[Background Blog] Designing the Nekojishi: Lin & Partners Logo

Hi there, it's Compymono from Studio Klondike! (I actually write most of these blogs but since this is some of my personal work it feels more natural to introduce myself.) So today I wanted to take a look back at the design process of the new logo for Nekojishi: Lin & Partners. It's a fairly interesting topic as this project has gone back a few years now and it's gone through a lot of changes over that time, so let's begin!

October 2018

So back around October 2018 was when the initial announcement of Lin & Partners was being planned and I was putting together the first designs for the game interface and designs. (Even though we were only planning to release the "The Story so Far trailer" for the announcement which was mostly completed and voiced around this time) 

At the same time we launched the http://linandpartnersllp.com teaser site and web mini-game to tie into the announcement. (With assets made by one of our other designers at the time)

Back then the name of the game wasn't fully set in stone so we had two proposals around this time, Nekojishi Designer, and Nekojishi: Lin & Partners. Going into this I was working on another unannounced project (yes still) so I was just briefly involved with the game outside of writing the script for the story trailer and directing the voice recording. What I had to work with was the premise (back then) of being a interior design game and the Lin & Partners Architects LLP branding made for the website and story trailer.

Here's a few of the designs I put forth at the time. The first one in the top left was partially designed around the new branding I was updating to at the time. (And which kind of got delayed in fully taking over until Lin & Partners was announced) The influences definitely draw from classic simulation game typography and design sensibilities, particularly the original logo for The Sims series.

Filson Soft has been used a series font since around this time where I can, it's more modern, consistent, and extensible than the typography which was drawn as a part of the original logo while I feel keeping the same energy. Blakely was an experiment to try and express the new business feel of this entry into the series with a more jazzy and rigid typeface to contrast well with the other ones. Oswald was a more restrained logo meant to complement the other two as a subtitle font.

While the first design in the top left could be fun, we ended up quickly outgrowing it as plans shifted to become the full sequel rather than a spin-off. (That and I felt the title and subtitle felt a bit disconnected)

The other three designs on the right reflected the Lin & Partners subtitle. The stamp concept behind them tied into the contracts (quests) featured in the game where a little paw-print stamp would be made on the UI when a quest was completed.

Above you can see a few in-situ versions of the logo with different drop shadow styles on what was initially a template for a planned postcard reward set for our old Patreon plans around this time. (eventually evolved into the postcard set made available as a reward in the L&P Kickstarter)

As the announcement plans were dropped around this time, these logos were never used and we jump forward to 2019.

May 2019

Back in May 2019 I was head first into the English localisation for Beek - Familiar Spirit, however since I was beginning to work on the logo for Beek coming back around to Lin & Partners came up around this time.

So this is where the first iteration of the current logo for Nekojishi: Lin & Partners came into being. While the stamp concept was a pretty good basis I felt that it didn't really have much of the identity of the original brandmark remaining. So the original design basically had two distinctive features, the paw-prints, and the tiger tail. This design is based on the concept of it being office stationary, with the logo sort of representing a letterhead with a dividing line in the shape of the tiger tail from the original logo.

The next iterations refined the design a bit more along with some experimentation with colour and texture.

Here you can see something a lot closer to our final logo including the paws brought over from the original design as mentioned earlier. The original concept of picking red was to play of the colour's connection to fortune/wealth in Chinese culture, but I was convinced it was too tacky so that's where the green comes in.

Current Day

Fast forward a few months and that brings us to the current logo! (It was finished sometime in the development wrap-up for Beek - Familiar Spirit if I recall) The CH typography was made by our concept art lead Totem and I think it does a good job at reflecting the feel of the English version. A surprising amount of time was spent on refining the shape of the curves in the tail divider and the slight gradient and glow effects on the logo but I'm pretty happy where it stands today.

I'm sure in the time before release next year I'll find some way to make a few changes to the Lin & Partners logo (such as to improve visibility on some backgrounds) but for now that wraps up the journey this logo has made over the past two years. Hope you guys found it interesting!

Compymono - Studio Klondike