Simóne Viljoen

CASE STUDY

DUBAI GAMES

Registration & Scoring System for Dubai’s Largest Government-Backed Sports Event

Dubai Games dashboard interface on a tabletDubai Games scoreboard mobile interface

Client Needs

The Executive Council of Dubai sought a secure digital platform to manage team registrations, payments, check-in, and to integrate with on-site scoring apps and hardware. Processes required secure, synchronised automation to mitigate the friction of manual operations.

User Needs

  • Participants → easy team registration, secure payments, and safe document and personal data submission.
  • Event officials → optimised registration management and seamless check-in
  • Scoring officials → robust, real-time system to manage scores, teams, penalties and edge cases

Solution

An end-to-end digital platform facilitating participant registration, on-site access control, and real-time scoring mechanisms that allowed officials and referees to monitor and accurately manage scores down to the millisecond.

PROCESS

Dubai Games definition and user journeys

Definition & User Journeys

With the responsibility of defining the end-to-end journey and feature requirements, I converted the brief into actionable outlines for the multiple user types and roles. Since the first edition in 2024, I defined the particularly niche features based on an ambiguous and flexible brief. Working alongside a proactive tech lead, I led the UX definition and risk analysis to lay a solid foundation for the hi-fi design and development phases.

Dubai Games governance documentation and handover materials

Governance

Across the three editions of the event, we had shifting, multi-cultural resources, tech stack updates, myriads of changes and updates from the client and testing feedback – along with a brand update. This posed multiple challenges, specifically for documentation, design system, dev handover, QA processes, and Arabic QC. To streamline the onboarding not only of different designers, developers, and quality engineers, but also of external stakeholders and new account manager, I experimented with proven governance practices and designed a documentation and handover system optimised for this use case. It included centralised documentation management, meticulous translation sheets, detailed change logs, and an intensive design handover process.

DELIVERABLES

  1. Registration Web App

    A fully responsive, bilingual web app for team registrations, payments, and profile management.

    Key Considerations

    • Mobile-first design of complex data collection features and tables
    • Optimal use of real estate with the use of visual hierarchy and carefully considered information architecture
    • Intuitive right-to-left layouts and components with Arabic font support
    Dubai Games registration web app interface
  2. Admin Dashboard

  3. On-site Apps

  4. Control Room App

OUTCOME

The platform supported various complex and critical requirements, enabling pleasant journeys for multiple user types and roles. Across the 2024, 2025, and 2026 editions, the system supported over 845 teams. The growing success has also secured 2 more editions.

Dubai Games super admin overview