BETA CLIENT. Flat design vs skeuomorphism

Boys and girls, stay awhile and listen.

I'm not saying that the old client was bad or good or that the new one isn't a step in the right direction. The single reason you may consider this new client better is simply because you are comparing it with the old one.

Let's talk in terms of aesthetics and usability/clutter. While I agree that the new client is slightly better in all aspects, the shift in visual style is evident and I it does not make justice to the League of Legends universe.

Having said that, let's focus on the aesthetics. It may be that the reason behind the attempt to settle with this new design have it roots in the fact that your design team cannot produce a great skeuomorphic interface? I doubt that. Now, I'm not saying just make it look like that, but for the sake of imagination - just browse through some Diablo 3 graphical user interface screenshots. Zero visual discrepancy and 100% utility. Then look back at your Beta client and tell me this is the best you can come up with: **A kitschy mix of heavy-skeuomorphic icons (original in-game items, spells, masteries etc) and a bunch of various visuals ranging from semi-skeuomorphic to an almost flat-looking style. **

Besides, your design team show signs of fatigue. Take the masteries page for example: It's elementary - why have three styles of icon borders? You can't quickly tell which masteries are selected without hard looking. Why not eliminate the third style (colored-border), leaving only colored-outline and greyed-out options.

Grow up and sync. Decide yourselves. Pay for a GUI master. You have the resources to come up with great GUI!