Style Guide and Look & Feel
My first project as a full time designer at 2K Games was to determine the look and feel of the marketing for the newest title in Gearbox Software's Borderlands franchise--New Tales From The Borderlands. The team was struggling to develop a design toolkit for the game, and handed it of to me to find a solve. The client at Gearbox wanted something that skewed towards a comic book style and resonated with the in-game look, while still retaining the franchise's trademark element of "Mayhem."
Process Images
I did a few explorations of different styles that could work for the desired direction, showing examples of graphic design elements that would be included in a toolkit and a mockup using those elements. Gearbox loved the comic book direction and moved I forward with putting together a style guide and useable assets for other internal and external designers to use in all of our New Tales From The Borderlands marketing.
I wanted to create something that felt playful, dynamic, gritty but not grim-dark, and retained the "mayhem" of the other titles in the franchise. I leaned into comic book design elements like the halftone textures, speed lines, and torn pages, while mixing with hand-drawn elements and distressed effects.
I pushed for an angled approach to many of the design elements to match the slant of the logo to help things feel fresh, dynamic, and playful.
I used pops of yellow to reference the overall Borderlands franchise and make it feel more comic book in nature, and kept the background color palette darker, with a few select colors that tie into our main characters.
Printed Posters
Additional collectible posters for print, and posters that were displayed at a real-life version of the in-game Fran's Frozen Yogurt truck at PAX West to promote the game.
Cosplay Guides & Social Assets
I also designed printable cosplay guides that were available for fans to download and use as reference for fanart and cosplay, using the toolkit I had developed for the game. The full PDFs are viewable on the Borderlands franchise website: HERE
Additionally, I did many social and digital marketing assets for the game. A few included below for example.
