Redesigning and Overhauling the interface.

[Kabbalah]

more like console MMORPG is shitty in itself.

It's not even ps2 limitations it's console limitations, you can have all the mods you want but it fucks over a huge amount of people that can't add them.

Well, simple example. When FFXI was ported over to the 360 (not sure if it was ported to the PS3 yet), it should have been a simple matter to update the status icons so that you could differentiate bar-elemental spells from one another, know the difference between different JA-based buffs like berserk, aggressor, and warcry (to name a few), or simply put, make new icons for old status effects. In effect (pun not intended), a way to put something new into one console that wasn't on the PS2 without making the advantage too drastic; a way of telling a PS2 player, "By the way, here's a reason to move shop over to this console over here." Baby steps, in other words.

But nope. SE's reluctance to change even the smallest bit of their inefficient GUI convinces me that playing FFXI with its third-party tools and .DAT swaps is really the only way to go. For a company that's trying to steer its players away from these things (at least, on the surface), it does them no good for their players to point out just how shitty and unattractive the stock setup really is.

I mean, honestly, is there a reason that everyone's names are listed in italics when there's no reason for this at all?

[Milton]

basically what this looks to me is what FFXI would look like if the apple osx guy designed the GUI, but the microsoft vista guy implemented it. mostly fluff..

i used to frequent a design forum that aldyn (the creator of that mock ui) was a member of and he also made this:

http://img501.imageshack.us/img501/7...iformacbc1.jpg

ffxi for mac

[Amele]

Well, simple example. When FFXI was ported over to the 360 (not sure if it was ported to the PS3 yet), it should have been a simple matter to update the status icons so that you could differentiate bar-elemental spells from one another, know the difference between different JA-based buffs like berserk, aggressor, and warcry (to name a few), or simply put, make new icons for old status effects. In effect (pun not intended), a way to put something new into one console that wasn't on the PS2 without making the advantage too drastic; a way of telling a PS2 player, "By the way, here's a reason to move shop over to this console over here." Baby steps, in other words.

But nope. SE's reluctance to change even the smallest bit of their inefficient GUI convinces me that playing FFXI with its third-party tools and .DAT swaps is really the only way to go. For a company that's trying to steer its players away from these things (at least, on the surface), it does them no good for their players to point out just how shitty and unattractive the stock setup really is.

I mean, honestly, is there a reason that everyone's names are listed in italics when there's no reason for this at all?

it's not actually italics, it's a slanted font face.

and compared to the default text face it actually looks better (I've rebuilt the player overhead font face to match the default and it just looks ugly)

the icons thing makes zero sense to me honestly; the ps2 (probably) has a full icon .dat just like we do.

[Rhianu]

I don't know if this has been mentioned already but you are wrong about not needing "Trade" in the main menu. It's impossible to trade to an NPC in your new design because you need to click on a target to bring up the mini menu but clicking on an NPC makes them talk.

Actually, that's another problem with the game: NPCs don't automatically detect items that you have in your inventory. I've never played any other RPG, online or off, where you actually had to manually trade items to NPCs in order to complete quests. It's just dumb. We don't need to keep the Trade option in the main menu. What we need to do is make it so that you never need to Trade to NPCs, because honestly, you shouldn't ever have to.

more like console MMORPG is shitty in itself.

It's not even ps2 limitations it's console limitations, you can have all the mods you want but it fucks over a huge amount of people that can't add them.

I don't know, modern consoles are becoming almost as mod-friendly as PCs. Hell, the PS3 version of Unreal Tournament 3 proves that it's possible for console games to support user-created mods, albiet limited support.

Maybe by the time the PS4 and the next Xbox roll around, consoles will have just as much mod support as PC games have now.

[byte]

Actually, that's another problem with the game: NPCs don't automatically detect items that you have in your inventory. I've never played any other RPG, online or off, where you actually had to manually trade items to NPCs in order to complete quests. It's just dumb. We don't need to keep the Trade option in the main menu. What we need to do is make it so that you never need to Trade to NPCs, because honestly, you shouldn't ever have to.

I agree. Example: In WoW your quests are automatically tracked and flagged when complete.

[Rhianu]

Hey, I redesigned the Quest Log to be more intuitive:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v2...ewquestlog.jpg

A few people were complaining about how the design in my original post made it take more clicks to get to things, so I took that into account when designing this new Quest Log.

The first post of this topic has been edited to include the above picture.

EDIT: Oh, and does anyone have a link to the previous news post from the BG main page? You know, the news post where they pointed out some of the official interface's short comings? Cuz' now another news post has been posted, and the old one seems to have disappeared, and I can't find it anywhere.

EDIT: Okay, a few people were getting confused about my new Quest Log above, so allow me to give a bit of an explanation about how it works exactly. To begin with, I'll first explain the distinction between Main Quests and Side Quests.

A few weeks ago, I was trying to introduce a friend of mine to the game. I went through the menus, explaining to him how everything worked and where things were. When I showed him the Quest and Mission buttons, he asked, "What's the difference?" Indeed, it's a valid question. What is the difference between Quests and Missions? Well, if you've ever played any of the offline Final Fantasy games, you understand that they have a main storyline and several side quests, and that is the difference between Quests and Missions in FFXI. But then, why use the terms Quests and Missions to distinguish between them? The difference between the two words is ambiguous at best, and the difference between the them in FFXI has become increasingly blurred as time goes on, especially in the new Wings of the Goddess expansion pack. And so I elected to rename them, changing them to "Main Quests" and "Side Quests," instead of "Missions" and "Quests." I believe that this not only clarifies their purpose and function, but also brings them more in line with how the game actually works these days.

Also, please keep in mind that the menu isn't supposed to be proportional to the screenshot behind it. I just threw that in there to make the transparency visible. You wouldn't have been able to tell that the menus were transparent if there was nothing behind them.

Oh, and the "Current Quests" boxes in the Main Quests section are not drop down menus. The reason they're like that is because Main Quests are Missions, and you cannot have more than one active Mission at a time.

And as for the windows with scroll bars in them, those are trees with branching catagories, and you can click on the area to show/hide completed quests for that area.

Also, since some people in this topic complained about how my redesigned interface made it take more button clicks to get to things, I have taken great care to make the new Quest Log as streamlined as possible, and ensure that it does not add excessive and unnecessary complexity to the interface.

[Colenzo]

ITT: people making the same GUI and complaining about the current one and trying to be game designers.

[Aksannyi]

I think the quest log in game is fine, EXCEPT for the fact that they're in no particular order. Alphabetical would be nice, or something.

[Rhianu]

ITT: people making the same GUI and complaining about the current one and trying to be game designers.

Well, it is sort of the same GUI, but it's a much more streamlined, simplified, and intuitive version of it.

[Amele]

I think the quest log in game is fine, EXCEPT for the fact that they're in no particular order. Alphabetical would be nice, or something.

they're in order of implementation I think - which is to say stuff added in the same expansion/patch is all going to be jumbled, but quests added in CoP come after zilart quests and before AU quests etc. (Basically, every quest has an ID number; and I suspect that the quests are sorted by their ID numbers)


I'm sure they're sorted, just not in a useful way; basically.

[Blabj]

If anything you're hindering design by having massive blocks of information such as the above design.

SE's quest menu layout is a good system when you look at it in terms of getting information, it seperates it into very distinct options to browse through, Completed or Current quests, then the nation/area it is in, the problem then comes in searching through this area of content, as it could potentially contain masses of list items.

However, interface as much as you like, you are not going to get around the fact that what you essentially have is a massive list that you can split vaguely into more categories. This leaves two options: further menus to refine your browsing, or a search bar. To quickly touch on why the former is flawed, it adds extra time to your browsing, and may get so specific that it could cause confusion to the user.

And why wont they implement a search based on the quests name or involved mobs or NPCs? Because they already have those on the internet. The amount of backwards engineering involved in creating links between search terms and desirable results would take a long time of going through every single quest in the dats and adding them in. Sure it's feasible, but it's much easier to advocate an online resource.

Edit

To add to my original post, a method of sorting the quests into alphabetical order would be nice, I had completely overlooked that they didn't sort that way. Well spotted, Aksannyi.

[Rhianu]

My redesigned Quest Log blocks massive amounts of information? What? What information is it blocking exactly?

[Aksannyi]

80% of the fucking screen?

[netz]

Hey, I redesigned the Quest Log to be more intuitive:
*snip*
A few people were complaining about how the design in my original post made it take more clicks to get to things, so I took that into account when designing this new Quest Log.

What differentiates a main quest and a side quest?

Why do the controls displayed differ between the main quest and side quest tabs?

Is the control that shows the current quests a drop-down box? How are multiple active quests displayed? Why are the controls different for active and completed quests?

Given the amount of information displayed there, a flat view that you propose doesn't lend itself well to rapid access, though everything is categorized correctly (aside from the main/side quest distinction). A tree might be better. Put everything under a single view with branching elements, and add the option to show/hide completed quests/missions, and then depending on how you access the view (/quest, /mission, etc) expand the correct branch by default.

The other thing to note is that the view I proposed works really, really poorly from the perspective of an xbox or ps2 player navigating the game entirely with a controller. Having to navigate the view and make multiple selections to get at the necessary information is a huge obstacle for a gamepad, and button presses should be conserved.

[Lordwafik]

Your overhaul is worse than the current system.

[Kabbalah]

One of the reasons SE quest log is almost win is that it separates them by logical divisions: area and status. The problem I have with SE's quest logging, however, is that a quest is listed as either 100% progress (and tossed into Completed Quests) or 0% progress: unless you bash through the quest that very night, you're never very sure what progress you've made in a certain quest.

For example, let's take a simple multi-step quest like "Petals for Parelbriaux." The description is:

You have been asked to find a rare plant that is often used in medicines. It supposedly grows somewhere on the Lufaise Meadows.

However, according to a walkthrough, the steps are as thus:

* Head to the Top section and talk to Chemioue for a cutscene.
* Talk to Tressia (standing near Chemioue) for another cutscene.
* Talk to Parelbriaux at K-7 for another cutscene.
* Now go to the Main section and talk to Ondieulix for a cutscene, and the actual activation of the quest.
* Go to Lufaise Meadows to the ??? at G-6; it needs to be selected during fog weather. (Fog shows up sporadically, during the morning from 1:00-8:00. It can only show when there is no weather icon up.)
* The Flytrap NM Baumesel will spawn when the ??? is selected during fog, and must be defeated.
* If multiple people in a group need the quest, it only has to be defeated once for all of them.
* After the NM is defeated, select the ??? again for a cutscene and to receive the Particularly Poignant Petal key item.
* Return to the Tavnazian Safehold and talk with Ondieulix for a cutscene and to complete the quest.

OK, that's a lot of steps, and if you should, for any reason, stop doing the quest, you're either going to have to take notes or redo everything from step one just to make sure you're on the right track. This is what we call "bullshit": while the obvious answer would be to finish the quest the second you get it, most people are liable to obtain a quest, do some steps, then come back to it later if something is in the way, like specific weather conditions, a particularly tough monster, not enough items to trade, etc., then give up on the quest later when they can't remember where they left off and are unwilling to backtrack their way through the quest. Compare this to the quest logs of games like Bioshock or RPGs like NWN or Mass Effect that confirm steps for you in a submenu so you don't have to go through the tediousness that is double-backing through quests: I could stop a quest in the middle of game, come back a month later, check the log, see what I've done, and know exactly what I need to do next in less than a minute.

A small but significant design flaw.

[Zhais]

80% of the fucking screen?

^


That and there seems to be no intuitive way to scroll through current quests, see the quest description, filter quests by area (which is why the current system rocks).

Making 5-minute mockups of a menu is not redesigning. If you want to seriously try it, sit down with a lot of printouts of the old design, draw it out by hand (Every menu, every sub menu, every possible combination of menus), make prototypes, do user testing.

Then go back and do it again because it wasn't good enough.

And when you show if off to people, using more text than actual menu display is a bad way of getting your point across in my opinion. Thorough explanations are never bad, but not when you are explaining images that don't exist.

[Rhianu]

80% of the fucking screen?

The menu wasn't supposed to be proportional to the screenshot behind it. I just threw that in there to make the transparency visible. You wouldn't have been able to tell that the menus were transparent if there was nothing behind them.

What differentiates a main quest and a side quest?

Main Quest = Mission
Side Quest = Quest

I edited my original post in this topic to explain why I changed them.

Oh, and no, the "Current Quests" boxes in the Main Quests section are not drop down menus. The reason they're like that is because Main Quests are Missions, and you cannot have more than one active Mission at a time.

Given the amount of information displayed there, a flat view that you propose doesn't lend itself well to rapid access, though everything is categorized correctly (aside from the main/side quest distinction). A tree might be better. Put everything under a single view with branching elements, and add the option to show/hide completed quests/missions, and then depending on how you access the view (/quest, /mission, etc) expand the correct branch by default.

Um... yeah, that's actually exactly how it works. See the menus with the scroll bars in them? Yeah, those are expandible trees, just like what you just described.

The other thing to note is that the view I proposed works really, really poorly from the perspective of an xbox or ps2 player navigating the game entirely with a controller. Having to navigate the view and make multiple selections to get at the necessary information is a huge obstacle for a gamepad, and button presses should be conserved.

Not really, actually. You could press L2 and R2 to switch between the two different tabs, and then use the directional pad to navigate around the menu. It would work just like navigating around the menus in the PlayOnline Viewer. Seriously, just go mess around in PoL with a controller for bit, and observe how the cursor automatically snaps to the different menus and dialoge boxes.

It seems like you people are just confused and don't really understand how my redesigned Quest Log actually works.

Making 5-minute mockups of a menu is not redesigning. If you want to seriously try it, sit down with a lot of printouts of the old design, draw it out by hand (Every menu, every sub menu, every possible combination of menus), make prototypes, do user testing.

Then go back and do it again because it wasn't good enough.

If I was an actual game developer and actually had a team of professionals to work with and had the resources to actually build a real, functional, interactive interface, that's exactly what I'd do. But I don't have any of those. I'm just one person doing things all by myself, and I don't have any programming skills whatsoever. I do not have the resources needed to build an actual working prototype. The best I can do is make static, non-interactive images and then provide explanations as to how they would be used if you could actually use them. And as for user-testing, that's sort of what I'm doing with this topic. You guys are the users, and you're testing what I've designed.

[Zhais]

It seems like you people are just confused and don't really understand how my redesigned Quest Log actually works.

Ok, so um.... You complain about the quest log not being intuitive... so you 'redesign' it to be more intuitive...


and then you flat out say it confuses people. Gee, I wonder where the flaw is: With our heads, or your design?


Like I said, if you want to be taken seriously put more thought and effort into your designs and mockups. Also, don't have a pre-supposing attitude about what people are supposed to think and how they are supposed to react. When you design things, you better damn well expect it to be nitpicked all to hell from all angles for all reasons. If you can't take it with a good attitude, then you better stop now.

[Kabbalah]

It seems like you people are just confused and don't really understand how my redesigned Quest Log actually works.

No offense, but a statement like this coming out of your mouth (or keyboard) should be a big flashing warning sign about the nature of your idea because it sounds very much like SE's explanation for AV and PW, and we all know how well those turned out.

If you are wishing to design an intuitive interface and someone else looks at it and has complaints, and you respond that they are 'confused' and 'just don't understand,' then there is a problem with the design, not the person looking at it. If you blame the player for not understanding the interface, then it is only intuitive to you.

IMO, SE's quest log is hardly in need of an overhaul. It needs a few tweaks here and there, but it's nowhere near the chaos of the status bar.