Designing a UX Learning App Without Code
For my capstone at Utah Valley University, my team of four UX designers turned a physical board game about UX into a mobile learning app, with no code. I owned the UX Laws section and took it from design to a fully finished screen.
A banner image showcasing the final designs for the empathy map, UX laws, and customer journey map pages.
Role: UX Design Intern | Team: 4 UX designers | Timeline: May to December 2025 | Tools: Figma, Create with Play
Overview
For my capstone at Utah Valley University, my team of four UX designers turned a physical board game about UX into a mobile learning app, with no code. I owned the UX Laws section and took it from design to a fully finished screen.
Problem
Students needed a more engaging way to learn UX laws and customer journey mapping. Our task was to turn an existing physical UX board game into a mobile app. Our professor required a new no code tool called Play, and our team was made up only of UX designers.
Research
We studied competing learning apps and gamified products. Then we built a style guide rooted in the board game, so the app kept its identity.
Ideation
We sketched flows, built wireframes, and made a high fidelity Figma prototype that our professor approved. When we moved into Play, most components broke on import. Hours of back and forth with Play Support brought us a little closer to goals, but we consistently had issues bringing our vision from Figma to Play. Instead of fighting the tool, we made the call to rebuild the app from scratch inside Play.
Early wireframes of the UX Laws App.
Final Figma Prototype: Journey Maps, Empathy Map, the UX Laws library, UX Law Info Panels, and Settings, built in Figma.
Iteration
Play had missing features and complex scripting, and we chose to follow Apple’s Human Interface Guidelines, including (at the time) the newly released liquid glass, which added a learning curve. These limits forced us to reconsider what was necessary and feasible within our timeline.
We cut the app from five sections to three core screens: Home, UX Laws, and Journey Map. Home and Journey Map were only partially built by the end of the semester. I focused on clarity, interaction, and strict Apple guideline adherence in UX Laws. No formal user testing was run.
Outcomes
We delivered a working app clip, documented in a video walkthrough. The UX Laws section, which I owned, was fully finished with images, videos, text, and interactions. Home and Journey Map were partially built when the semester ended.
What I Learned
Design tools are getting powerful, but they don’t replace developers. Play couldn’t do everything our designs needed, and that gap showed me where design ends and engineering/development begins.
We also took on too much at the start. Even after cutting the scope, only one section was fully finished. We should have tested what Play could really do before designing around it. Next time, I would check a tool’s limits early on and scope smaller from day one.
What I Would Test Next
Interactions: Test the UX Laws screens with more users to see if the interactions are clear and if students can apply what they learn.
Board game appeal: Research what players loved about the original board game and bring it into the app.
UX Laws App Clip (iOS Only)