ALGS Open Esports Production Graphics Concept

TLDR;

OVERVIEW

A visual design concept for the ALGS Open esports event's production graphics. The concept involves an overhaul of color and style that represents the host city - New Orleans, Louisiana. The graphics can be used as a part of the event livestream.

DURATION

March 20, 2025 (1 day)

ROLE

UX Lead

RESPONSIBILITIES

Research, user flow, visual design, wireframing

PROBLEM

The Apex Legends Global Series is an esports tournament for the Apex Legends videogame created by Respawn Entertainment and published by Electronic Arts. For the first time in the history of the esport, the ALGS Open hosts an arena event (LAN event) that has 160 teams participating over 4 days. The production graphics require a localized color palette that represents the city of New Orleans.

REQUIREMENTS

Introduction

Scoreboard

Character Pick Rate (Legend Pick Rate)

Weapon Stats

Team Stats

Player Stats

GOALS

A simple color palette that represents New Orleans, Louisiana.

A typography that is familiar to the Apex Legends Global Series audience.

Unique visual representation of the data critical to the storytelling by the broadcasters.

PROBLEM STATEMENT

Apex Legends is a first-person hero shooter battle royale videogame developed by Respawn Entertainment and published by Electronics Arts. The game also has its own esports tournament series called Apex Legends Global Series (ALGS) that is hosted across North America, South America, EMEA, and Asia Pacific. The tournament series is split into 2 Playoffs of 40 teams each that are held in arenas (LAN) and culminate in a global championship tournament.

For the first time in the tournament's history, a LAN event has expanded from 40 teams to 160 teams in its 5th year - the ALGS Open held at New Orleans, Louisiana in May 2025. The production's graphics require a visual touch that represents the great city of New Orleans while retaining the familiarity and emotion connected with the ALGS tournament series.

$1 Million

Prize pool for the ALGS Open tournament

30,000+

Viewers in attendance at the last LAN event held in Sapporo, Japan

IDEATION

The research involved identifying the right shade of colors that represent New Orleans that can stand out in the ALGS production while simultaneously not looking out of place. The additional colors must also blend in with the chosen color palette in a more seamless manner.

Color Palette

Typography

APEX BOLD

APEX SEMIBOLD

Apex

The typography chosen was the font appropriately named Apex. It is a tried and true typeface that players as well as fans find familiar. It provides a feeling of being home with your friends that enjoy playing and watching the game Apex Legends.

The concept involved identifying the core aspects that are displayed during the production of the tournament when the games aren't being played. Managing to entertain the audience during the time in between games is dependent on the broadcasters who require data points and statistics to tell stories. Post-match data can provide a lot of points to include in analysis of the matches, something that has been used consistently in esports as well as traditional sports. Representing these elements by blending in the New Orleans color palette posed a challenge as it was a Goldilocks-scenario, trying to find the right proportions of spreading out the colors.

Based on research conducted on the ALGS broadcast elements as well as someone who has personally watched all the official ALGS broadcasts over multiple years and production companies, the following screens were selected for this project.

1. Introduction

2. Scoreboard

3. Legend Pick Rate

4. Weapon Stats

5. Team Stats

6. Player Stats

APEX REGULAR

APEX BLACK

A fun activity in the visual design process was creating the introduction graphic. I had previously drawn 3 of my favorite legends from the game in a Japanese art style (chibi) where the character's heads are larger than the body to accentuate the features. These particular legends were chosen due to their popularity in different years of the tournament meta (most effective or optimal strategy for winning). These 3 drawings were also included in the introduction graphic to provide a feeling of fun and competition - a core emotion associated with esports.

In addition to the assets extracted from the game itself, representative icons for each legend was used from the Apex Legends wiki with some modifications for the Player Stats page to show the legends they played. Full credit goes to the artists that created these assets for the Apex Legends Wiki.

As a part of the visual design process, the assets from the Apex Legends game had to be extracted. Available images from the Apex Legends website for the characters (legends) and weapons were used for representation accordingly. This involved usage of Adobe Photoshop to create graphics with transparent backgrounds. In addition, images of the esports organizations and individual players were used from publicly available press/media images from the associated websites.

The ALGS logo was also modified to include the New Orleans fleur de lis to provide a more local feel. 2 variants were made for different types of usage.

FINAL RESULT

Upon multiple iterations of the visual representation process and design process, the final screens were designed as shown below. Additional screens were also designed for the other competitive maps played during the ALGS tournament matches. The maps being played are also shown as pagination at the bottom right of the screen.