Action-Adventure

When Electronic Arts (EA) decided to enter the action-adventure market with Motive—a new gaming studio based in Montreal—it approached Frontier to design a brand to capture its vision. The action-adventure genre pushes the boundaries of video games. At its heart is a complexity and mystery that invites players to not only to complete levels or tasks, but also to think and explore beyond the obvious. We began by developing a brand position, speaking with key stakeholders at EA, especially industry-legend founder Jade Raymond.

Purposeful Tools

It became clear that Motive needed a brand that could hit a dynamic range—in some cases expressing its curious and thoughtful personality and in other cases adopting a quiet tone in support of a big-name property like Star Wars Battlefront. To accomplish this, Frontier designed a custom typeface called Motive Code that became a critical dynamic element. It established both the visual tone and the building blocks for a new logo, as well as unique patterns and an iconographic style that’s infinitely scalable.

Relentless Discovery

Once established, our strategy became the foundation for an ongoing design partnership that captured a spirit of mystery and adventure that was uniquely Motive. We developed core principles to bring depth and detail to the company mission, designed environmental graphics that helped disseminate those principles throughout the organization at multiple office and pop-up locations, and created playful, interactive activations to reach new audiences and attract new talent.