VICTOR CHU LEAD UX DESIGNER & PRODUCT MANAGER
Social Star, Slide
2010, 2009
SAN FRANCISCO
Slide
Slide was a social gaming venture founded by PayPal founder, Max Levchin. During this time, the big thing in the Valley was Zynga, FarmVille and the virtual goods gold rush. To compete in the social space, Google was acquiring talent to design and build a social platform. Which turned out to be Google+. In 2010, Google acquired Slide for $182 million, with an additional $46m in retention bonuses to help lead the design of Google’s social platform. Here’s a fantastic interview with Max on startups.com “Working Hard & Staying Humble”.
Slide had a Pets game on Facebook and needed a virtual world game to compete with Zynga. Slide acquired HandiPoints, founded by Viva Chu to leverage its virtual world gaming platform. Slide’s competing game was initially called “Social Scene”. When released, the title became “Social Star”.
Victor was the UX design lead for Social Star, a virtual world, social game played on Facebook. At Slide, Victor designed and developed the game’s fashion and pop culture experiences, merchandise, game levels, game interactions and play.
The Social Star team designed, developed and launched the virtual world in 6 months. The creative team consisted of UX, UI graphics, content and game designers as well as an offshore content production crew. Two dedicated QAs were also embedded in the team. At Slide, the culture centered around high quality, high performance with a focus on team execution.
Post release, Victor was promoted as product manager for Social Star, leading the creation and management of over 2,500 virtual goods for sale.
True to trend and Valley speed, new drops which included looks, clothing, accessories, gear and furniture were designed and released weekly.
