Nov 23, 2022
Evermore App Proof of Concept
App Design and Prototyping
Note: I used images from multiple creators. This is for educational purposes and to expand my skills as a designer.
The Evermore App Proof of Concept design is part two of a 3-part branding project for Evermore Park found in Pleasant Grove in Utah. It is an immersive role-playing theme park where you can interact with unique characters, complete quests, and join guilds.
For this POC, I focused on the LORE event which runs from September-October. I wanted to make a simple app that customers can use while in the park and made it as a response to what I’ve heard people want while at the park. This included making a simple way to know where you are while roaming the park, keeping track of characters, locations, and quests, while answering questions about the hidden things at the park that should be a bit more obvious.
The Process
Evermore Park Branding
There were four main items I considered when it came to creating the branding: imagery, icons, colors, and fonts.
All fonts, colors, and logos came from Evermore’s website. The other icons under the logos I got from Iconify, a plugin for Figma. I also used a parchment paper background for all of the pages of the app which I thought tied the whole thing together. The idea was to make sure that everything I used is either associated with Evermore’s brand or fit the brand without getting away from their vision.
As far as images go, I went with both images I found online, as well as images I took myself while at Evermore Park.
I took photos with both my phone and my SLR, and made sure all photo assets worked together as I used them. I used a smoke filter on some of the images I took during the day to make them a bit more gloomy so they matched the theme more.
Site Map and Wish List
As always, this was a messy and evolving process. The first thing I usually do is scribble on my large sketchpad, and create a feature “wish list” of everything I was thinking of adding. This was so I didn’t get locked into a specific design using a design tool first.
I wanted to include a lot that did not make it into the final design, such as creating a place for a photo library of your time at the park and including a tab for Evermore’s Convergence. There were a few high-priority features that I made sure stayed such as a place where you can gather information about characters and locations, and a way how to take notes about quests.
From my wishlist, I needed to create a simplified sitemap so I would have a good starting point. I sketched out what I wanted where, and expanded on it later in Figma. I wanted to make sure that all the features I put on high priority would be easily accessible, so instead of a three-menu-button system, I created a five-menu-button system with the icons I found on iconify.
From here, I went to figma to make wireframes for the concepts I had in mind
Key Features
Everything needed from the Home Page
This app design was set up in a way where people can have different levels of immersion if they so chose. I put the most important components of the app up front on the landing page, which includes the map which would show the customer’s location in the park, the park’s daily schedule, and a way to pull up a QR code (or what would be called *Runes) for easy access to your tickets. This helps those who just want to explore and see the shows do that easily just from the first page.
*QR Codes as Runes is my concept and not a current concept of Evermore Park, but one I feel should be implemented to help with immersion.
Keep Track of Quests, Characters, and Locations
The next most important feature I felt the app needed was a place to keep track of Quests, Characters, and Locations. I found evidence of this being a need of park goers whenever I went to the park. For background, I usually always bring a notebook with me, which is something that people see and wish they brought. They don’t normally think of pulling out their phones for notes. But if there was a dedicated app function for it, *people may turn to it more.
This is my assumption without User Testing though.
This led to the creation of the “Field Guide,” which is a place where park goers can go, take notes, and save information about the park. I also used the Journal aspect of this app to keep track of guild quests, which is more of a hidden feature of the park (something that I as a casual park goer never ran into naturally). The idea of this feature is to get people involved in looking into things at the park instead of just walking around. It's a feature designed to help people get excited about quests and piecing together the lore of the park.
Other Features
Along with the key features I thought were important, I added other features that fit an app like this, and that would help park goers and their experience while at the park have a good time.
I added a place to make an account so that park goers could keep track of what tickets they purchased, manage their payment methods for easy purchasing, and a place to manage contact information for ticket confirmations. I also added a place to order food at Evermore Park through the app so you can order then pick food up later (which is currently not something you can do at the park). The last feature that made sense was allowing for tickets to be purchased in the app. I made this feature to follow the purchasing process on Evermore’s site while making design improvements.
You can go through all these features in my Figma Prototype.
Concepts not in the Prototype
This prototype was focused on the LORE event at Evermore Park, but all in all there are three or four different events that happen throughout the year. What I would add to the app’s overall design would be different colors and font pallets for each season, as to reflect the color and font changes that happen on Evermore Park’s website.
I would also include a way to archive and look up past seasons’ events, journal notes park goers would take, and a way to archive and delete notes, which is something I did not implement in the prototype.
Conclusion and Take-a-ways
Throughout creating the app’s design, I made sure to match all the icons I added, all the images, and color concepts to align with Evermore’s brand, and I believe I accomplished that to some degree. I also added different concepts that the park currently does not have, including a way to order food in advance, and scan for lore beats via QR “Rune” codes.
While I was not as organized in this project, this was an overall fun project that helped me learn more about my process and will be something that I can look back on for future projects.
Again, here is my Figma Prototype if you want to look around at my app concept.
