8 years crafting
enjoyable
digital experiences
for real people.

I'm Javi, a Senior UX Designer, Career Lead & Mentor based in Santiago, Chile. Most recently I led UX features for Apex Legends at Electronic Arts, owning HUD design, accessibility systems, and player-feedback loops for a global competitive audience. Before that, I was at Epic Games on Fortnite Creative & UEFN, shaping the tools that let hundreds of millions of players build their own worlds. I don't just design, I bridge UX, engineering, and game design to make sure the right thing ships, not just the prettiest one.

Beyond gaming, I've shipped across aviation, healthcare, logistics, and government, always at the intersection of scale, complexity, and real human stakes. I hold a Master in Advanced Design and, unusually for a designer, a degree in Clinical Psychology, which shapes how I approach research, team culture, and the humans on the other side of every screen.

javifaret@gmail.com LinkedIn

Senior UX Designer · Santiago, Chile

Thoughtful
experiences
played by millions.

Eight years across gaming, mobility, healthcare, and logistics. Most recently shipping live-service features at Epic Games for APEX Legends and Fortnite.

Currently

Senior UX Designer

Focus

Gaming UX Design · Live Service

Available

For senior IC + lead roles

Selected Work · 2022 — 2025

Gaming Case Studies

7 Case Studies

Respawn Entertainment • Apex Legends • Gaming

Legend Vantage — UX Flows & HUD Rework

Vantage was underperforming in fights and seeing less play overall. As a sniper, her role grows more difficult as the game progresses and the playspace shrinks. The goal was to keep her kit powerful at every stage of the game through clearer UX communication and a redesigned HUD.

Scope

Canted Sights — new fire mode UX & communication
Ult Charge — spotter ping feedback & cooldown clarity
HUD rework across both abilities
Audio + animation cues to reinforce loops

UX Flows HUD Rework

Vantage — Legend Locker (Recon · Survivalist Sniper)

Vantage — upgrades tree (LVL 1–3)

The Challenge

A sniper whose kit needed clarity

Vantage was underperforming because her kit's complexity wasn't communicating clearly to players. Canted Sights — a side-mounted 2× alternate sight toggled via the weapon fire-mode button — was being confused with the ADS system. Ult Charge, gained through Spotter's Scope pings, had no clear visual link between the spotter mark and the bullet UI charge.

The design challenge: communicate these mechanics clearly without overloading the HUD, and ensure every feedback loop felt intentional and readable mid-fight.

Before States

What the kit lacked before the rework

✗ Canted Sights — Before

Only ADS for zoom, no fire mode — therefore no mid-range scope (3×–8×). Toggle fire to equip Canted Sight required ADS time reduction from 0.5s to 0.4s. Bullet scaling drastically reduced in Canted Sights.

✗ Ult Charge — Before

No Ultimate charge through pinging. Hard to distinguish between Spotter's mark and shooting mark (passive ability). Rechamber time 1.2s vs 1.1s when canted — unclear to players.

Key Mechanics

Fire mode toggle teaches itself. A hint displays on initial pullout — players discover Canted Sights naturally without needing a tutorial or settings deep-dive.

Quick swap animation on mode change. A "flick" animation plays when switching between Normal and Canted — tactile feedback that confirms the mode change visually.

Cooldown is team-dependent. Once ult charge is granted from marking an enemy team, that team goes "on cooldown" for the charge reward — preventing farming the same squad.

Audio reinforces every loop. An audio cue accompanies charge gain — ensuring the feedback registers even in high-action moments when visual HUD attention is split.

Process

A look into Figma

Meta Changes Delivered

Canted Sights

Side-mounted 2× alternate sight toggled via the fire-mode button. Switches between Normal sights (no ADS + ADS) and Canted Sights. A hint displays on initial pullout to teach the toggle.

Ult Charge

Using Spotter's Scope grants ult charge once per team every 10s. Designed to reinforce the spot → charge → shoot loop with clear, quick feedback (~3s display) and audio cues.

Canted Sights Design Intent

Communicate clearly that Canted Sights are a new fire mode — not part of the ADS system. Simplified interaction so players feel confident using it at mid range.

Ult Charge Design Intent

Communicate that the Spotter's ping is distinct from the shooter mark — and correlates to the bullet UI charge. Cooldown clarity via Spotter's Scope icon: color/icon change for available vs. on cooldown.

Community Reactions

Players respond to Canted Sights

Respawn Entertainment • Apex Legends • Gaming

Legend Fuse — New Ult & Kit Rework

Fuse's ultimate was seen as too difficult to use and often unimpactful. The rework focused on making it easier to find effective use cases while cementing Fuse's identity as mobile artillery — clearing large spaces and tagging enemies with a quicker, more responsive kit.

Scope

New Ult Motherlode — breach mode toggle
Knuckle Jumper replaces Knuckle Hustler
UI widget redesign for breach feedback
Before / after UX communication audit

Kit Rework UX Flows

Fuse — Legend Locker (Assault · Explosives Enthusiast)

Fuse — upgrades tree (LVL 1–3)

The Challenge

An old dog that needed new tricks

Fuse's ultimate was seen as too difficult to use and often unimpactful. The design goal was to refocus the ult on clearing large spaces while making the tactical quicker and easier to use for tagging enemies. The reduced duration on Knuckle Cluster also helps players follow up on their own damage — particularly alongside his passive change.

Knuckle Jumper replaces Knuckle Hustler as a movement option — more "Fuse-y," with plenty of nuance to master across its many use cases.

Meta Changes Delivered

New Ult Motherlode — what changed

Fires a projectile that creates a ring of explosives instead of a ring of fire — fundamentally shifting how the ult is deployed and read by enemies.

Can bounce off walls and land against the ground. Right-click toggles "breach mode" — the breach version digs through cover and sprays explosives out the other side.

Intended behavior in non-breach mode: sticks to the ground and sends explosives around its landing point. Fires 16 projectiles with 2s fuse time, dealing up to 30 damage each.

Design intent: communicate clearly to players when the breach ability will work as expected versus when it will revert to normal mode.

Upgrades — LVL 2 & LVL 3

Pyro Techniques (LVL 2)

Ultimate explosives create flames for 8 seconds — extending zone control and area denial after the initial blast.

Knuckle Jumper (LVL 2)

Jump near your tactical for a boost and a 50% cooldown recharge — a movement option that feels distinctly Fuse.

Reignition (LVL 3)

Ultimate recharges 1 second for every 2 explosive damage dealt — rewarding aggressive use and skilled placement.

Wreckless (LVL 3)

Take 50% less explosive damage — letting Fuse play into his own chaos without the self-damage penalty punishing close-range aggression.

Process

A look into Figma

Before & After

What the rework actually fixed

✗ Before

Ultimate felt underwhelming to players. UI widget was confusing in its feedback and how to use it — players couldn't read when breach mode would activate.

✓ After

Ultimate can now breach through walls. Behavior change works similarly to the tactical but with more ease of use. New UI respects the narrative and fantasy of the legend.

Community Reactions

Players respond to the rework

Epic Games • Fortnite • Gaming

Matchmaking Improved Experience

Redesigned the game lobby and matchmaking system to unify the experience across Battle Royale and Creative modes — reducing confusion for millions of concurrent players worldwide.

Key Decisions

Unified lobby architecture across all game modes
Progressive disclosure to reduce cognitive load at entry
4 iteration cycles with internal playtesting each round
Multi-platform input parity (controller + KB/M)

4 Iterations Multi-platform

The Challenge

A unique experience for all? Let's see.

Fortnite hosts radically different game modes — Battle Royale, Creative, and others — yet matchmaking and game details pages had grown inconsistently, with different layouts and hierarchies depending on which mode a player entered.

The goal: design a flow that felt custom-created for each mode, yet cohesive within the broader Fortnite ecosystem — balancing engineering feasibility, UX clarity, and the existing Tech UI system.

Project Scope

Core screens redesigned: Game Options, Lobby & Matchmaking Progress

Design iterations to reach the optimal solution

100M+

Monthly active players impacted by the new flow

Game details & lobby screen

Every creator can write their own descriptions. This includes emojis, translations and other personal designs they want to bring. No standard.

Information redundancy in tags. Potentially lower in information hierarchy.

Players can change options of the game without the possibility of going back to game details after they go into the lobby.

Lobby — existing state

Options button isn't indicating the faculty to choose between different settings and the game preview details doesn't show the other most important ones (Team Fill and Team Members).

Inability to reopen game details from the lobby unless players go to the Discover page and find the island again.

Other things we considered

Current options support only Battle Royale settings, that are different and not always available in Creative games.

Matchmaking process have large and technical copy.

Cancel button is sometimes buggy and disappears during the process.

Iterations

Choosing the best option across engineering, UX & Tech UI

Improve overall readability and reduce redundant information across screens in both Battle Royale and Creative entries.

Differentiate Creative from Battle Royale — fundamentally different structures that should feel distinct without breaking consistency.

Improve visual hierarchy so the most important actions are immediately scannable and the flow feels purposeful.

A seamless experience that feels custom-created per mode, but remains recognisably part of the Fortnite ecosystem.

What we redesigned

Three screens, one cohesive flow

Screen 01

Game Options

Differentiated Battle Royale and Creative options. Reduced redundancy and simplified hierarchy so players orient quickly.

Screen 02

Lobby

Clearer player status, team composition, and settings access — consistently structured across modes.

Screen 03

Matchmaking Progress

A reassuring queue state that communicated progress without anxiety — aligned across all modes.

Final Screens

Screen 01 — Game Options

Screen 02 — Lobby Details

Matchmaking Progress screen — redesigned

Screen 03 — Matchmaking Progress

Design Decisions

Goals arriving at their destination

Mode Differentiation

Battle Royale and Creative required distinct visual languages within one component framework — colour, iconography, and density adjusted per mode without rebuilding architecture.

Engineering-first Constraints

Every iteration was evaluated against feasibility. Several visually interesting proposals were deprioritised in favour of solutions buildable on the existing UI system.

Lobby Clarity

Stripped back to essentials — who's in your party, what mode you're entering, how to start. Everything else was removed.

Matchmaking Feedback

Clear status communication and micro-animations made waits feel intentional rather than broken — addressing player queue anxiety directly.

Epic Games • Fortnite • Gaming

Creative Mode Spectate Feature

Designed a new spectator camera system for Fortnite Creative, giving island hosts the ability to broadcast gameplay with three distinct camera modes for custom events and tournaments.

Key Decisions

3 camera modes: Gameplay, Third-Person & Fly-Around
Minimal HUD interference during active spectating
Host-controlled permission model for island creators
Full parity across PC and controller inputs

3 Camera Modes PC + Console

Fortnite spectate mode — camera selector

Spectate camera mode selector

Context

Creative mode needed something better

The existing Spectate mode — shared with Battle Royale — only let players cycle through other players. Battle Royale's spectate UI had a recent visual refresh, but no new functionality. The Creative team had a clear ask: give spectators camera view control.

Creative is fundamentally different from Battle Royale. Spectators aren't watching a competitive match — they're observing collaborative builds and player-made games that need entirely different camera perspectives.

Feature Scope

New camera view modes designed for Creative spectators

Input platforms designed: M+KB and Controller

1st

Dedicated spectate experience built specifically for Creative

Spectate camera modes — Drone Free, Controller, Third Person

Camera view controls — KB/M, Controller & Third Person

The Solution

Three camera views — one unified selector

Gameplay

Follows the spectated player from their exact perspective. The default for new spectators entering a session.

Third-Person

Camera pulled back behind the player — more spatial context, useful for builds and traversal in Creative maps.

Fly-Around

Free-roaming camera detached from any player. Orbit environments, observe builds from above, capture full scale.

$Spectate — Console view$

Console

Design Challenges

Engineering constraints shaped the solution

We proposed selecting specific spectate targets — not just cycling. Scoped out due to engineering restrictions that required keeping the cycle-through approach.

View switching needed to feel instantaneous. Transitions between Gameplay, Third-Person, and Fly-Around were designed to avoid disorienting jumps.

UI had to work across M+KB and Controller without two separate models. A unified selector with platform-specific button prompts.

Outcomes

Last details and beautiful icons

Custom Icon Design

Dedicated icons designed for each camera mode — legible at small sizes, distinguishable on dark backgrounds, coherent with Fortnite's iconography.

Layout Definition

Layout defined around the camera selector as primary control — surfaced clearly within the existing HUD without disrupting present information.

Iteration Discipline

Target-selection was a real improvement we advocated for. Recognising when to hold a feature vs. block the current sprint is part of the work.

Creative-Specific Foundation

The first feature built specifically for Creative's spectating needs — setting a foundation for future Creative-specific tooling.

Epic Games • Fortnite • Gaming

Text Chat Moving Feature

Enabled players to freely reposition the in-game text chat window across the HUD — a meaningful accessibility improvement for Fortnite Creative mode players on all supported platforms.

Key Decisions

Drag-to-reposition with magnetic snap zone system
Validated against accessibility standards throughout
Community testing with Creative mode players
Works across PC, console, and cross-platform sessions

Accessibility HUD Design

Text chat window repositioning in-game

The Opportunity

New text chat launched — and the community reacted

Fortnite's new text chat was a significant launch. For the first time, players could communicate during gameplay and in the lobby without voice chat — a meaningful accessibility improvement for players with hearing disabilities.

But the initial release came with a limitation: the chat window was fixed in position. In Creative mode, where HUD layouts vary enormously, this quickly became a pain point.

✓ Loved by community

Text chat as an alternative to voice — async communication, hearing-disability accessibility, and quieter playstyles in competitive Creative games.

✗ What was missing

The ability to move the chat window. Default position frequently overlapped critical info — health bars, minimaps, objective trackers.

Community reactions — Text Chat placement feedback

Community feedback that drove the feature

Design Scope

∞

Possible chat positions within HUD safe zones

Primary use cases: Battle Royale and Creative mode

A11y

Core goal — designed for hearing-impaired players

Design Constraints

Moving the chat — not as simple as it sounds

Reserved space only for Battle Royale. The widget occupies a designated HUD region that can't move outside defined boundaries — preserving competitive UI integrity.

Specific chat size — cannot be changed. Window dimensions are fixed by the text rendering system. Moveable applies to position only, not scale.

Position must persist across sessions. A player who moves chat should find it there next launch — required backend coordination with HUD customisation.

Works across Creative game types. Custom maps have wildly different HUD configurations — chat positioning must respect creator-defined UI without conflict.

Chat repositioned — center placement

Chat repositioned — bottom right placement

HUD Safe Zones

Where can the chat actually go?

Rather than free-position anywhere, the design defined anchor zones — areas of the HUD consistently free from critical game UI — where players snap the chat window.

Top Left

Default. Clear of health and ammo in most modes.

Top Right

Viable in BR; may conflict with storm timer.

Bottom Left

Most-requested by Creative — below build/edit UI.

Bottom Right

Strategy games; preferred by tab-chat players.

Centre Bottom

Wide-screen — balanced visibility, no edge bias.

Custom

Free positioning within Creative-mode safe zones.

Key Decisions

Why this matters beyond positioning

Accessibility by Default

Originally designed as accessibility for hearing-impaired players. Moveable respects that origin — users who rely on it most shouldn't have it stuck behind other HUD.

Community-Driven Priority

Added directly from community feedback post-launch. Surfacing player pain points through social listening into shipped features is core to Fortnite's process.

Creative Mode First

While BR has fixed HUD zones, Creative drove this request. Diverse game types mean no single chat position works universally — flexibility is essential.

Persistent Preferences

A reposition that resets every session is useless. Position is saved per account — a small engineering investment that turns a fix into a lasting UX improvement.

Selected Work · 2018 — 2022

Other Work

3 Projects

LATAM Airlines · 2021

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Enter the password to view Javiera's work.

8 years crafting
enjoyable
digital experiences
for real people.

Thoughtful
experiences
played by millions.

Gaming Case Studies

Legend Vantage — UX Flows & HUD Rework

A sniper whose kit needed clarity

What the kit lacked before the rework

A look into Figma

Players respond to Canted Sights

Legend Fuse — New Ult & Kit Rework

An old dog that needed new tricks

New Ult Motherlode — what changed

A look into Figma

What the rework actually fixed

Players respond to the rework

Matchmaking Improved Experience

A unique experience for all? Let's see.

Choosing the best option across engineering, UX & Tech UI

Three screens, one cohesive flow

Goals arriving at their destination

Creative Mode Spectate Feature

Creative mode needed something better

Three camera views — one unified selector

Engineering constraints shaped the solution

Last details and beautiful icons

Text Chat Moving Feature

New text chat launched — and the community reacted

Moving the chat — not as simple as it sounds

Where can the chat actually go?

Why this matters beyond positioning

Other Work

Fares Redesign

Practice Management Redesign

Logistics Platform

Password required

8 years craftingenjoyabledigital experiencesfor real people.

Thoughtfulexperiencesplayed by millions.

Gaming Case Studies

Legend Vantage — UX Flows & HUD Rework

A sniper whose kit needed clarity

What the kit lacked before the rework

A look into Figma

Players respond to Canted Sights

Legend Fuse — New Ult & Kit Rework

An old dog that needed new tricks

New Ult Motherlode — what changed

A look into Figma

What the rework actually fixed

Players respond to the rework

Matchmaking Improved Experience

A unique experience for all? Let's see.

Choosing the best option across engineering, UX & Tech UI

Three screens, one cohesive flow

Goals arriving at their destination

Creative Mode Spectate Feature

Creative mode needed something better

Three camera views — one unified selector

Engineering constraints shaped the solution

Last details and beautiful icons

Text Chat Moving Feature

New text chat launched — and the community reacted

Moving the chat — not as simple as it sounds

Where can the chat actually go?

Why this matters beyond positioning

Other Work

Fares Redesign

Practice Management Redesign

Logistics Platform

Password required

8 years crafting
enjoyable
digital experiences
for real people.

Thoughtful
experiences
played by millions.