Stranded Deep

Redesigning Stranded Deep's crafting and inventory system under UX is Fine! mentorship.

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Overview

Goal: Select one of my favorite games that I felt needed some improvement to their UX. I then had to analyze and break down the game and by the end of the program, have a prototype of the solved problems.

Check out the video walkthrough of this case study or continue to scroll for the story below!

Hey, I have something I’ve been dying to show, are you free?

Of course I am, what have you been working on👀?

So this project is a very special one- this was completed under a mentorship program with UX is Fine! where I spent the past few months learning about User Experience design within games under some super awesome mentors😁😁!!

Whattt, that sounds like a great opportunity, tell me more about what you did..

Stranded Deep?

I initially had to select one of my favorite games that I felt needed some improvement to their UX. I then had to analyze and break down the game, and by the end of the program have a prototype of the solved problems.

What game did you end up choosing and what were some of the problems it had?

At the time I was playing a lot of Stranded Deep, a game where players are left in the Pacific Ocean and have to do what it takes to survive. I chose it due to being aware of my own and others’ personal experiences. Specifically, I decided to focus on the problems within the crafting and inventory system, as well as some aspects of the skill system. Here are some of the problems I discovered initially:

Crafting and Inventory System (Click to enlarge)

Skill System (Click to enlarge)

In order to solve for these problems I made the crafting system less cumbersome by adding a new search, sort, and filter feature, the ability to craft multiple items at once and reduced the amount of categories players currently have to cycle through. To improve the skills menu, I reduced the cognitive load on players by providing more information on what all the skills do and how they affect players in game.

Oh cool, I’d love to know more about the process itself!!

Loops & Desires

Of course, I wouldn’t leave you hanging! So once I analyzed Stranded Deep and had all those pain points discovered, I sought to determine the players' desires for the game, and mapped out some high level and smaller game loops. From there, I completed a SWOT analysis, which provided me with a sense of direction for ideas and decision making. Here’s the results:

Core Game Loop (Click to enlarge)

Smaller Game Loop (Click to enlarge)

SWOT Analysis (Click to enlarge)

Nice!! So how did you use this information to move forward?

Go with the Flow...

Go With the Flow...

Now that I had a better idea of Stranded Deep’s core gameplay loop and some of it’s opportunities for improvement, I was able to move forward to creating a high level navigation flow, where I mapped out the major journeys a player takes when using the crafting and inventory system. Here are the initial flows I created:

Crafting Menu Flow (Click to Enlarge)

Crafting / Inventory System Flow (Click to Enlarge)

After receiving feedback from Mentors, I was able to refine and clean up some of the flows. I found these were much simpler to go through and understand at a glance:

Revised Crafting / Inventory System (Left) and Menu (Right) Flow (Click to Enlarge)

Oh awesome, nice job iterating based on that feedback! What happened after you cleaned up those flows?

At this point, you’ll see I directed most of my focus to the crafting/ inventory system because it had the most pressing issues. So, I built some low fidelity wireframes, creating a visual representation of how those systems currently look in game:

Wireframes of Current Systems (Click to enlarge)

Looks great! So tell me, so far have you had any difficulties?

Initially, everything was moving pretty smoothly (with a few bumps here and there) and it wasn’t until I got to the competitive analysis that I had to take a moment to reassess everything I had completed so far.

Why’d you feel the need to take a step back?

Competition?

So after creating the wireframes showing the crafting/ inventory and skill system's core functionality is when I moved on to the competitive analysis. My first take I analyzed 3 other games with crafting and inventory systems:

Original Competitive Analysis (Click to Enlarge)

But soon realized I was approaching this from a surface level. I had received feedback from mentors through Miro and live meetings, which encouraged me to re-evaluate if some of the issues I addressed are true pain points.

So, at this point I decided it would be best to take a brief step back, to ensure that I’ve been looking at everything from the player’s perspective rather than my own.

Awesome of you to make that realization ahead of time. So what changes did you make the next time around?

In taking my step back, I looked back at the initial analysis I made, did some of my own desk research, and re-examined the player desires for the game. This allowed me to refocus on solving for players rather than my own personal desires.

From there, I felt using “how might we” statements in conjunction with the competitive analysis would offer great insight on how competitors tackled some of the problems within Stranded Deep. It also helped me to better organize my analysis, making it easier to come back and review throughout the duration of the process.

Revised Competitive Analysis (Click to Enlarge)

Oh this is awesome, it’s great that you were able to re-analyze everything and better organize your information so it’s easier to understand! What came next?

Revisions

This is where everything starts to come full circle and I started to revise the flowcharts and wireframes using the learnings and new information I discovered over the previous month.

At this point I went back into Figma to improve the existing flow, tackling the pain points I addressed initially. Here I came up with 2 sets of wireframes, one sticking with Stranded Deep’s current design, and the other a completely different one:

Current vs. New Crafting Menu

Current vs. New Inventory

Current vs. New Skill Menu

What made you do 2?

So here I was torn because the complete redesign allowed for more room to add the new features, but the same style redesign may have been easier for players to grasp since it’s closest to what they’re used to. I wasn’t sure on the best practice for the sake of maintaining a great player experience, so I waited to receive feedback from Mentors before sticking with one.

What did you hear back?

I received great feedback that the focus here is ultimately to solve for the problem, and that sometimes includes straying away from how the system currently looks. They also expressed that in hindsight, sometimes straying away can bring in new pain points that didn’t exist prior. All in all we felt sticking with the complete redesign would provide the best learning and (if executed correctly) player experience, and I stuck with that.

Nice work! So did you find that you had any problems with the redesign?

Actually, I did! Which is why it was the perfect learning moment. While I was able to solve for some problems, I now had some new problems on my hand:

The scaling was off to be a console game,
I forgot to include the craftsmanship level in the crafting menu as intended, and
The skill menu contained too much information for more casual players.

Revisions.. Again?

Revisions..Again?

After receiving that feedback, I made changes so that the menu had the proper scaling, the crafting menu contained all the necessary information and that the less casual skill information was contained in a sub section:

Revised Wireframes (Click to Enlarge)

Nice, definitely an improvement from the first set of wireframes! So how did these changes affect the flow of the game?

It’d be much easier to show you, check out the revised flowcharts, which reflect the changes I made to the crafting system:

Final Revised Crafting System (Left) and Menu (Right) Flow (Click to Enlarge)

Nice! Wow everything is great so far, I can’t wait to see how everything turns out😅!!

Luckily, that’s what comes next! After going back and making some final changes to the flowcharts and wireframes, I was able to move on to the last part of the project: the prototype.

Prototyping!

What did you focus on when prototyping?

For this prototype I focused on building out these features:

Opening/ closing the menu,
Crafting multiple stone tools,
Viewing the favorites menu,
Accessing the Skill menu,
Expanding/ collapsing skill attributes.

I was able to prototype these features in Figma with my PS5 controller, which I think helped accurately convey the experience of navigating through the new crafting and skill menu. If you have your controller handy, check it out here. If not no worries, I have a quick video 😎!

Prototype of New Systems (Click to Play)

W O A H 😦! I think this really captures the problems you aimed to solve, well done!!

I will say, it wasn’t perfect, I did have to iterate on the final prototype a few times based on feedback. Also, if time allowed, further player testing would be most beneficial! I would then be able to make/revise changes to further enhance the crafting experience based on those results.

Most definitely, testing is always beneficial! Overall though, nice job! How do you feel about everything?

Takeaways

Over the past few months I’ve learned a lot that I feel has made me a better UX designer and problem solver but here’s a few takeaways that especially stuck with me this time around:

I had to learn how to consider how one change (even the smallest appearing one) could potentially change an entire system (or even related system). Even further, that change can cause friction that didn’t exist previously. This taught me to be more intentional with the changes I sought to make.
One that I continue to learn the importance of, the whims of the design process. Throughout the project, I had to take multiple “steps back” that allowed me to better solve for player’s needs. In fact, while it seemed like a step back, in the long run I probably saved time rather than designing a full system that doesn’t solve any real problems!

Oh that’s awesome.. Once again, seems like you’ve learned a lot and I can’t wait to see how your work continues to grow and progress! Thank you for sharing.

Of course! I’m looking forward to my next steps and can’t wait to show you everything I continue to learn😁. Until next time 👋🏾!