YourGamePal ➜

Mobile app to help gamers track their game library.

2018 - 2019

Summary

Problem/Background

From personal experience and frequent discussions with friends, I realized that some dedicated gamers juggle between multiple games at once and have a growing backlog of games. This frustrates them as new games release during busy times, and the number of games they are interested in playing grow each week.

Solution

I designed a mobile app to supplement many gamers' needs, which mainly include the ability to track in-game statistics and to easily access game guides and walkthroughs. This app would improve the quality of gamers' user experience because they can manage their game library and progress anywhere they like.

Personas

Gamers of all kinds with busy lives.

Persona Goals

I discovered these goals by interviewing 10 gamers with interest in different genres.

• Seeks a more organized way to complete their currently in-progress games on multiple platforms.

• Hopes to find a way to easily track completion rate and achievements in each game and use walk-through videos all in one place to complete the games in a shorter amount of time.

• Wants a way to track game progress while not gaming, like while on their way back home from work.

Problem/Background

Being completely new to the country and having limited English proficiency, tens of thousands of immigrants struggle to settle down in this new community and face difficulty communicating with others.

I personally have faced similar struggles when moving from another country to the United States as a young child, as well as when moving to and from multiple different cities throughout my life.

Solution

I designed a mobile app that aggregates local resources and services (e.g. grocery stores, churches, community centers), and essential information for immigrants and newcomers. Users can discover new places via the app, which would make it easier for them to take advantage of valuable local benefits and resources.

Personas

Immigrants and newcomers regardless of socioeconomic status and language ability.

Pain Points

I discovered these pain points by interviewing 10 immigrants from a variety of backgrounds from the US east coast.

• Uncomfortable with their surroundings.

Most immigrants felt uncomfortable looking for new resources or services in person, and would rather rely on their social circle for local information. I want to help them break this barrier.

• Unaware of nearby resources.

  A few immigrants indicated that they have lived in their community for over three years but have never heard of some local resources until very recently that would have been extremely helpful to them if they had found out earlier.

• Insufficient knowledge with technology.

  Over half of the interviewees had at least basic knowledge of using a smartphone, but they mostly use it to communicate with close ones via call or text.

• Most interested in language, education, and finance-related resources.

  Due to the interviewee’s financial and personal situations, they are looking to maximize their success in those departments.

Design Opportunities

• A simple overall app design without the need of an onboarding process.

• Allow users to easily discover new resources and locations within a few screens.

• Easy-to-access information for each resource or service, which include business hours, address, contact information, available services, and more.

Prompt

A great residential community (e.g. condominium, college dormitory, etc.) provides a variety of amenities and a dedicated staff responsible for its maintenance. But there isn’t always an easy way for community members to report problems to management so they can be resolved quickly.

Design a system for a community of your choice, so members can report issues and track their resolutions. Show your process and how you arrived at your solution. Please include a sequence of high-fidelity mocks from your design solution.

I had one week to complete this exercise.

Looking at how my university dorm handles maintenance requests.

Looking at how my apartment management handles maintenance requests.

Maintenance staff came in at 2AM without resident’s approval.

Seems like the tenant should have received an advance notice that maintenance was coming and at so late of a time

A form like this is good for reference.

An online community issue reporting system seems to be much less prevalent in apartment residential communities.

Directly contacting maintenance or the landlord by calling or text messaging is much more common.

There seems to be a lack of confirmation and feedback of the status of the request.

Design Opportunity

Allow users to easily track the status of their request, whether help is on the way or that the issue has been resolved. And also allow them to view a history of their requests.

A mobile solution seemed to be preferred over a desktop web version (at least for apartment communities).