Good design — The Metaverse’s Propellant
More people than ever now know what the Metaverse means. With so many tech giants working in the space, aiming to bring several technologies such as AR, VR, and decentralized platforms to the public, the Metaverse is beginning to take shape.
While every player in the field has their speculations and assumptions, we believe that good design is what will make the Metaverse easy to use and give a reason for new users to stay.
Virtual vs. Reality
All these years, technology had to compete with the physical world, what we call the “reality”. Online shopping experiences needed to be a good replacement for physical shopping, texting with someone on a messenger needed to be more fun than a face-to-face conversation, and a game experience needed to be as good as a real-life experience. The Metaverse is simply trying to bridge the virtual and the reality.
So this “virtual” layer on our real-world needs to be as good as the real-world, almost indistinguishable. This is where effective design, especially 3D, and a seamless user experience are very important. While we need amazing tech to make the Metaverse better, tech alone is not going to be enough.
Good tech needs to be followed by good design.
That is essentially why we want to put design at the forefront of every project we are building for the Metaverse.
Fixing the weak link of the Metaverse
There is a lot of noise being made about the Metaverse. But one thing that is currently missing is user engagement and a dedicated user base.
We got down to analyzing how we can potentially solve this. While the awareness exists, the Metaverse needs an effective user experience flow that will make people want to return again and again. So many people are out there talking about the Metaverse, but without the right content interaction, user experience, or engaging touchpoints, we’ll have no users!
We need to make the experience so attractive, because with technology as forward as Web3, the design needs to take the experience to the next level. Nobody wants a dull and glitchy experience.
The wow factor
The Metaverse is not your normal online application, it is more custom and personalized. It relies on interactions between elements in the surroundings and authentic conversations between the users and the platform, unlike other digital products. To make this happen, designers play a very crucial role in creating an experience that appeals to the audience.
When we talk about design, it’s not JUST the visual elements. Let’s look at design as two different verticals in this case
- Practical user experience
- Kickass 3D designs
We need to understand that we are building an application or a service. We are building virtual worlds for users to tread upon.
How do we intend to nail it?
A few years ago, building an interconnected ecosystem would have been a farfetched idea. The programming and technology required to do it are now evolving but otherwise, we also need a deeper understanding of human behavior, preferences, and the psychology behind users’ choices.
- User Experience
Some of the factors we consider before detailing the User Experience are, knowing what the audience wants, how will they be using it, and potential problems they might face. For example, if someone purchases an NFT, how do we make unlocking the utilities easier? That’s how Dehidden was born, where we have now made unlocking utilities easier by giving a unique link to each NFT that we mint.
2. Visual Design
As for the visuals are considered, there is a variety of demographics that is being targeted for each project. It is a process of research, analysis, and survey to identify what kind of design appeals to the kind of audience we want to reach. It is important to create designs that will resonate with a wide range of audiences.
There is one thing we have learned during our process of building products and startups. It is important to make sure the backend (that is technology) is seamless, but design and UX are going to be how this tech is going to be presented to the audience. Not a lot of users are going to know about tech optimization but perceive a product by how easy it is to use, switch between, and how appealing it is to see.
And this is why we think that good design will be the propellant to the rocket that is The Metaverse’s technology.
