Personas: discover, collect, play

The Humankind avatar hub on Games2Gether and the Twitch Drops journey, to discover, collect and receive Personas.

Hub players66.3%have at least one Persona in their collection
Monthly creations+70.8%from 1,472 to 2,514, the month before and after launch
Collections changed36.8%over 30 days

The problem

A growing avatar collection that has to stay useful for playing.

My role

The two hub views, the filters, the collection and the Twitch Drops journey.

My approach

Forum and community manager feedback, mockups iterated with the team.

The result

Monthly avatar creations up 70.8%, from 1,472 to 2,514.

Role: Product Designer (UX/UI)
Team: PO, developers, community managers and exchanges with the game team
Period: Two months of design at Amplitude Studios / Games2Gether
Tools: Figma, FigJam

01The hub: three decisions

Two views, suited to each player

“My collection” is for managing one’s picks, the global collection is for discovering. The side column explains to new players how to create a Persona, then shows the player’s own once it exists.

Humankind's Personas hub: 9 personas out of 50 in the collection, 72,918 in the global collection, and the two steps to create your own — New player: two views and the steps to create a Persona in game.

The Personas hub as seen by a collector: 48 personas out of 50, 67,454 in the global collection, their own Persona as a card, and their collection with DEV badges — Collector: their Persona and the remaining capacity are visible.

Filter by gameplay traits

Role, archetype, sorting and search help choose an opponent. I favoured these criteria over a popularity ranking, which would have concentrated visibility on the same creations. The creator and badges stay visible.

The global collection with the archetype filter open: cautious, adaptive, hateful, introverted, cruel, open, vindictive — Role and archetype help choose an opponent.

The global collection as a list, filtered on VIP players, with the add-to-collection action and the 9 out of 50 counter — Creator, badge and add button stay available in the list.

Limit the collection to 50

A manageable, varied selection that bounds synchronisation with the game. The counter is visible before adding. An unlimited collection risked becoming a pile. The limit of 50 remains a trade-off to evaluate.

The capacity trade-off

Humankind can bring together ten players. A collection of 50 therefore offers the equivalent of five groups of ten opponents and bounds synchronisation with the game. This explains the trade-off chosen, it does not prove that 50 is an optimal threshold.

02Twitch Drops: making every step clear

Watching a streamer earns their Persona, provided the right accounts are linked. I designed the journey on the site around three screens: campaign, account connections, rewards.

1Campaign
2Twitch link
3Watching
4Drop earned
5Game platform link
6Persona received in Humankind

The connection status is visible on the campaign. Steam, Epic and Twitch links are grouped in the settings, and the rewards page separates what is unlocked from what is still to earn.

Humankind's Twitch Drops page on Games2Gether: campaign visual and Account linked button — The campaign shows whether the Twitch account is linked.

Games2Gether account connections: Steam, Twitch and Epic Games Store, each with what it unlocks and a Connect button — Connections and what they bring are grouped in the settings.

Rewards page: the 18 streamer Personas already unlocked, and the one still to unlock — The campaign’s 19 Personas are split between earned and still to earn.

03Results: telling use from volume

Data provided by the team:

66.3% of hub players have at least one Persona in their collection.
36.8% of collections were changed over 30 days.
From 1,472 to 2,514 Personas created between the month before and the month after launch, +70.8%.
Twitch Drops: 58.1% of tracked viewers linked Twitch, and 90.6% of earned rewards were received in game.

A public count

A separate public count: 72,918 Personas, against 67,454 a month earlier, 5,464 more creations. This counter describes the size and growth of the collection several years after the game’s release. On its own, it does not measure the effect of the design.

Other team and campaign indicators

Median collection: 13 Personas out of 50. 6.1% of collections are full. The ten most collected Personas account for 19.4% of additions. Among players without a Persona who saw the creation steps, 14.2% create one within seven days. The campaign shown includes 19 streamer Personas.

04What I learned

I would test different collection capacities, 30, 50 and 100, and track additions and removals. I would also make creators’ popularity more visible, as well as the status of rewards between Twitch and the game, with a reminder when a platform is missing.