Welcome to this case study where I’ll be sharing my experience as a UX/UI designer working on the Valhallan esports training platform. Throughout this journey, I had the opportunity to address key user challenges and enhance the overall user experience of the platform. By conducting interviews, surveys, and extensive research, I gained valuable insights into the needs and pain points of both current users and potential enthusiasts.

So, join me as we dive into the details of this project, from identifying user frustrations to developing effective solutions, all with the ultimate goal of providing a seamless and enriching experience on the Valhallan esports training platform.

Through user personas, user journey maps, and empathy maps, we gained valuable insights into the needs, frustrations, and aspirations of Valhallan users. This empathetic approach helped us understand their experiences with the platform and identify areas for improvement. By putting ourselves in their shoes, we were able to shape our design solutions to better meet their expectations and create a more engaging user experience.

Our research phase encompassed both quantitative and qualitative methods, including 100 surveys and 10 in-depth interviews. Through the surveys, we gained a broad understanding of user preferences, while the interviews provided valuable insights into the experiences and expectations of current Valhallan students and subscribers. 

At the beginning, as well as throughout the entire process, discovery and iteration meetings were held, from which aspects of feasibility, profitability and scope of the project emerged. The teams present at the meetings were composed of directors, managers, marketing teams, project managers and developers.

This comprehensive research approach enabled us to uncover key pain points and opportunities for improvement, informing the design process and shaping the proposed solutions for an enhanced Valhallan esports training platform.

Through user personas, user journey maps, and empathy maps, we gained valuable insights into the needs, frustrations, and aspirations of Valhallan users. This empathetic approach helped us understand their experiences with the platform and identify areas for improvement. By putting ourselves in their shoes, we were able to shape our design solutions to better meet their expectations and create a more engaging user experience.

With a clear understanding of the problems based on the research insights and analysis, we facilitated brainstorming sessions where team members shared their ideas, thoughts, and suggestions. During this process, I provided stakeholders and meeting attendees with sketches and low-fidelity prototypes.

We also discussed the user flow for the main features and analyzed the technical possibilities for each different case. We spent a month iterating this ideation process within the team and validating them with current students, teachers, and the director of the VH facilities.

We encouraged an open and inclusive environment, allowing for a diverse range of perspectives and innovative concepts to emerge.

We published alpha and beta versions of the application for small groups with which we conducted usability tests and QA processes that yielded valuable insights that exceed the length of this case study, but of which I want to mention the detection of possible improvements in readability and layout on various devices when users manually increased the font size in the mobile operating system. 

For this, we worked with developers to implement the native functionality of the app for text size adjustment, adapted the design systems in sets of libraries normal, M and L size and prototyped and designed the option in different screens of the app, which also allows customizing other aspects of the overall experience in the app.

By the time I finished my participation in the project, the functionalities fully implemented were those related to subscriptions and member management, as well as support and a basic initial version of the chat and student progress tracking. Added to this are the general functionalities for the operation of the business, such as onboarding, personal information, payment, etc.

At the beginning of 2023, the development teams were developing the APIs and infrastructure adjustments needed to implement the event features, promo codes, and the more advanced versions of progress tracking, chat and advanced member management. This work is being made possible thanks to the foresight in the design process and the implementation of a robust design system and documentation.

The app began to be offered privately to existing students and communicated on Valhallan’s social networks. During the first two months of using it, the results were very good and the next versions of the app, according to the directors, will strengthen the growth curve and customer retention thanks to this product, which will go from being complementary to being a core element of the service.

Throughout this project, I’ve gained valuable learnings that have had a significant impact on my work as a designer and my understanding of the ed-tech industry. One key lesson I’ve learned is the importance of establishing a solid design system early on, especially when we have limited time and resources. This allows us to stay organized, maintain consistency, and ensure that our product and brand integrity are preserved.

In the realm of education and technology, I’ve discovered the immense value placed on instant access to progress, achievements, and support. Additionally, this project highlighted the significance of considering scalability and future growth. As the Valhallan esports training platform expands its user base, it’s essential to anticipate and plan for scalability challenges. This involves designing a robust and flexible infrastructure that can accommodate increasing user demands and future feature enhancements. By proactively addressing scalability considerations, we can ensure a seamless user experience and avoid technical limitations as the platform grows.

In summary, this project has provided me with valuable insights to shape my work as a designer but also led me to adapt my strategies in order to create impactful and user-centric solutions, in this case,  oriented to meet the evolving needs of the education and technology landscape.