Client
Duration
A brand built to grow
Thundergryph Games is an independent board game publisher founded in 2016. Known for their premium components, creative mechanics, and outstanding art direction, they design titles that appeal to both families and experienced players. Beyond publishing, their philosophy centers on quality, longevity, and immersive storytelling.
From dice rolls to smooth scrolls.
As their game catalog expanded, so did the need for a digital platform that could reflect the same artistry and attention to detail as their physical products. Our collaboration focused on reimagining their e-commerce platform and landing pages to deliver a unified, user-friendly, and scalable digital experience.
Throughout the collaboration, I was responsible for the end-to-end design of the platform. My role extended beyond web design, touching on branding, storytelling, and creating assets that captured the company’s artistic spirit:
UX Design – auditing the old platform, mapping user flows, and creating intuitive paths for browsing, discovering, and purchasing games.
UI Design – building a clean, modern interface that balanced clarity with playfulness.
Web Design – designing responsive layouts for e-commerce pages, product listings, game detail views, and checkout flows.
Branding & Visual Direction – translating the brand’s craftsmanship into a digital-first identity, ensuring consistency across all touchpoints.
Illustrations & Iconography – creating a custom icon set and supportive illustrations to enrich the user journey.
Motion Design – using subtle micro-interactions, transitions, and hover states to bring playfulness and delight to the interface.
Design System – building a scalable design system with reusable components, typography rules, and color palettes, ensuring consistency across current and future releases.
Facing the Challenges
At the start, the project presented several unique challenges:
Visual consistency across diverse designs
Each game carried its own strong art style, making it difficult to unify the digital experience without diluting the individuality of the titles.Readability and navigation issues
The previous website had a cluttered layout, making it hard for users to find game information or move smoothly through the shopping process.Scalability and performance
With frequent new releases and limited editions, the platform needed to scale quickly while ensuring visual consistency and technical stability.Cross-device experience
The platform needed to perform equally well on desktop and mobile, with responsive design that enhanced usability across all devices.
Crafting the Solution
Custom Design System
A modular, scalable system that unified the digital presence while allowing flexibility for new titles and limited editions. This improved efficiency for future updates and simplified collaboration between design and development.
Improved Shopping Flow
Redesigned navigation and cleaner layouts made product discovery and checkout frictionless, resulting in a smoother customer experience.
Responsive Mobile Experience
Mobile usability was prioritized to support the increasing share of customers browsing and buying on smaller screens.
Brand Cohesion
The new platform brought consistency across all game presentations, reinforcing Thundergryph’s reputation for craftsmanship and creativity.
Results of the Collaboration
The redesigned platform became the digital counterpart to Thundergryph’s artistic and premium reputation, delivering both business and user value:
Stronger brand perception, aligning the digital experience with Thundergryph’s high standards.
Improved readability and navigation reduced friction in the shopping process.
Faster, clearer, and more enjoyable user experience across devices.
A scalable foundation, enabling the team to release new games and updates without disrupting the platform’s coherence.
Key Learning
This project highlighted the importance of balancing creativity and usability. By building a flexible design system and focusing on the user journey, I was able to deliver an e-commerce experience as engaging and long-lasting as the games themselves.
