How Do We Adapt to Designing for the Metaverse?
How Do We Adapt to Designing for the Metaverse?
As a designer, you hear it wherever you go: the metaverse is a disruption. It poses a radical challenge for the design industry. It requires a completely different set of tools, methodologies, and conventions.
In the metaverse, the design challenges we face are plenty.
First, it’s no longer two-dimensional but three-, four- and five-dimensional. The space is borderless and the interaction potential can be truly mind-boggling.
Second, there are no more buttons and screens. We have to train users to figure out navigation on the go and ensure they are still comfortable while doing so.
Third, a different kind of interface means we have no choice but to enable interaction via voice, gaze tracking, body movement, gestures and touch, eventually developing the conventions around it to make it as accessible for users as possible.
Fourth, we need to figure out how to make the user’s real-life sensations relevant to the virtual scenario from the storytelling point of view.
Fifth, the user’s avatar is no longer a mere extension to facilitate virtual interactions, In the metaverse, the avatar is the user.
These challenges will indeed require designers, storytellers, engineers, brands, and even governments to come together and figure out the new conventions of creating in the metaverse.
Want to learn more how we should approach designing experiences for something as complex as the metaverse?