Ian Parovel is a multi talented Artistic Directory, a kind of Swiss Knife from the design&game universe. Ian worked on of animation movies for TV and Cinema (Podcats, Disney, ...), video games (Ubisoft, E.A.), and is working for some years on board games (Gosu, Colt Express, Deus, ...).
As a graphic designer, Ian designed interfaces in a lot of contexts : for the general public, for professionals, for the web or for games.
Ian has been awarded multiple time for his work (including by FWA), and is also a big players on BGA. Obviously we were very proud when he accepted to work on improving the player experience on this service, and as he is a player we first ask him this question ;
What kind of player are you?
I play everything, really. I enjoy playing a wargame like I enjoy playing a tiny party game. In my opinion the only thing that matter is the pleasure to play and to join an adventure. My only constraint is time. I am happy to play "6 nimmt!", "Imagine", "Dungeon Twister" or "Civilization" (the board game by Avalon Hill from 1982 - on my PC I vote for Sid Meier) : I'm fine with everything if the Right Ingrredients are there.
I must admit I have a special crush for "Carcassonne" (with some personal rules), and building games in general. I appreciate a lot the LCGs like "Race for the Galaxy", "Netrunner", "Game of Thrones 2nd edition", but I often prefer the great classics like "Ticket to Ride" and especially "EVO" because this is way more easy to find around me new players to "evangelize" than core gamers.
By the way, this is really a big chance to make people discovering new fields : you can immediately get what players understand from the game, how they understand the material, and how they feel about the game mechanisms. This is essential to understand why sometimes small details prevent players to immerse themselves quickly into a game - and this leads me to think and work deeper and deeper on user experience.
What is planned for BGA?
At now, Board Game Arena is, with almost 600k users, the biggest website for online boardgaming worldwide, with more than 30 languages.
The majority of players here are real board games addicts, who know some games like the back of their hands. They are here to try their strategies, or just to have good time, with strangers or friends.
However, BGA is a 6 years old service : like all the other online services, some new users are coming while the old users - YOU, the heart of this website - continue to use the website the way they do in the past. You have your habits, this website is a little bit like your home, and you are right to do it like this because BGA became what it is thanks to YOU. And this cause an issue because of course this service must be adapted to its new size, it must evolve regularly, little by little, to be enriched.
At the very beginning of BGA, there was only few players and features, but now the website became a monster with many many features, constantly evolving. And this is thanks to you all, who regularly suggest new features that has been evaluated and finally developed.
Technically speaking, this is possible to make your good old car go faster than sound by improving its engine, its wheels, or any other component. But what is way more efficient for everyone is to gain performance by changing the car body.
"if you're gonna build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some *style?*"
This is the heart of the change planned for BGA.
This is not a very big change. No. Everyone should continue to feel like this is home. This is a progressive step by step change, so everyone can handle it.
However this is not just about changing colors. BGA is going to propose new services, while keeping the old ones.
At now, we are changing the logo. But not completely. A lot of you may have noticed that the dynamic stays the same, with the idea of 5 overlapping circles. These circles used to representi tokens, and now there are players, viewed from the top, symbolized by 4 circles with different sizes. Why? Because players are the heart of this service, they are all from different nations, ages and types, but they are all linked together by a central element : a game table, here on BGA.
This logo is not explicit, because BGA is not only tables and players. This is a community, an idea of what online boardgaming should be. A multidisciplinary and technological leisure that must offer an experience simple but rich, recognizable but unique.
The chosen colors are part of a very accurate camaïeu which conducts the navigation hierarchy. The transversal blue, main color for users, the purple at the top for active important menu, and the light blue for secondary interactions. But this is just a start.
This is really important to create a navigation experience that is simple but clear, to help new players to discover BGA - even if they are not familiar with tools with so much features. However, this is equally important to keep "advanced" features you are using accessible.
This is why we are going to reorganize the menus and navigation, to propose an interface that is more clear without changing everything. We are going to make the whole thing more readable and more accessible, while keeping the useful advanced feature YOU are using not so far - maybe an additional click - with an clear and normalized iconography.
At the end, the whole website will benefit from clear icons you can identity immediately, to make the navigation and the tools usage fluid for everyone. Some enriched visuals and animations will improved your game experience, to make it more accessible and immersive.
We'd like to thank all of you that are using this service regularly, playing regularly, participating to the life of this website and making its hear beat. We'd like to thank you by introducing a greatest experience, more gratifying. Thus, a new system will allow you to show your exploits, your level and your general experience. Those of you who want to participate more to this website will have improved tools and clear features, to make sure that everyone feels home, and to make sure every possible player is welcome here the best way.
There is a lot of work to do before all of this is operational, but the change has been launched. Thus, please feel free to send us your suggestions, we are reading all of them. Just keep in mind that even if these are things we already think about, we need time to evaluate/test/finalized all these details that improve your BGA experience, for all present and future games, from your computer, tablet or smartphone.
BGA is going to change little by little, for you, for us, for all of you that are faithful to this service, and for those who are going to join us.
Thanks for your support.
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