2019 — 2021 | Case Study / Mohawk Games · Flint Collective
Old World
Mohawk Games +
Flint Collective
STUDIOS
UI Design + Animation
ROLE
PC
PLATFORMS
01 | THE WORK
Foundational UI design
From 2019 through 2020, I worked async with Mohawk Games as the solo external UI consultant on Old World, engaged during the pre-Early Access development window.
The work covered three parallel areas across the full engagement: the menu and HUD, a full icon system for the game's mechanics and flow, and FTUE tutorial animations introducing players to the game's systems. All three went into the product that shipped to Early Access in 2021 and to wide release in May 2022.
The Challenge
The development window for the rebuild was tight, which meant the design system had to do as much work as possible with as few unique decisions as possible.
02 | THE CHALLENGE
A 4X game with dynasty management layered on top
Old World is a historical strategy game designed by Soren Johnson (lead designer of Civilization IV) that layers Crusader Kings-style character and dynasty management on top of a traditional 4X structure, with a shared Orders resource, randomized tech trees, and over 3,000 unique events. The interface has to surface political relationships, military positioning, resource states, character traits, and event storytelling simultaneously.
The design challenge wasn't making any one of those things readable. It was making all of them readable at the same time without any of them getting in the way of each other.
03 | THE DELIVERY
Three workstreams, one language.
The menu and HUD work established the primary reading layer: what a player sees in the moment of play, how information is prioritized, and how the game's unique mechanics surface without overwhelming the map.
The icon system was the granular work: a full set of icons covering the game's mechanics and flow, designed to be instantly distinguishable at small sizes and across the range of situations a player encounters over a long session.
The FTUE animations introduced various systems in sequence, pacing the onboarding so the game's complexity arrived gradually rather than all at once. Three workstreams, each addressing a different layer of the same underlying problem.
04 | ON WORKING WITH MOHAWK
What a design-led studio feels like.
Mohawk is a small studio, and working with them directly reflected that. Soren Johnson's fingerprints are on every design decision in Old World, and that rigor extends to how the team thinks about UI. Every conversation about the interface was grounded in specific design intent: why a particular system worked the way it did, what player behavior it was trying to support, and where the UI could either help or get out of the way. That clarity of purpose made the work sharper.
When a client knows exactly what they're building and why, the design problems get more interesting, not more complicated. Mohawk is the kind of team that reminds you why this work matters.
05 | A NOTE ON THE WORK
The work that stayed through ship.
Old World shipped to Very Positive reviews on Steam. PC Gamer called it "a brilliant 4X" and recommended it over Civilization. IGN noted its ability to tell "more intimate and less abstract stories about human society" than its predecessors in the genre. The foundational UI work from the pre-early access engagement shipped with the game and stayed through release.