’s time for our second character spotlight! Next up is the self-declared detective extraordinaire, Herman Merman!
Herman Merman is a crime novelist who dreams of solving real cases. Always one to project himself as an infamous detective, he's never actually had a real case.
Herman’s latest novel is not going down so well with the publishing house, and with waning sales and a new star on the horizon - Herman needs to up his game!
When he receives an unexpected call from Lady Unterwald seeking his employment aboard the Reuss Express, Herman jumps at the opportunity to hone his skills in the field.
Ever the optimist, even when his employer meets her untimely end - Herman believes he's destined to solve this case.
There's just one problem, however. He hasn't got a clue!
That’s all for now! We’ll be sharing more progress as we go, but in the meantime you can follow us for updates on Twitter or join the community in our brand new Discord channel.
Come aboard and say hello!