Today’s entry into my ongoing series, ON SPEC, actually originated from a (unsuccessful) job application. After applying for an open designer position at this company, I was excited by the prospect of working there and I immediately had an idea for how to enhance their branding. Despite their eventual rejection of my application, within the two days it took for them to respond, I had already developed an entire rebrand and decided to share it with them anyway.
Critical Role, founded by a group of talented voice actors, including Matthew Mercer and Laura Bailey, is a renowned entertainment company. Best known for their flagship show on Twitch and YouTube, the team embarks on epic Dungeons & Dragons campaigns with high production values and captivating storytelling. Beyond the main campaign, they explore various tabletop role-playing games, host talk shows, and interact with a dedicated fanbase known as "Critters." Critical Role has expanded into publishing, merchandise, and live events, including a recent SOLD OUT show at Wembley Arena, solidifying its status as a trailblazer in the TTRPG community with a global impact.
The current branding for Critical Role heavily draws from the visual language of D&D but lacks a unique identity and ownability. I aimed to provide them with something that felt familiar yet entirely their own. I retained the recognizable hexagon shape, echoing the silhouette of the twenty-sided die ubiquitous in TTRPGs, and repurposed it as the container for the CR monogram as well as for image frames and a repeating pattern. A new, brighter color palette breathes life into what can often be mostly dark and dour, middle-earthen tones. A completely custom wordmark, again borrowing from a familiar visual language without appearing as pastiche, further cements the identity as singular. The niche that Critical Role occupies also afforded me the opportunity to create unique pieces, such as custom character trading cards and branded dice caddies. I also wanted to rebrand some of their current instagram posts to show how the rebrand extrapolates across usage cases.
As I mentioned earlier, I have reached out to Critical Role to gauge their interest in this direction for their brand, possibly for their upcoming 10-year anniversary, but have yet to receive a response. If anyone out there knows the right person at Critical Role who needs to see this, please tag them, forward this to them, or send them my way! They are a great brand and deserve great branding.
'til next time.
- Cody
