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Today, it’s vital that websites aren’t just attractive and user-friendly; they need to be accessible too. The government’s requirements regarding accessibility are clear, and considering Games Aid’s goals to empower children and young people, Grandad knew building a website for everyone was paramount. Case in point: Games Aid’s logo.

Through our brand and creative discovery, we learned that green and red, and their variations, are troublesome colours for colour-blind and sight-impaired web users – Games Aid’s original website was failing on critical contrast ratios, that ensure legibility. The UK government’s Web Content Accessibility Guidelines exist to make the Internet as accessible as possible, and the current WCAG design principles exist to make sure modern websites are perceivable, operable, understandable and robust.

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Accessibility Across The Board

Today, it’s vital that websites aren’t just attractive and user-friendly; they need to be accessible too. The government’s requirements regarding accessibility are clear, and considering Games Aid’s goals to empower children and young people, Grandad knew building a website for everyone was paramount. Case in point: Games Aid’s logo.

Through our brand and creative discovery, we learned that green and red, and their variations, are troublesome colours for colour-blind and sight-impaired web users – Games Aid’s original website was failing on critical contrast ratios, that ensure legibility. The UK government’s Web Content Accessibility Guidelines exist to make the Internet as accessible as possible, and the current WCAG design principles exist to make sure modern websites are perceivable, operable, understandable and robust.

A screen grab of the top of Games Aid's new website, showing a picture of children learning
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 Across Games Aid’s old website, the organisation’s distinct green and red logo was used in areas that could be hard to see. Grandad gave the Games Aid logo the treatment it deserved at the top of the website! It was given pride of place, weighted to the left and balanced by a clean and recognisable motif – but more on that in a moment!

This was true across the whole design of the website. Grandad uses the Adobe Colour Tools application to guarantee – there are rigorous checks automatically applied to each choice a designer makes. Case in point: the Contrast Checker. As the wording dictates, Adobe’s Contrast Checker ensures that a user’s colour choices are as accessible as possible by checking the contrast ratio of your background and text colours.

Brand language is as key to a positive online experience as the website design itself, so we were proud to help hone the Games Aid website’s distinct design aspects and push them even further for a more cohesive. Our mission is always to provide feasible solutions to a project’s obstacles, and we achieve this by identifying a problem, investigating the best course of action, and finding an appropriate solution. This process guarantees that our websites aren’t just up to date; it makes them state-of-the-art.

“We use these tools to guarantee that every site is readily accessible to everyone. We had a blank slate and complete creative control to produce something special; the drop shadow is a great example of utilising new visual elements to guide the eye and distinguish information, whilst also being playful and visually exciting!” – Emily McCarthy, Designer

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 Across Games Aid’s old website, the organisation’s distinct green and red logo was used in areas that could be hard to see. Grandad gave the Games Aid logo the treatment it deserved at the top of the website! It was given pride of place, weighted to the left and balanced by a clean and recognisable motif – but more on that in a moment!

This was true across the whole design of the website. Grandad uses the Adobe Colour Tools application to guarantee – there are rigorous checks automatically applied to each choice a designer makes. Case in point: the Contrast Checker. As the wording dictates, Adobe’s Contrast Checker ensures that a user’s colour choices are as accessible as possible by checking the contrast ratio of your background and text colours.

Brand language is as key to a positive online experience as the website design itself, so we were proud to help hone the Games Aid website’s distinct design aspects and push them even further for a more cohesive. Our mission is always to provide feasible solutions to a project’s obstacles, and we achieve this by identifying a problem, investigating the best course of action, and finding an appropriate solution. This process guarantees that our websites aren’t just up to date; it makes them state-of-the-art.

“We use these tools to guarantee that every site is readily accessible to everyone. We had a blank slate and complete creative control to produce something special; the drop shadow is a great example of utilising new visual elements to guide the eye and distinguish information, whilst also being playful and visually exciting!” – Emily McCarthy, Designer

A diagram of Adobe's Contrast Checker tool – used to make sure text is legible for as many users as possible!
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The Games Aid team organises incredible events to super-charge their fundraising – from July’s celebrated Golf & Spa Day to the glitzy Games Aid Gala in October – but they take a more is more approach to them!

A full-view calendar just wasn’t doing their output justice, so we worked closely with Lily Rimington, Games Aid’s Production Manager, to showcase their fundraises in style. The team can now select an event to shout about on their home screen, and users can scroll through a new page brimming with top-class events! And it’s not just website design that Grandad excels in; we build bespoke enterprise CMS solutions regardless of the size of the client, ensuring that Games Aid’s staff can update this information easily, and aren’t relying on us for content updates down the road.

That said, Grandad prides itself on continued communication long after each project has gone live!

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Save The Date

The Games Aid team organises incredible events to super-charge their fundraising – from July’s celebrated Golf & Spa Day to the glitzy Games Aid Gala in October – but they take a more is more approach to them!

A full-view calendar just wasn’t doing their output justice, so we worked closely with Lily Rimington, Games Aid’s Production Manager, to showcase their fundraises in style. The team can now select an event to shout about on their home screen, and users can scroll through a new page brimming with top-class events! And it’s not just website design that Grandad excels in; we build bespoke enterprise CMS solutions regardless of the size of the client, ensuring that Games Aid’s staff can update this information easily, and aren’t relying on us for content updates down the road.

That said, Grandad prides itself on continued communication long after each project has gone live!

The Games Aid Events page
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Games Aid does many incredible things, and their hard work was getting buried in tricky-to-navigate tabs. Our team turned the Games Aid website into a dynamic dream – if you can’t see what you want, there’s a nice, big ‘hamburger menu’ tab to click on, that leads to the most common clicks on the website.

“Presenting the primary navigation of the website under a hamburger menu was considered an acceptable design compromise,” says Grandad’s Creative Lead and Head of UX, Nikolas Head. “We favoured narratively-led primary navigation, as opposed to single-word labels, as this better reflects the brand story and helps target users locate the content relevant. To the needs.”

Nick continues, “The hamburger affords our design team space to accommodate such labels (giving them space to breathe) whilst also focusing on the user solely on the menu and where they want to go next.”

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Streamlining The Site

Games Aid does many incredible things, and their hard work was getting buried in tricky-to-navigate tabs. Our team turned the Games Aid website into a dynamic dream – if you can’t see what you want, there’s a nice, big ‘hamburger menu’ tab to click on, that leads to the most common clicks on the website.

“Presenting the primary navigation of the website under a hamburger menu was considered an acceptable design compromise,” says Grandad’s Creative Lead and Head of UX, Nikolas Head. “We favoured narratively-led primary navigation, as opposed to single-word labels, as this better reflects the brand story and helps target users locate the content relevant. To the needs.”

Nick continues, “The hamburger affords our design team space to accommodate such labels (giving them space to breathe) whilst also focusing on the user solely on the menu and where they want to go next.”

Games Aid's hamburger menu options
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“We made sure to clearly label the icon to maximise its usability.”

Of course, Games Aid’s chosen charities for the year take pride and place, but we found on the old site that it could be challenging for users to know how to get involved, and make donations. Five is a golden number for sub-headers; the end user perceives it as a generous amount of information, but not cluttered. Likewise, options are spaced out and legible so all users know exactly where they’ll end up.

The ‘Make a Donation’ Call to Action is structured to make an impact at the bottom of the list – a brand-appropriate punch of colour simultaneously emphasises it and underscores the other options in this section.

“It's been a pleasure working on the Games Aid site and allowing them to fully showcase the wonderful work they do on their new website.” – Lucy Spencer-Davis

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“We made sure to clearly label the icon to maximise its usability.”

Of course, Games Aid’s chosen charities for the year take pride and place, but we found on the old site that it could be challenging for users to know how to get involved, and make donations. Five is a golden number for sub-headers; the end user perceives it as a generous amount of information, but not cluttered. Likewise, options are spaced out and legible so all users know exactly where they’ll end up.

The ‘Make a Donation’ Call to Action is structured to make an impact at the bottom of the list – a brand-appropriate punch of colour simultaneously emphasises it and underscores the other options in this section.

“It's been a pleasure working on the Games Aid site and allowing them to fully showcase the wonderful work they do on their new website.” – Lucy Spencer-Davis

Games Aid's hamburger menu options
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Games Aid’s Co-Chair & Trustee, Terry Haynes, is a total legend in the industry, and we know that he and the whole Games Aid team is busy making incredible things happen. This made the time we had with them to discuss website development vital.

Checking in with clients to provide context on progress made is a vital aspect of any website’s development, and we needed to make sure we were working to their schedule ahead of the launch of this new online space. Terry and Lily were always clear in their communication and gave us feedback that shaped the site to guarantee it was appropriate for Games Aid’s audience.


The organisation’s presence at 2023’s Develop: Brighton has served as a deadline for both parties. If you’ve ever been involved with any large-scale creative endeavour, you’ll know that obstacles do arise – Games Aid’s team have played an instrumental role in overcoming them.

What’s more, site-side, we considered accessibility again regarding Call to Action buttons and their functionality on the Games Aid website. Our Creative Lead and Head of UX Nikolas Head studied the best practices regarding screen readers and shared them with Grandad Digital’s developers applied our knowledge behind the scenes to make navigation easier for users with sight impairments. Brilliantly, clearer, signposted Call to Actions have made navigation easier for everyone – it’s an excellent case for accessibility!

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Communication is key

Games Aid’s Co-Chair & Trustee, Terry Haynes, is a total legend in the industry, and we know that he and the whole Games Aid team is busy making incredible things happen. This made the time we had with them to discuss website development vital.

Checking in with clients to provide context on progress made is a vital aspect of any website’s development, and we needed to make sure we were working to their schedule ahead of the launch of this new online space. Terry and Lily were always clear in their communication and gave us feedback that shaped the site to guarantee it was appropriate for Games Aid’s audience.


The organisation’s presence at 2023’s Develop: Brighton has served as a deadline for both parties. If you’ve ever been involved with any large-scale creative endeavour, you’ll know that obstacles do arise – Games Aid’s team have played an instrumental role in overcoming them.

What’s more, site-side, we considered accessibility again regarding Call to Action buttons and their functionality on the Games Aid website. Our Creative Lead and Head of UX Nikolas Head studied the best practices regarding screen readers and shared them with Grandad Digital’s developers applied our knowledge behind the scenes to make navigation easier for users with sight impairments. Brilliantly, clearer, signposted Call to Actions have made navigation easier for everyone – it’s an excellent case for accessibility!

Picture perfect

The style of a website is only as strong as its assets, and we appreciate that imagery in this context can be hard to come by. It’s a topic of sensitivity, and there are many parties involved.


Games Aid has chosen five exemplary charities to support this year, and each right has stakeholders that sign off on content. Grandad vied to present AFK, Autistica, Access Sport, Game Therapy UK and Solving Kids Cancer in the best possible light. Our team was mindful that, from a visual standpoint, demonstrating the personal benefits of getting involved beyond doing something incredible such as donating time, money or resources.

Supporting a cause is incredible, but Games Aid rewards support with experiences and prizes you wouldn’t normally associate with a charity. Giving gamers and supporters alike an idea of the difference they’re making whilst simultaneously showing off how much fun it can be with Games Aid was paramount. The organisation engages with charity support innovatively – did you know they have an eBay store that directly supports fundraising? We wanted to bring great ideas like this to the fore. Planning on having a games night anyway? It was our mission to emphasise Games Aid’s innovative incentivisation.

Grandad’s resident Designer Emily also noted a smart solution to improve a common visual element of modern website design: the embedded media play button. “Getting to know the Games Aid brand, we saw that the organisation’s iconic plaster-badge design could be rotated to echo the typical video play button. We echoed this symbology to make the design even more cohesive across the whole website.”

Sign off

This has been an incredible project for the Grandad Digital team, and we were proud to develop this brand-new website voluntarily on behalf of Games Aid. It’s the ambition of our Creative Director Paul Sheffield to always deliver beautiful design and a strong technical foundation,  combing usability and feasibility.

The Games Aid website is a testament to that goal, and we’re proud to support the team throughout Develop: Brighton and beyond.