Evil Geniuses' Owen M. Roe has been creating a series of posters focused on esports organizations. The self-described creative athlete's design focuses heavily on stark, minimalist contrast and bold, striking usage of text. In creating the series of posters that features organizations such as Fnatic, 100 Thieves, OpTic Gaming, FAZE Clan, and Sentinels, Roe was looking to broaden his horizons as an esports designer. 

"I’ve been a designer in esports for over four years now, but as time went on it became clear that esports design was more often than not uninspired," Roe explained to Inven Global's Nick D'Orazio. "It gets repetitive very easily, and I could see those patterns in my own work. I wanted to break out of that."

The text of Roe's posters being the primary focus of his works is not a coincidence. Typography draws Roe into design more than any other facet of the art. "I think typography is a relatively underutilized part of esports design. It’s amazing how much you can accomplish with nothing but the text," said Roe. 

Typography is one of the more uncommon aspects of esports design, and Roe thinks that trend is due to esports' tendency to 'go big' in the visual medium: "Something like typography is a little too subtle for many esports designers, so it doesn’t get the love it needs. But it’s no coincidence that the masters of esports design are also masters of typography."

In creating the series of esports posters, Roe hopes to break the mold on what designers in the esports industry consider in terms of creative possibilities. "People look at esports design and think 'No, this is an esports team, we can’t do that. It has to look like esports.' But that’s not entirely true, those aren’t mutually exclusive." 

"In general I’d like to see esports brands broaden their horizons in terms of creative direction," Roe explained. "It’s very easy to fall into a cycle when working on esports graphics, it can get repetitive very easily. Once you become familiar with the esports design meta you’ll begin to see it everywhere."

Roe has taken influence from outside the esports space in creating the series of posters, and hopes that he inspires the designers around him to go non-endemic for artistic inspiration. "I want to show them that you can have it both ways," Roe said.

Throughout fashion, art, culture, and even tech, the visual aesthetic of esports has evolved, and Roe hopes to have contributed to the industry's first steps out of the creative echo chamber: "This is only the tip of the iceberg in terms of what’s possible."

All images by: Owen M. Roe

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