Creating Icons and UI Elements for Mobile Games

Creating Icons and UI Elements for Mobile Games

Game UI is not web icons or corporate UI. It must work on screens from 4.7" to 6.7", remain readable during active gameplay (while the player watches the action, not the interface), and convey the game's style without text. Our team has 5 years of experience in game UI: over 30 projects, from hyper-casual to RPG. The key pain points are texture packing without performance loss and a consistent style across all screens. Errors in 9-slice or atlases lead to memory overuse and FPS drops. Let's dive into how to avoid this.

Minimum tap target — 44×44pt — Apple HIG.

Technical Requirements for Game UI

Sizes and Density

Minimum tap target per Apple HIG is 44×44pt. For action game buttons, 60×60pt or larger is better—players tap without looking. Small inventory icons: from 64×64px to 128×128px depending on screen density.

Why 9-Slice Is Critical for Buttons?

Buttons and frames aren't simply stretched—they scale via 9-slice: corners are fixed, edges stretch. In Unity, Sprite Editor → Sprite Border defines the borders. One 40×40px button with 9-slice works for an 80×200px button without distortion.

Sprite Atlas: Packing UI

All UI elements of one screen go into one atlas. Unity UI → Canvas → Render Mode: Screen Space Overlay draws everything in one pass if using one Material/Atlas. Separate atlases for HUD (always on screen) and inventory (rarely opened).

Pixel Density Settings

For pixel art UI: Filter Mode: Point, Compression: None. For vector-drawn UI: ASTC 6x6 works fine. Icons with thin lines (1–2px) handle ASTC poorly—use ASTC 4x4 or no compression.

Typical Game UI Elements

HUD: Persistent Interface

Health bar, mana, experience, score, timer—always on screen during gameplay. They should be minimally invasive: occupy screen edges, not cover the game area. Safe area on iPhone with notch is always considered.

Item Icons: Frame System

Consistent frame + unique item. System: frame by rarity (gray—common, blue—rare, gold—legendary) + item icon on top. Frames—one atlas, item icons—separate (added via content patches without reworking the frame atlas).

Buttons: States and Animation

Normal, Pressed (scale 0.95 + tint), Disabled (opacity 50%). In Unity Button: ColorTintTransition or AnimationTransition with animation via Animator. For critical buttons (buy with real money) — Highlighted state with glow effect.

From Practice: RPG Collector, Unity

Item icons were made as separate PNGs without an atlas—200 icons × 2 draw calls each = 400 extra draw calls in the inventory screen. FPS in inventory dropped to 40. After packing into 2 atlases 2048×2048 — inventory draw calls became 8, FPS reached 60.

How Atlas Packing Affects Performance?

Using atlases directly reduces draw calls. Here's a comparison for a typical inventory screen:

The savings are obvious—correct packing frees resources for gameplay. The cost of a single item icon with frame ranges from $10 to $30 depending on complexity.

Animated UI Elements

Particle Effects in Canvas

Canvas Particle System in Unity—particle system working in Canvas space. For coin collection, level up effects, rewards. Sort Layer should be above game objects but below the main HUD.

Tween Animations: DOTween

DOTween (Unity) or LeanTween is the standard for game UI. Bounce on reward: transform.DOPunchScale(Vector3.one * 0.3f, 0.3f). Shake on error: transform.DOShakePosition(0.3f, 5f). Floating text on XP gain: DOTween.Sequence() with Move + Fade.

Fonts in Game UI

Game font is part of the art style. TMP (TextMeshPro) in Unity is the standard—SDF rendering is readable at any scale. Cyrillic fonts require separate TMP Font Asset generation with a Cyrillic Character Set (Window → TextMeshPro → Font Asset Creator). Fallback fonts for emoji or special characters.

Process and Scope

What's Included in the Project

• Item/character/ability icons in a unified style
• Frames by rarity/type
• HUD elements: bars, counters, timers
• Buttons in multiple states (normal, pressed, disabled)
• Panels, frames, dialog backgrounds with 9-slice
• App icons for iOS and Android (including adaptive)
• Export at correct sizes + configured atlases for Unity/Godot
• If needed: animated elements (reward icons, effects)

Estimated Timeline

Basic UI kit for one screen (10–20 elements): 3–7 working days, starting from $500. Full UI kit for a game (HUD, inventory, menus, shop, item icons): 1–3 weeks. Cost is calculated individually, roughly from $1,500 to $4,000 depending on complexity. Contact us—we'll evaluate your project in 1 day.

Step-by-Step UI Creation Process

1. Define stylistic direction and gather references.
2. Create basic shapes in vector or raster.
3. Test on a real device considering safe area and density.
4. Pack into atlases with correct 9-slice.
5. Export with settings: ASTC for textures, Point for pixel art.

What Export Formats Are Optimal for Different Icon Types?

Order an evaluation of your project — get a consultation on atlas packing and style.

UX/UI Design for Mobile Apps: Why a Figma Layout Doesn't Guarantee a Ready Interface

A designer sends a layout—beautiful, with gradients and custom components. The developer opens it and realizes: the button is 36pt, the tap target is 20pt. On an iPhone SE, it's physically impossible to press with a thumb. The bottom sheet covers content when the keyboard appears. Navigation is built against the native iOS model. Apple will reject the app, or users will leave within a week—depending on how lucky you get with the review.

We have been designing mobile UX/UI for over 5 years and have seen hundreds of such situations. During this time, we have designed and helped launch 30+ mobile apps—from fintech products to social networks. You don't need to guess whether the design will pass App Review or Google Play—we embed platform requirements from the first screen. We'll assess your project in one day, contact us.

Mobile UX/UI is not an adaptation of web design. It is a separate discipline with specific platform constraints: safe area, touch gestures, UIViewController lifecycle, Activity state management.

Why Can't You Ignore Human Interface Guidelines and Material Design 3?

Apple HIG and Google Material Design 3 are not aesthetic recommendations. They are documented user expectations formed by years of using system applications. Expectations confirmed by user experience research on mobile platforms (User experience design).

HIG defines: minimum tap target 44×44 pt, safe area insets for notch and Dynamic Island, standard gestures (swipe back on iOS, back gesture on Android 10+). Ignoring safe area is a common mistake. safeAreaLayoutGuide in UIKit and safeAreaPadding in SwiftUI exist precisely for this. A designer who doesn't set safe area margins in Figma guarantees a bug during development.

Material Design 3 introduced Dynamic Color—the color scheme is generated from the user's wallpaper via MaterialTheme.colorScheme in Jetpack Compose. An app that ignores dynamic colors on Android 12+ looks out of place. This is not critical for niche products but is noticeable in mass-market apps.

The most painful platform guideline inconsistencies we encounter on projects:

• Custom navigation on top of system navigation. iOS users expect swipe back from any point on the left edge of the screen. A custom NavigationController without interactive gesture breaks this. Android users expect the system back button—a custom back button in the left corner does not fully replace it.
• Modal windows instead of navigation push. Bottom sheets are appropriate for actions, not for navigating content.
• Missing haptic feedback. UIImpactFeedbackGenerator on iOS is not decoration but part of the interface response. Buttons, swipes, and confirmation actions without tactile feedback feel broken.

Table: Comparison of iOS and Android UX/UI Requirements

How to Get the Most Out of Figma?

The Figma Variables API has changed the workflow. Design tokens—colors, typography, radii, spacing—are stored as variables and exported directly to code via figma-tokens or style-dictionary. This eliminates manual value transfer and desynchronization between design and implementation. Practice shows: Figma Variables speeds up asset handoff to development by 2–3 times compared to static frames, and using design tokens reduces code transfer errors by 60%.

Auto Layout with wrap and spacing between elements allows building components that behave like flex containers. A developer opens a component and sees not a static artifact but a description of behavior at different content sizes.

Component Properties—variants, boolean toggles, instance swaps—enable building a full design system right in Figma. A button with 4 states (default, hover, pressed, disabled), 3 sizes, and 2 icon variants is one component, not 24 frames.

Figma Prototype with Variables allows creating an interactive prototype with real state: showing how the screen changes with different variable values. This is no longer just a "clickable layout" but a full UX testing tool.

How to Benefit from Prototyping and UX Testing Before Development?

The most expensive mistake in a mobile product is to develop a feature, release it, and discover that users don't understand how it works. A Figma prototype at the testing stage costs zero development hours. Redoing a finished screen costs days. Testing a prototype before development begins reduces the number of fixes by 80%.

For usability testing, we use Maze (task testing on a prototype—the user goes through a scenario, we get heatmaps and mis-click rates) or direct sessions via UserTesting. Key metrics are task completion rate and time on task, not "like/dislike."

A/B testing on mobile is harder than on web: the App Store doesn't allow UI changes without an app update. Therefore, it's important to test hypotheses on a prototype before release, not through production experiments. According to research, fixing a bug found on a prototype costs 10 times less than after production release. And average task completion time increases by 40% after proper UX optimization during prototyping.

Why Are Animations Critical for Interface Perception?

Animations in mobile apps are feedback. An element doesn't appear instantly—it transitions to the desired state over 200–350 ms. This gives the brain context to understand what happened.

• iOS: withAnimation in SwiftUI, UIViewPropertyAnimator in UIKit for interactive animations with interruption capabilities. Spring animations with dampingRatio are the basis of most Apple system transitions.
• Android: AnimatedVisibility, animateContentSize, Crossfade in Compose. MotionLayout for complex scenes with multiple transformations.
• Flutter: AnimationController + Tween, Hero animations between screens, Lottie for After Effects exports. Lottie is especially effective for onboarding illustrations and empty states.

The key constraint is 16 ms per frame (60 fps) or 8 ms (120 fps on ProMotion devices). Animations must run on the GPU via CALayer/RenderThread, not on the CPU via layoutSubviews. Profiling via Core Animation instrument in Xcode is a mandatory step before releasing animated screens.

Why Is Accessibility Not an Optional Feature?

VoiceOver on iOS and TalkBack on Android are used by up to 15% of users—this statistic is confirmed by accessibility research described in Accessibility (Wikipedia). In absolute numbers for a large app, this is thousands of people. Additionally, App Store rejections due to accessibility occur, though rarely.

Minimum checklist:

• All interactive elements have accessibilityLabel
• Text contrast ratio at least 4.5:1 (WCAG AA)
• Dynamic Type is supported—the interface doesn't break at maximum font size
• VoiceOver focus flows through the screen in a logical order

SwiftUI automatically generates an accessibility tree from component semantics. UIKit requires manual setup of accessibilityTraits, accessibilityHint, and grouping via shouldGroupAccessibilityChildren.

What Does the Work Include?

The UX/UI design deliverables include:

What Is the Process and Timeline?

Design goes through stages: research and competitive analysis → user flows and wireframes → design system → UI layouts → prototype → testing → handoff to development.

Timeline estimates:

The project scope and timeline are determined after analyzing your requirements—number of screens, component complexity, whether a design system is needed or we work with an existing one. Get a consultation for your project—contact us for a preliminary assessment. Order a complete mobile app design—we'll assess your project in one day and propose the optimal work scope.