I built the first shared visual brand system to bridge over 20 distinct studio identities into a cohesive design vehicle that scales across 16,000+ employees worldwide.
Post aquisition of Activision Blizzard, Xbox had become the largest gaming organization of over 20 unique studio cultures and intellectual property ranging from Minecraft to Call of Duty. This created a dissonance in visual design standards across shared content, surfacing these goals:
Develop a visual identity that honors gaming cultures without compromise
Build stakeholder consensus around shared brand visuals to scale vertically
Recognizing the stakeholders spanned the globe, cultural differences and identities were the first to address; the system should not remove the attachment to specific intellectual property or disrupt business, but add value and encourage collaboration.
Through several conversations from leadership, project leads, marketing, and talent the need for a shared visual system was validated through every part of the employee experience. Through executive presentations, I secured sponsorship that provided the momentum to drive change at scale.
Initial attempts at branding were closely rooted in aligning Xbox consumer branding. Fewer game assets were emphasized and the patterns were optimized to flex total creative freedom. In practice, the system felt less "video game" and more "corporate" causing a blue sky issue of too many options.
A true lightbulb moment emerged: while working in a highly creative industry, most teams preferred structure and boundaries around the soul and culture. This particular moment defined next steps and fully formed the entire system.
The moment I explained that the next iteration for the system was designed with "cinema" at heart, the overwhelming positive reception was palpable. By adding the through-line of connecting through media at the core, I was able to devise a "movie reel" and "brick" layout to display iconic franchises that coexist but in parallel rather than in unity. Elements to tie the narrative together emphasize the use of gradients and textures with an expanded color palette allowing the system to expand and contract to every depth and style preference.
While the documents displaying the information were mostly static, a critical implementation of the system was web. The sharepoint example was praised for being clean and evoking a sense of pride for seeing culture in each asset while able to deliver messaging for a global workforce.
As all of the system took shape, I created a simplified set of guidelines to be used alongside creation of shared content experiences. Five major sections have been outlined to address the culture of cultures, AI enablement, ethics and legal with a visual language to flex across systems.
The guidelines have become the foundational reference for visual design across shared services, stretching to finance and HR, regularly cited by stakeholders as the clearest framework for producing cohesive content at scale across a global, multi-studio organization.
