Summary
An essential part of creating a Design System is to make distribution and content flow sustainable. When the task is bringing the joy and community of gaming to everyone on the planet, the challenge gets massive! How can DesignOps and Automation become a facilitator for this challenge? Join Senior Software Engineer & Designer Luca Rager from Xbox as he takes us through their innovative take on design systems. Luca will illustrate how Sketch’s flexibility and modern DesignOps automation has allowed Xbox to package, theme and easily distribute component libraries. Furthermore, how their system bridges the gap between the Xbox Design System team and the wider product teams at Xbox.
Key Insights
-
•
Xbox Design System supports four themes including high contrast to ensure broad accessibility.
-
•
The component library needed to work across multiple platforms: TV, desktop, and mobile.
-
•
Theme customization is achieved by swapping foundational Sketch libraries rather than relying on overrides.
-
•
Every component and foundation (theme file) exists as its own Sketch file to support clarity and easy iteration.
-
•
Clyde, an internal automated tool, packages components into Sketch libraries and generates design tokens for engineers.
-
•
The design system team focused on creating easy-to-adopt kits for product designers to reduce complexity and improve uptake.
-
•
Multidisciplinary team members, including designers with engineering skills, help bridge gaps between disciplines.
-
•
Accessibility experts are embedded in the design process, enriching documentation and audits within the system.
-
•
Governance balances flexibility for product teams to propose and customize components with ensuring consistency from the core team.
-
•
Integration with Microsoft tools like Azure and Teams allows realtime notifications and seamless collaboration around design system updates.
Notable Quotes
"Gaming is for everyone anywhere, and Xbox has evolved way beyond the box under your TV."
"Our mission required us to build something fast, flexible, and scalable across many different product needs."
"A button is just a rectangle with some text, but our magic is in how we theme and customize it using foundations."
"Instead of overrides, we swap out entire theme files to customize components for different product teams."
"We realized the real problem was a people problem, not just tooling complexity."
"Sketch’s open file format allowed us to build custom tooling that shapes the design data to our needs."
"Clyde runs every time there’s a change, generating libraries and tokens to keep everyone up to date."
"Engineers love having individual components in files because it makes implementation much easier."
"Design system adoption exploded when we focused on the needs of everyone who builds, extends, or uses it."
"Accessibility and research are part of our org, not just consultants, which makes a huge difference in quality."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"The only way to do research wrong is to not do it at all."
Benjamin Wiedmaier Annie MayfieldRedefining Toolkits: Unbundling to Create a Perfect Match
March 11, 2025
"Apple’s innovation with VoiceOver on iOS changed the world by making accessibility a built-in, first-party responsibility."
Sam ProulxTo Boldly Go: The New Frontiers of Accessibility
November 18, 2022
"Saying on budget is every project goal, and in design it can be the hardest, especially with ever-changing requirements."
Kristin Sundermeyer Tygre MorehartDesign Ops Metrics
September 30, 2021
"You need to be just as careful conducting interviews in Beverly Hills as in poorer neighborhoods; wealth does not guarantee safety."
Yasmine KhanChecking Bias and Listening to Financially Vulnerable Americans
March 30, 2020
"Steve Bennett asked, what’s beyond ease, leading us to study companies known for delighting their customers."
Kaaren HansonStop Talking, Start Doing
June 9, 2017
"Organic decision making doesn’t always work for high stakes efforts because design ops initiatives are often horizontal and require alignment."
Michelle ChinThe DesignOps Starter Kit
September 29, 2021
"Objectives are qualitative, inspirational statements about the future we want to create for our customers without mentioning any solutions."
Jeff GothelfWho does what by how much?
November 20, 2025
"HR, especially Learning and Development, holds the real power of organizational transformation."
Jeff GothelfThe Intersection of Lean and Design
January 10, 2019
"Your priorities don’t tell you what to do — your judgment makes the decisions."
Harry Max Jim MeyerPrioritization for Leaders (2nd of 3 seminars)
June 27, 2024
