At ARQProduct Designer2019iOS, AndroidVisuals, UI/UX, sound and music

Arcade Quest

A city quest for arcade games: Tetris, Space Invaders, a tank battle and Arkanoid stand at spots around Kazan, and you play them in AR on the pavement. Everything you see and hear in it is mine.

The Arcade Quest title screen as a videotape: the logo over a striped sun, the Kazan skyline on the horizon, a neon grid on the floor, PLAY in the corner and a timecode at the bottom.
The title screen, redrawn in 2026 and running: the floor rolls toward you, the tape tracks. Hover it, or hold it on a phone, to fast-forward.

The brief

Old games, found on a map

A major regional telecom provider commissioned a city quest from ARQ: the arcade games of the 80s and 90s scattered around Kazan. You walk to a spot, point the phone at the ground and play; your best score goes into a table for the whole city.

The project took about six months. The Unity team built the games; I did the visuals, the product design, the sound and the music. The screens here are redrawn in 2026 from my 2019 mock-ups — same screens, same flow, a videotape look.

The splash: ARQ presents, the Arcade Quest logo over a striped sun and the Kazan skyline, and a tape-style loading bar, loading, please wait.Welcome, 01 of 03: The first city quest for arcade games. Find the games on the map, play them in AR on the street, beat the city's records. Next.The menu: Open map, Records, Settings, Credits under the logo and the sun, with an offline note and a VHS date and timecode.
The first launch — the tape loads, three lines on what to do, and the menu.

The look

A look from the same decade as the games

  • Synthwave, not a city look Black ground, a neon grid, a sun going down behind the mountains, retro display type. The games are from the 80s, so the interface sounds like them. Price: a dark screen reads worse outdoors in daylight, so every line of text is large and high-contrast.
  • The pin is the game Each spot on the map is drawn as the game's own sprite — a tank, Pac-Man, an invader. You know what's waiting before you get there. Price: you can only play where the pin is.
A black board: a row of glowing Tetris blocks, nine colour swatches with their hex codes — green, blue, red, magenta, yellow, cyan, white, violet, orange — an outlined space invader in each colour, and a Galaga ship.
My 2019 board — nine neon colours, an invader in each, the ship, the falling blocks.
The map: Kazan in magenta and violet, seven game pins — invader, tank, Tetris, Pac-Man, Arkanoid, a race, Galaga — a dashed route from you to the Tetris pin, 140 m, and a card: Tetris, Bauman St, best 12 980, rank 21, Open camera.
The map of Kazan. Each game is its own sprite and colour; the route runs to the nearest one, and its card comes up with your best score and your place.

In AR

AR without the technical pause

  • Calibration as a level loading The phone has to find the ground before a game can stand on it. I drew that search as part of the game — the same neon grid as the splash, laid on the pavement — so the wait feels like a level loading, not a setup step.
  • Gestures instead of a joystick Every game got its own set of swipes and taps, and a screen that shows them before the start: swipe to move, tap to rotate, swipe down to drop. Price: coarser control than buttons, and the tanks feel it most.
Tracking: a street in Kazan behind a dark veil, a filling bar, slowly move your phone to find the ground, a magenta grid on the pavement, surface found, Play.
Tetris in AR on Bauman Street, playing: a Z piece turns upright and drops, an I piece turns and slides into the deep column, a T turns and lands on the tall stack, an L turns twice, moves left and drops — the score and the next piece change with each one; hints below: tap to rotate, swipe to move, swipe down to drop.
Finding the ground — the bar fills, the grid lands on the pavement, Play lights up — then Tetris on Bauman Street.
Space Invaders, how to play: swipe to move, tap to shoot.Battle Tank, how to play: swipe in four directions to drive, tap to shoot.Arkanoid, how to play: swipe to move the paddle.Pac-Man, how to play: swipe to turn.Tetris Race, how to play: swipe to change lane.
A hint screen for every game — Space Invaders, Battle Tank, Arkanoid, Pac-Man, the Tetris race.

Records

A record without a sign-up

You can play straight away. The first launch offers a short sign-up — a nickname, an email, a password, or a social account — with "continue without an account" right under it. An account is needed only for the city's records table.

Price: a guest's records don't reach the table.

Save your records: nickname, email and password, Continue, log in with VK, Google or Facebook, and continue without an account.Check your email: a four-box activation code half typed, request again in 0:58, Confirm, and a keypad.Records for the whole city: the top three with their scores, then places 20 to 22, with your own row in yellow.
Game over in landscape: WASTED in red over a dimmed street, Battle Tank level 4, your score 1 741, best 10 731, rank 10, Play again and Map.
Game over, in landscape — your score, your best, your place in the city, and straight back in.

Sound

Every sound in it

I wrote the music and made every sound in the game — the menu, each cleared line, each lost life. The theme plays on the title screen and under the map.

  • Arcade Quest Theme Music by Tim Zagirov, 2019
    1:29
Settings: music, sounds and touch sensitivity as VCR-style level bars, and a now-playing card, Arcade Quest Theme, Tim Zagirov, 01:29.
Credits, an ARQ Family production: lead Unity developers, Unity developers, 3D, UI, UX, sound and music by Timur Zagirov, special thanks.

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