Fear: UIv2

[Varana]

Why is everyone putting everything at the bottom bar there? Vertical space is much more precious than horizontal one. Even more in today's age of widescreen monitors, but even BG had its portraits at the side. Having all UI elements at the bottom reduces the visible area to a low but very wide strip. This is not only impractical, it also has gameplay implications: you want to approach potentially dangerous things in a way that you're coming from the side, so you can spot earlier what's going on; you'll probably have the issue that you can shoot your bow or fireball horizontally quite fine, but have to scroll to do it vertically across the screen. Both effects should be avoided as much as possible, imho.

If there's a "heavy" UI, and even in more minimalistic designs, at least some elements should be aligned vertically at the sides. It's where we have more than enough space for them.

[Sensuki]

Why is everyone putting everything at the bottom bar there? Vertical space is much more precious than horizontal one. Even more in today's age of widescreen monitors, but even BG had its portraits at the side. Having all UI elements at the bottom reduces the visible area to a low but very wide strip. This is not only impractical, it also has gameplay implications: you want to approach potentially dangerous things in a way that you're coming from the side, so you can spot earlier what's going on; you'll probably have the issue that you can shoot your bow or fireball horizontally quite fine, but have to scroll to do it vertically across the screen. Both effects should be avoided as much as possible, imho.

If there's a "heavy" UI, and even in more minimalistic designs, at least some elements should be aligned vertically at the sides. It's where we have more than enough space for them.

 

I couldn't agree more, but since you're new here and missed the debarcle that was Art Update #54, Obsidian have stated that they will not be using the U shaped UI design of Baldur's Gate and Icewind Dale. They are against it. The main reason for not using it is plausible at best and it is because of the distance between the character portraits and the action bar at the bottom - apparently having to click a portrait on the side of the screen and then mouse down to the bottom is "not economical".

 

I personally think that is a ridiculous notion considering that these days that distance is easily mitigated by high dpi mice, high mouse sensitivity and mouse acceleration being turned on by default in windows and mac for most people ... and that distance in screen pixels would likely equate to 1cm or 2cm of mouse movement (IF THAT) for the majority of current day users. I use a low mouse sensitivity, no mouse accel and 400dpi so that's probably 10-15cm for me and I don't mind at all, I like moving my mouse ... but what do I know.

Edited December 13, 2013 by Sensuki

[curryinahurry]

^ This is why I have reconciled myself to the fact that we're going to get a fairly crappy UI.

 

You hit the nail on the head with the last post.  The problem I see with the whole discussion around UI design is that its supported by a bunch of assumption that I find highly suspect. It seems like there is a preference by the decision makers on POE to have a certain type of UI and the reasoning was tailored to that bias.

 

 

BTW, the whole kinematics of right to left mouse movement is nonsense.  That was based on old NIH research of straight mouse directional movement.  The reality, is that the hand (and mouse attached to it) likes to describe an arc in its movements.  This means that diagonals are extremely efficient, generally moving from upper left to lower right, but the opposite direction of mouse travel is negligibly less so. 

 

This means, that given the POE/ Karkarov examples, mouse travel to and from the center of the screen to the character portraits will be roughly as efficient as if the UI was U shaped in the BG2 style (which many of us prefer).  However, once portraits have been selected, travel to the action key will be inefficient as it will be either down to up (very poor by the NIH test results) or left to right (also very poor).  With right justified portraits and action bars directly below the portraits, as many mock ups UI in the Update 54 thread described, mouse travel would be roughly triangular / elliptical, and always in a clockwise motion which would ultimately be more efficient than what Obsidian is developing.

[Sensuki]

Exactly. To be perfectly honest I think that the bottom UI is just a design that the PE devs (Josh Sawyer in particular) prefers over the U shaped UI. That said you don't see too many games with a U shaped UI.

 

And yeah the mouse movement statement is a farce. To further my point about the manner in which gamers move their mouse, let me paste a video of a competitive quake 3 player from a few years ago. Right handed and low sensitivity player. Notice how his preferred method of movement is a left to right flick, followed by re-positioning his mouse to the left. He only flicks/turns left when the map/gameplay dictates.

 

http://www.esreality.com/files/movies/2006/mew_playing_06.avi

 

And let me demonstrate real mouse movement in a simulated situation. I have taken two mockups and a BG2 screenshot, placed a star on the screen to dictate my starting cursor position, then drawn my mouse movements in mspaint so that the movement is tracked.

 

These movements are made with the following settings

 

1920x1080

Windows sensitivity: 6 (Default)

Enhanced Pointer Precision: Off

DPI scaling: Off

MarkC Windows 8 Mouse fix

1000Hz Polling rate

Logitech G400 @ 400 DPI

 

 

Total area moved on the mousepad was probably around 10-12 cm (although this is only a 1280x720 screenshot), it would be a bit more in game. For a comparison, in Call of Duty 4 I have to move my mouse over 60cm to do a 360 degree turn.

 

 

Now this one does have the least movement out of all of them, as the action bar is closer to the portraits, but I still moved my mouse about 8-10cm in total. The actual distance between the portraits and the ability icons is pretty much negligible in terms of mouse pad space - even on my abnormally low mouse sensitivity set up.

 

And finally a BG2 screenshot (however this is a smaller screenshot)

 

 

Total distance is the most out of all of them, and the distance between the portrait and the action bar is large, but that mouse movement took me less than half a second to make - in a lot of situations the player would be paused anyway, debating their decision. So the actual movement is probably a non issue, especially considering you can select your character in the world.

 

The distance here was about 6-8cm, but it would be more on 1920x1080.

 

The situation is totally dependent on - where your cursor is on the screen when you decide to make this movement, and where your target is on the screen. Those two movements take up the most amount of mouse movement, the actual movement between the portrait and the ability icon, even in the Baldur's Gate 2 instance is almost negligible on my low mouse sensitivity setup.

 

Someone with a 1800 dpi mouse and mouse accel would move their mouse what ? 1-cm for each movement ? depending on how fast they move their mouse.

 

And finally whether the ability icons is on the left or the right or above the player portraits is completely irrelevant regarding "comfort", as you still have to make three movements anyway.

Edited December 13, 2013 by Sensuki

[curryinahurry]

And actually, the direction of travel for the mouse in your first two examples (counter-clockwise) vs the third (clockwise) is much less comfortable for right handed mouse users.  Of course, as you stated, with mouse acceleration, its pretty much a non issue, as all of these movements become little more than hand gestures.  

 

I would really have like to seen a poll among KS backers as to UI preference - before we got the first glimpse in Update 54.  I think BG-2 would have been the overwhelming favorit.e

[Sensuki]

Indeed it is, it's three very easy mouse movements despite the distance and I've also got years and years of Infinity Engine muscle memory so that just feels right to me.

 

Mouse acceleration is actually bad because it increases your likelyhood to misclick.

 

Devs are set in stone on the UI though, it's gonna be bottom only and we can only hope that they don't completely derp out and do something like what Karkarov made.

Edited December 13, 2013 by Sensuki

[J.E. Sawyer]

I think UI discussions on these forums have shown that it's pretty rare than anything is ever the overwhelming favorite.

[Sensuki]

Indeed so. For the record, back when you started making your changes, did you go with a gap in the middle design ?

[J.E. Sawyer]

That is what we started with, but it's not where we ended up.  It's still a bottom-only UI, but it doesn't have the left/right split with a gap in the middle.

[Ink Blot]

That is what we started with, but it's not where we ended up.  It's still a bottom-only UI, but it doesn't have the left/right split with a gap in the middle.

Your cat. Is epic.

[curryinahurry]

@ JE Sawyer

 

Possibly, but I think the data would have been useful in any case.  User preference and experience would is a tricky thing, I know, but I really like data when I can get it to help establish an idea of the field.

 

As an example, I'll be interested to see how you folks treat the poll results for the additional content in the announcements sub-forum.  While its easy to say the an overwhelming majority are in favor of additional content at this point, one could also view the numbers as showing a significant group against added scope.

[Sensuki]

That is what we started with, but it's not where we ended up. It's still a bottom-only UI, but it doesn't have the left/right split with a gap in the middle.

Great *thumbs up*

Edited December 13, 2013 by Sensuki

[Boox]

That is what we started with, but it's not where we ended up.  It's still a bottom-only UI, but it doesn't have the left/right split with a gap in the middle.

I hope that means that it also doesn't have gaps in the corners (as in Sensuki's worse case result).

[rjshae]

 

That is what we started with, but it's not where we ended up.  It's still a bottom-only UI, but it doesn't have the left/right split with a gap in the middle.

I hope that means that it also doesn't have gaps in the corners (as in Sensuki's worse case result).

 

So.... if you have somebody with a high res. display, you'd be okay with padding out the ends to fill them up? I sure wouldn't.

[Sensuki]

As an example, I'll be interested to see how you folks treat the poll results for the additional content in the announcements sub-forum.  While its easy to say the an overwhelming majority are in favor of additional content at this point, one could also view the numbers as showing a significant group against added scope.

To be fair, they didn't explain the "cost" of the new features other than money. A lot of people are concerned about them taking away from other features, and adding significantly more development time to the game.

 

When the actuality is it's probably just more money for outsourcing environment art and to bring another writer onto the project. So the time difference will be there, but it wouldn't be very long I don't think

 

So.... if you have somebody with a high res. display, you'd be okay with padding out the ends to fill them up? I sure wouldn't.

Scaling and Aspect Ratio are both a concern, I wonder whether they can get the UI to scale if they have art assets for the > 1080P resolutions. A set portrait size of 73x86 is going to be smaller on a 1440p screen than it would be on a 1080p screen.

 

One of the reasons I did the mockup of the middle UI with the sides cut off is it pretty much fits 4:3, so it's a "lazy" solution to the problem, I guess. Most other skeuomorphic games I've played alter button size and stuff (like DotA 2) but also have dead space on the UI to collapse.

Edited December 13, 2013 by Sensuki

[Boox]

So.... if you have somebody with a high res. display, you'd be okay with padding out the ends to fill them up? I sure wouldn't.

What do you consider a high-res display? I have a 2560x1440 display and I wouldn't want gaps in the corners depending, of course, on how large those gaps are. If the UI is relatively narrow (say 1/3 of the screen width), I'd probably be fine with gaps. However, if the gaps themselves are too narrow to be of use then, yes, I would like padding. I guess it also depends on how tall the UI is, but I definitely don't like the gaps in Sensuki's WCR.

[Sensuki]

I plan to upgrade to a 27" (or larger screen) when they start doing 120Hz + 8-10 bit colors. Had one of those Korean PLS ones but had to sell it due to cash flow issues.

[Mor]

I hope that means that it also doesn't have gaps in the corners.

I hope it does.

[Hassat Hunter]

You know what's funny? When this thread started, I was in full agreement with Sensuki. But as more and more posts are made, the completely oposite starts to happen and I start to completely disagree with any and all points made. It's... odd.

 

 

This is the reason why I believe IWD2 use Health Number, due to the smaller portrait size they couldn't realistically do the blood fill on the portrait anymore because there was a very small amount of total space to work with.

Also, IWD2's HUD was horrible. Absolutely freakin' HORRIBLE. The less we take it as base for PE the better. If a OE-developer ever even thinks "Hey, this is how it worked in IWD2" they should immediately discard it. It was THAT bad. I kid you not.

I have no idea what Black Isle thought when they went from the excellent BG2 interface to that steaming pile of IWD2 interface.

 

 

There is zero chance that they will implement your idea because of the portrait size in Pillars of Eternity and the two health mechanisms, two colored fills on a portrait looks silly and is clunky and unintuitive - no matter what you two think.

The portrait size ain't fixed... so there goes 1 point against 'zero chance.' There have been 2 different suggestions so far to deal with the new mechanisms that doesn't make it look like a 5 year old drew 2 bars on your HUD, so there's 2 points against 'zero chance.' And for some odd reason it works far better than having a seperate tiny 2 bars to it, as can also be seen in other RPG's using said system, which makes 3 'zero chances.' Or as they say in baseball... "You're out!"

 

 

They won't INCREASE the height of the UI size. There is a snowball's chance in hell of that.

Then they could add... *drumsounds* a verticle side-bar.

Yeah, yeah, I know, awesome idea right. Sadly I didn't think it up myself... some company named BioWare already did in 1999. They seemed to have lost their excellent UI designers around 2002 or so I think?

Then they can make the portraits pretty high, I got about... 1080 pixels for them. Enough space too for additional buttons like journal and stuff you say? Hey, that's an excellent idea... I wish I suggested it before... wait, I did.

Sure, modern PC's no longer require the 2 bar's of the BG's, but I believe 1 bar definitely beats putting all the stuff at the bottom. Also allows to make the bottom bar less high. And since there's more horizontal space than verticle (1900 pixels for me) in the end more screen is won to boot.

Awesome, ain't it?

 

 

Have the devs mentioned where status and effect icons will be placed on the UI? Will they be displayed over the character portraits like in BG2? If yes, it would make it harder to discern stamina and health levels when using Rabain's suggestion.

How so? It worked in BG2 right? Until the end where status effects just went way out of hand.

 

 

As an example, I'll be interested to see how you folks treat the poll results for the additional content in the announcements sub-forum.  While its easy to say the an overwhelming majority are in favor of additional content at this point, one could also view the numbers as showing a significant group against added scope.

It's not really the scope most of us are against... more the use of resources, prefering it to be used on other, more pressing matters like QA and improving existing content rather than adding new. If you think all no voters are simply "against added scope" you interpretate data like a BioWare employee (read: badly).

 

 

Great *thumbs up*

I'm not so sure. I still fear a travesty like the IceWind Dale II interface. Which was, if you haven't mentioned me saying it yet, bad. Very very bad. I was kinda hoping they would just stick to BG-style, with the "spiritual BG successor" and all, but that art update crushed my dreams. Then they said it would be modified... *hope up* but that hope didn't nearly stay there long enough, and is pretty much in the 'fear for disaster' level again. I have faith in OE, but it's just that their last attempt (as Black Isle) to re-make an IE interface turned out so damned horrible, one can't help but feel insecure about it.

[Hiro Protagonist II]

Also, IWD2's HUD was horrible. Absolutely freakin' HORRIBLE. The less we take it as base for PE the better. If a OE-developer ever even thinks "Hey, this is how it worked in IWD2" they should immediately discard it. It was THAT bad. I kid you not.

I have no idea what Black Isle thought when they went from the excellent BG2 interface to that steaming pile of IWD2 interface.

 

I agree. I'll take the BG UI over IWD 2 any day.

[curryinahurry]

 

As an example, I'll be interested to see how you folks treat the poll results for the additional content in the announcements sub-forum.  While its easy to say the an overwhelming majority are in favor of additional content at this point, one could also view the numbers as showing a significant group against added scope.

To be fair, they didn't explain the "cost" of the new features other than money. A lot of people are concerned about them taking away from other features, and adding significantly more development time to the game.

 

When the actuality is it's probably just more money for outsourcing environment art and to bring another writer onto the project. So the time difference will be there, but it wouldn't be very long I don't think

 

 

 

People voting against will have a multitude of reasons, but all are based on a concern that scope increasing will create problems.  I will be interested in seeing how Obsidian handles this issue.  This isn't a question for the masses.  It is being directed to stakeholders.  It doesn't matter that the naming convention is backers, the people on this forum are a particularly invested group who have contributed more than is necessary in order to receive a particular benefit ( a game type we believe we have been deprived of over the past 10+ years); thus the term stakeholder; partners is also a relevant term. 

 

We are exploring a new paradigm, and I am very interested in how game developers approach this particular wrinkle as we have shifted the field quite a bit.

Edited December 14, 2013 by curryinahurry

[Mor]

 

Also, IWD2's HUD was horrible. Absolutely freakin' HORRIBLE. The less we take it as base for PE the better. If a OE-developer ever even thinks "Hey, this is how it worked in IWD2" they should immediately discard it. It was THAT bad. I kid you not.

I have no idea what Black Isle thought when they went from the excellent BG2 interface to that steaming pile of IWD2 interface

 

I agree. I'll take the BG UI over IWD 2 any day.

 

This would be more helpful if you can show a modern game with your idea of UI. Because most here loved BG UI, it worked well for a fixed 800x600, but as I pointed out before its not 1999, there many different resolution\aspect ratio to consider and BG UI design don't work for most of us.

 

Personally, I would love to see the portraits\status moved to the side bar and some elements made bigger. But in either case I don't see continued bars framing my screen. You are going to have some empty spaces.

 

I hope that means that it also doesn't have gaps in the corners.

Expanding on my previous comment, because of various resolutions and aspect ratios are always going to have a problem with this. I am familiar with two ways to approach this:

 

1. Creating vector based UI, or just stretch existing one, but I it wont be as detailed and pretty (same issues as 3D vs 2D with paint overs). I don't recall anyone pulling this off with good looking stylized graphics and since UI is single most visible element we don't want this.

 

2. Create several custom ui paintovers for most common resolutions(lowest\highest and 1? in between) which everyone will use, and those who doesn't have one of the "supported" common res, will use a similar one with small gaps of dead space. Sure you can fill those gaps, but if the question is between stretching the UI (creating dead space, possibly ruining the design) for the sake of it touching the sides vs ending it in artistic fashion like this:

 

 

 

 

I vote artistic over stupid every time.

 

 

p.s. Also its always possible that their design might have gaps, simply because it don't make sense to use that space, I have yet to see a better thought out design then Obsidian concept (that included all elements)

Edited December 14, 2013 by Mor

[rjshae]

A completely mod-able UI would be a nice feature. That way, those who can't just enjoy whatever the developers come up with will have recourse to modify the look and feel to their satisfaction.

[curryinahurry]

This would be more helpful if you can show a modern game with your idea of UI. Because most here loved BG UI, it worked well for a fixed 800x600, but as I pointed out before its not 1999, there many different resolution\aspect ratio to consider and BG UI design don't work for most of us.

 

 

I'm not sure if you read the Update 54 thread before you posted here, but you should because there are several mock-ups that meet this criteria.  I'm including one of mine as an example, but look for others.[/url]

Edited December 14, 2013 by curryinahurry

[Karkarov]

Anyway that's enough of your wisdom for one day

I think I will just quote you right back.  No offense Sensuki, but I REALLY hope you find something better to do with your time than hunt down posts I made... what 6 months ago???, and repeatedly take them out of context.  You seriously need to get a life and learn deal with people not agreeing with you.

 

PS: All Sawyer said was there is no right left split with a gap in the middle.  He didn't say it takes the whole bottom.  Wait for an actual new mockup before making more assumptions.  I won't care as long as the mostly useless combat log can be turned off.

Edited December 14, 2013 by Karkarov