1095 replies to this topic

[42and19]

Just looked through the UI 2.0 thread again to make sure this hasn't been previewed.

One thing that would be amazingly useful to connect new players to units and houses and such would be a tab in the social panel that would give you a list of the players in the last drop. There have been many times were I have been trying to help a new player connect to a community when the match ends and you are auto disconnected before you two can finish talking. Some people's names are so....odd that it is hard to remember them perfectly it would be nice to have the ability to click on a players name in the list of players in the last drop and open a dialogue with them.

I know this would open the door for harassment but as long as it is fairly easy to block people this shouldn't be a huge issue.

[QuimMorius]

42and19, on 30 September 2013 - 02:39 PM, said:

There have been many times were I have been trying to help a new player connect to a community when the match ends and you are auto disconnected before you two can finish talking. Some people's names are so....odd that it is hard to remember them perfectly it would be nice to have the ability to click on a players name in the list of players in the last drop and open a dialogue with them.

I know this would open the door for harassment but as long as it is fairly easy to block people this shouldn't be a huge issue.

I use printscreen of scoreboard to remember name, add friend in MWO and open chat to continue the conversation.

BTW, we need that in game clock when doing full screen! +1

[Clownwarlord]

After battle reports that you can go back and look at the matches you already played since you logged in would be nice. It would be something that would be saved on the users end like screen shots of the end of battle reports that have an easy re open process built into the UI 2.0. This will help those have bragging rights or create BOUNTIES for later on when they note who has been a very good player and need a good taking down

[culverin]

Maverick01, on 29 September 2013 - 06:16 PM, said:

Bryan, maybe add a small digital clock to the new UI 2.0 for those late night gaming sessions.

I respectfully disagree.
I would rather the devs focus on what is important, the game.

You've got a clock on your phone, your computer, your keyboard screen or your alarm clock.
Having the add in something like this from the GUI.
1. Does not enhance the game experience.
2. Clutters the GUI with non-game-relevant information.
3. Takes dev time AND money away from improving the game.

Nobody is going to come to MWO and stay for the clock.
If 2.0 is looking great and PGI is rolling in cash and dev time, then maybe for 3.0?

[Redlor Fidelious]

After more than a year of the existing interface I am looking forward to something that is more user friendly and easier to navigate. Will we also see addition of account management features to go with the new user interface? After more than a year I would still like to change the email address associated with my account.

[Phoenix Branson]

culverin, on 01 October 2013 - 11:43 PM, said:

I respectfully disagree.
I would rather the devs focus on what is important, the game.

You've got a clock on your phone, your computer, your keyboard screen or your alarm clock.
Having the add in something like this from the GUI.
1. Does not enhance the game experience.
2. Clutters the GUI with non-game-relevant information.
3. Takes dev time AND money away from improving the game.

Nobody is going to come to MWO and stay for the clock.
If 2.0 is looking great and PGI is rolling in cash and dev time, then maybe for 3.0?

Seriously. How long would it take to add a small digital clock to the new UI? Let's not have them take coffee breaks either, might slow them down.

Edited by Maverick01, 03 October 2013 - 06:24 PM.

[No7]

I actually wrote a 2 page post about UI2.0 and why it is _still_ not in the game and why everything is suffering from it.

Then I realized one link would say it all much better than I could:




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[mad kat]

Whats wrong with the current layout? i'd say this new one is more fussy. Just need a little tooltip window to explain things don't need to go into re-aranging everything......if it ain't broke don't fix it.

Are we also gonna get some more support for low end machines and ways of helping to boost FPS which seem confusingly poor on the home screen as well as in game.

Dont hit me for it but what about the earnings? any light at the end of the tunnel for us porpers?

[Kaeseblock]

No7, on 08 October 2013 - 02:45 AM, said:

[...]
http://www.youtube.c...ADFPuscG8#t=470

Aww man, that vid is sooo~ true ^^
Sadly the lack of planning is a common cause for problems, not only in game development but in development in general.

Well, I like what is known about UI 2.0 thus far, so I'm eagerly waiting for it to be tested in public and finally implemented.
But I prefere waiting a bit longer for getting a thought through and well implemented UI 2.0 in return.

(Otherwise I'd contribute to another problem basically every project has to deal with and it's evident, that MWO is no exception: Deadlines that are set faaar too short )

So PGI, take all the time you need to develop a good UI 2.0 and CW. Just inform us about the current status from time to time (like you did in the last two weeks)

[Evgeny Bear]

Dropship Icon.... I really hope they bring Drop Tonnage limitations....

[Chemie]

No7, on 08 October 2013 - 02:45 AM, said:

I actually wrote a 2 page post about UI2.0 and why it is _still_ not in the game and why everything is suffering from it.

Then I realized one link would say it all much better than I could:




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So, is the issue that PGI did not do any pre-production, or they have been perpetually stuck in pre-production?

Or they are just incompetent and or under-resourced on the programming side (my hypothesis). The reason is that they seemed to know what UI2 was supposed to be this time last year, and posted the mock ups back in 1Q13....but have more recently stated that programming is really hard and they never knew it would be so tough to code (which seems very lame to me). Basically, their programmers were great at C++ but had no idea how to do flash.

Edited by Chemie, 18 October 2013 - 03:40 AM.

[No7]

Chemie, on 18 October 2013 - 03:40 AM, said:

So, is the issue that PGI did not do any pre-production, or they have been perpetually stuck in pre-production?

Or they are just incompetent and or under-resourced on the programming side (my hypothesis). The reason is that they seemed to know what UI2 was supposed to be this time last year, and posted the mock ups back in 1Q13....but have more recently stated that programming is really hard and they never knew it would be so tough to code (which seems very lame to me). Basically, their programmers were great at C++ but had no idea how to do flash.

Extra Credit is a great resource and interesting to watch for many reasons. If PGI had watched it they could have learned a great deal and avoided about 98% of their problems since last year or so. One thing that PGI does extremely well so far, is to avoid the power creep problem found in many online games. But the main problem of power creep comes of course with the clan mechs. Although, you could argue that they have already failed the power creep problem with the dual hitsinks since you can't use single heat sinks in any mech that has more than 1 laser.

However, being in the software industry myself (not games though) and have been on projects spanning from 1 person to over 5000 and projects with a 'budget' of a few hundred manhours up to.. well millions. As well as being on countless of pre-production phases. I can say that I have no idea what PGI did in their pre-production phase. Checking google it seems that PGI was involved in MWO for quite a few years before they went closed beta. But what did they produce from it?

The only thing they did do was to decide on the engine to use. And then they probably used the rest of the time to simply produce a prototype that they could show investors/pubilshers in order to get some funding. But that prototype was then used as the foundation in production instead of being scrapped and designed properly which is a very common mistake. You think you save some time when instead you spend 10x the time in order to patch the patches on the prototype in order to get it to work and eventually you run into a wall and is forced to scrap all or parts of it. Which is why we now will soon have a UI2.0.

Looking at the launch event and the power point presentation it seems that now they are doing the pre-production for the upcoming CW. This powerpoint should have been the result of the first week of discussing and requirement analysis back in 2009 or something. This kind of high-level design is what you use to further break down the design into implementation packages which is done well before any coding is started.

Don't get me wrong, I don't complain about the game. It is a fun game that will hopefully turn out to be a great one when we hit september again.

But almost all of the delivery estimates have failed by a huge margin and things that they should have had when they went open beta they are still struggling to get control over. That is not good and is not a good sign of how things are done in PGI.

Can't help but compare with Star Citizen, now there you have a guy who knows how to run a game company and how to do pre-production. Granted, the end result might still be {Scrap}, but it will be from different reasons than the lack of a good foundation.

Also, one thing that usually goes hand in hand is the lack of a good pre-production and the negative force of a publisher. The publisher demands things and in a certain time and want things that the game company do not want to even spend any time on (3pv?). But are forced to do it and one way of 'saving' time is to skip on the pre-production.

Anyways, enough rambling from my side. Got some phoenix mechs to grind.

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[DirePhoenix]

Bryan Ekman posted a recording of UI 2.0 (and a little preview of the upcoming moon map) on twitch.tv

http://www.twitch.tv...man/b/472237522

(audio is a little weird... he's got a 5-second audio feedback loop. where his mic is picking up the computer's audio)

Edited by DirePhoenix, 21 October 2013 - 12:10 PM.

[Haakon Magnusson]

Mechlab looks somewhat clunky... hope that isn't anything close to what it's going to be

[CtrlAltWheee]

Haakon Magnusson, on 21 October 2013 - 03:04 PM, said:

Mechlab looks somewhat clunky... hope that isn't anything close to what it's going to be

Agree. Hopefully they change it.

I like the artistry that goes into how the mech model changes in real time as you change weapons. What Bryan was using didn't seem to show that.

PGI, if you're listening, there's a joy to tinkering with the mechs. Please you have such great assets and I want to see them.

Love the new drawings for the weapons. Reminds me of the MW2 manual. Read that manual over and over. It was my introduction to battletech and there's a lot of fond memories in art like this for me and I'm sure others.

[CrashieJ]

What the hell happened to Perks&Quirks

why the hell did they stop halfway?

[3Xtr3m3]

Loved the sneak peak of UI 2.0 and the mooon map.
Awesome stuff Bryan.

[Morang]

Just started to watch Bryan's twitch on UI2.0, already noticed an awkward flaw:



Do you see a diamond-like green diagram?

Guys, TONNAGE for a given chassis is not a variable influencing its combat abilities. It's a resourse we use one way or another to get Armor, Firepower, Heat Efficiency and... and... SPEED! Speed is a variable we can change by devoting certain part of tonnage to engine. Speed influences our combat abilities like Armor, Firepower and Heat Efficiency do. Tonnage by itself does not!

Compare with MW tactics. Here we have three inputs for firepower at different ranges, but idea is the same, and the last position in the diagram is occupied by speed.

[Heffay]

Morang, on 22 October 2013 - 11:03 AM, said:

Just started to watch Bryan's twitch on UI2.0, already noticed an awkward flaw:



Do you see a diamond-like green diagram?

Guys, TONNAGE for a given chassis is not a variable influencing its combat abilities. It's a resourse we use one way or another to get Armor, Firepower, Heat Efficiency and... and... SPEED! Speed is a variable we can change by devoting certain part of tonnage to engine. Speed influences our combat abilities like Armor, Firepower and Heat Efficiency do. Tonnage by itself does not!

Compare with MW tactics. Here we have three inputs for firepower at different ranges, but idea is the same, and the last position in the diagram is occupied by speed.

That is good feedback. You should post it in the Feedback thread. Probably in the test server thread too, once it comes online.

It might not make release, but maybe they can update it in the future.

[DoktorVivi]

Morang, on 22 October 2013 - 11:03 AM, said:

Compare with MW tactics. Here we have three inputs for firepower at different ranges, but idea is the same, and the last position in the diagram is occupied by speed.

Agreed, the second one is better. I might also like to see some sort of representation of DPS vs Alpha capabilities, but at that point it might be too cluttered.