↳ The Experience
Worlds Built
to Explore
Four immersive game worlds across devices and touchpoints — each with its own visual theme, characters, and mini-games tied to literacy milestones.
Teaching first-time readers — one world at a time.
"Students embark on quests, explore whimsical worlds, and assist heartfelt characters — learning to read without ever feeling like they're learning."
Smarty Ants is a core literacy game recognized and integrated into school systems for students from Pre-K through 2nd grade. The original version hadn't been redesigned in over a decade and needed a complete rebuild — not just visually, but architecturally. Our redesign evolved it into a modern, immersive MVP experience spanning four phases of work.
The challenge was massive in scope: translate 20+ levels of educational content and pre-existing pedagogy into a new immersive game experience. Tailor narrative, game mechanics, and interaction design for ages 5–8. Build a Design Language System for UI and illustration that could accommodate 20+ levels across 3 worlds, while ensuring inclusivity and accessibility for every student.
I led the full creative — visual design, illustration direction, UX, level design, and user testing. We spoke with student and teacher pairs selected across school performance, reading level, demographics, grade, ethnicity, US region, and device access. I even conducted user testing with my own daughter on game mechanics and storytelling ideas.
Four phases of work, end to end — creative direction, UX, illustration, and game design across 20+ levels.
Four immersive game worlds across devices and touchpoints — each with its own visual theme, characters, and mini-games tied to literacy milestones.
Each level environment was designed with a distinct visual theme — systematically applied across our full illustration component library.
Every level had a new imaginative visual theme — applied systematically across a shared illustration component library to keep production scalable.
Design principles that governed every visual and interaction decision — balancing imagination with clarity for ages 5–8.
Aligning 20+ levels of literacy content and pedagogy with engaging game narrative across three captivating worlds required a rigorous design framework.
Creating UI for children was a distinct challenge — intuitive interactions, accessible patterns, and visual clarity that kept students focused on learning.
Student and teacher pairs across diverse demographics — testing what worked, what didn't, and what made kids light up.
A full lesson flow — from world introduction through cinematic, transversal, teaching video, and interactive learning moments.