Star Wars Battlefront - Web Experiences
The next generation of games to come from a multi-year deal between EA and Lucasfilm was one of the most anticipated series of Star Wars games since the initial Battlefront series over 20 years ago. My task was to create a web platform that could be used throughout the multi-game marketing lifecycle to build anticipation towards the release and provide deep dives into the games throughout. The result was a flexible, marketing website that could expand over time to reveal more about the game as the development progressed. And a set of immersive HTML5 web experiences.
The Campaign Timeline
Leading up to the launch, we worked with the marketing, web and game studio teams to define a series of milestones where we’d reveal more information about the game.
Adapting the in-game aesthetic to the web
The Star Wars universe has a distinct and highly intentional aesthetic that’s been crafted over decades by Lucasfilm. I set the goal for the project from the outset that the web experience had to authentically represent the aesthetic of the game and the broader franchise to the web. I created connections with the DICE creative directors to adapt their style guide and lead multiple rounds of LucasFilms reviews to ensure we were adhering to the visual language appropriately.
Color & Typography
Navigation & Controls
Visual Effects
The Tease
The first taste of Battlefront 2 came in the form of a web-based teaser, I developed the concept of displaying a countdown page that would precede the launch of the full web launch, the page featured an ambiguous looping video of an Inferno Trooper helmet - a rumored division of the Imperial Special Forces. Every 20 seconds, the visual would glitch and reveal a glimpse of the female protagonist’s face underneath. This combined with the Inferno Squadron marking on the helmet created a huge amount of buzz online.
The Reveal
Getting closer to the launch of both Battlefront 1 & Battlefront 2, we developed interactive web experiences that gave users a fresh look at some of the most detailed aspects of the game. The experiences were built around footage we captured in-engine from pre-release builds of the game, which we then cut up into shorter clips, and punctuated with interactive moments where users could explore what they were seeing in more detail.
The Launch
For the last phase of the campaign, in the days before launch, we updated the site to a more comprehensive and structured destination. The goals changed from generating pre-orders, to driving engagement for game owners so the content skewed much more towards the informative and educational, while also catering to prospective buyers by keeping an experiential layer that allowed users to explore all the in-game vehicles, weapons and characters.
