BMT Product Manager, David Lortal, looks back at how BAFTA View was readied up for the 2023 BAFTA Games Awards.
Background
The Games Awards are unique within BAFTA because awards judging involves playing the games instead of watching video content. Where video content is supplied as supporting material alongside written statements, images and documents by entrants, the key component for the Games Awards is the distribution of codes to members and highlighting the bundles where the games are available for members to review. What does a VOD (Video on Demand) service look like when it doesn’t supply any video?
BAFTA View was designed as a VOD service, exclusively used by BAFTA members to review content entered into BAFTA’s Awards; the platform launched in 2021 for the Film Awards. One of the key development aims for 2022 was to update the platform to support BAFTA’s Games, Television and Television Craft Awards. BAFTA had been hosting and streaming television programmes for over 10 years and supplying game codes to members for eight years. However, the previous system design was outdated and could no longer support the larger metadata sets and assets now required for the judging processes. BAFTA View was designed to be content-rich, with API links between Nucleus (BAFTA’s Awards management system) pulling in entry data and assets. It is also integrated with our Voting Site, which holds user data, so it seemed like an obvious next step to develop BAFTA View to support more workflows.
The key issue was attracting Games Awards voters to log into the platform when the core asset being judged lives outside of the BAFTA View ecosystem; the game. The awards team have overcome this challenge by supplying a wealth of additional content that acts as a companion piece for the games. They have used the full range of functionality available to them to encourage members to use BAFTA View as the gateway to reviewing entries. They can make notes, mark games as played and use the filters to track and review all of the entries. The assets supplied by the entrants when populated on BAFTA View make the site look visually stunning, enhancing the slick user interface (UI) designs, which entice the members to return time after time. This is evident in the screenshots below.
How did we do it?
The key challenge of this project was to support additional content types and additional awards workflows within the existing system architecture without an extensive rewriting of the code. This was achievable due to early pre-planning during the initial development phases.
While the designers worked on incorporating the new features into the existing designs, we broke down the different components for each award and listed them in a grid to determine the crossover. From the grid, it was evident that the requirements could be broken down into five component categories. These categories could be turned into controls that admin users could switch on or off on a per award basis:
- has video
- has category page
- has primary judging media
- has runtime sorting
- has download button
Within these controls, we could specify all of the unique parameters required. We took a decision to build the controls into the existing dashboard of the Voting site. Admins have full control over setting up BAFTA View for each different award but without us having to build a new mapping control page in BAFTA View. This reduced cost and time.
Particular requirements for Games UX
To simplify the process for members, some games can be added to bundles, such as Steam, which means that members need to only claim one code and the game is added by the entrants to the bundles. We wanted to reflect this in the BAFTA View UI so that entrants who provided individual codes were not at an advantage. A much-needed solution was to create a bundle section that appears in the same UI as the game code. This is illustrated in the example below.
Feedback
The launch of the UI for the Games Awards has been well received:
“The new BAFTA view has been streamlined into a system that makes accessing content simple and intuitive. Being able to filter by dates, game systems and category is perfect for what we needed when assessing games.” – BAFTA Member
“BAFTA View has a modern design that collates all the information related to each title, which makes it much easier to track and record my impressions on entered games.” – BAFTA Member
“The revised BAFTA View is not only visually appealing, but also provides practical features that help to track status of entries. We particularly appreciate the ability to add games played alongside annotated notes, previously we had to cross reference a separate spreadsheet. Now this is conveniently all in one place!” – BAFTA Member
By the end of 2023, all BAFTA awards viewing will take place on BAFTA View, which is a huge technical achievement for a small in-house development team. We are immensely proud of the work that we have delivered, which brings benefits to BAFTA members and highlights the creative work that went into each entry, allowing the games, films and television programmes to be viewed in their best light.
BMT (BAFTA Media Technology) is the software research and development arm of BAFTA (The British Academy of Film and Television Arts).