Research
Desk Research
I began the research by looking into online articles and YouTube reviews to understand how the community perceives the eShop. It didn’t take long to notice how common frustrations around navigation and discovery were.
“The fact that there’s no shopping cart or some form of Mario-branded equivalent is baffling. If I want to buy two or more games, I literally cannot purchase them together.” - Techradar
“In the ‘Adventure’ row, you’ll find Grecian mythology roguelike Hades… alongside Minecraft. The side-scrolling Cuphead shows up high in the list for ‘Shooter’, but not ‘Platformer’. Various titles repeat across genres, suggesting they were so loosely tagged as for each tag to be somewhat pointless. What’s the point of a filter if a game shows up for each one?” - Lifewire
In one Youtube review video I discovered a 2022 survey conducted by a gaming content creator where 67 out of 81 participants (82%) rated the Nintendo eShop between 2 and 3 out of 5.
The most common complaints focused on slow loading times and difficulties in discovering new games. Other recurring feedback included the absence of background music, a feature often found in previous Nintendo stores, a bland interface, the lack of a shopping cart, missing recommendations and user reviews, and an inefficient wishlist.
Competitive Analysis
To better understand Nintendo’s position in the market, I also analyzed its main competitors and the overall digital shopping experience across platforms.
Reports by GamesIndustry.biz show that at least half of Switch users also own a PS4 or Xbox One, making comparisons between platforms inevitable.
Besides, while 83% of console games were purchased digitally in 2023, the eShop still lacks basic industry standards, such as a shopping cart or recommendations, highlighting a significant gap compared to its competitors.
Ideate
Sketches & Wireframes
After defining the MVP, I began brainstorming ideas, going over countless round of iteration in order to reach the final solution. The main challenge was to maintain the familiarity of the eShop while improving the overall experience by modifing the existing features or introducing new ones.
Information Architecture
I also created a revised information architecture to better structure the alterations in the system. It includes the breakdown of the 4 main areas accounted for in the redesign - homepage, discovery, wishlist and shopping cart - and their subsequent features.
Prototype
Style Guide
For the visual aspect I wished to communicate the familiarity of the brand, bringing a mix between Nintendo's red and blue, and elements that, when put togheter, wouldn't overwhelm the user despite the amount of information.
Solution
With the objective to provide a more streamlined and enjoyable experience the redesign spanned across different aspects of the system. The idea was to rethink the eShop so that it would, not only feel more personalized, but thought out in every aspect to increase user retention and satisfaction, while solving their current frustrations.
Personalized Home Screen
Introduced a new home layout with categories and personalized game recommendations, making it easier for users to discover games that match their interests.
Subgenre Filter
Redesigned the filtering system so selecting multiple genres narrows down the results, improving search precision and reducing loading times.
Faster Browsing Actions
Added "Add to Wishlist" and "Add to Cart" buttons directly on game cards, allowing users to act without opening individual game pages.
Shopping Cart Flow
Enabled users to buy multiple games at once with a simplified checkout process that maintains essential security steps.
Updated the visual hierarchy to create a more organized interface. Also adjusted the design to align with Nintendo’s visual language, maintaining brand consistency.
Enhanced Wishlist Management
Added sorting filters for easier organization and introduced an in-app notification system, allowing users to manage sale alerts directly from the platform.
While this redesign hasn't been tested in a real setting, with the solutions designed to address the main user frustrations and achieve the defined goals, I listed the anticipated improvements of the project.
Increased engagement and retention. The introduction of a personalized home screen and subgenre filters was designed to make game discovery easier and more engaging, also leading to a potential increase in sales.
Reduced friction in the user experience. An organized layout and faster browsing actions, such as adding items to the cart or wishlist directly from game cards, were implemented to streamline the user journey, creating a faster and more intuitive experience.
Higher sales conversion. The addition of a shopping cart and a redesigned checkout flow, allowing users to purchase multiple games at once, is expected to improve the overall conversion rate.
In addition, if I were to consider future steps, the next immediate action would be to conduct usability testing to validate the new flows and features.
Afterwards, following a hypothetical launch, success would be measured by monitoring conversion rates, total session duration, and user satisfaction scores to confirm the redesign's impact and identify areas for future improvement.