357 replies to this topic

[FreelanceCommando]

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview?
- Displaying which mech you have selected is really handy.
- Seeing all available mechs as a icons rather than a bar at the bottom.
- That glass effect.

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?
- Not having a seperate screen for armor values. I understand it's handy to do it section by section, but when comparing these values for different parts is overly clumsy.
- There needs to be more information about mechs in the shop, at least to the standard we currently have.
- I don't believe the UI scales well in the Mechlab when editing the loadout of your mech, the tabs for each section overlapping with the Cbill/MC/selected mech tab at the bottom left. This also applies to the model of your mech on the right, which gets covered over with the details.
- Selecting colours for your mech would be easier if it was set up similar to the loadout/parts. ie Colours you own, basic colours, premium colours as seperate tabs/windows.

4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?
- Need to display more info about the mechs, atm it's worse off than the current system.
- It would be easier to find variants if they're all grouped together, maybe each mech given a row so you can easily pick them out.

5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?
- Text didn't seem to fit in the graphic boxes (ie The red box with INCOMING MISSLES)

6) Any other comments or concerns?
- Seriously, those glass effects are lovely.

[Vorgen]

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview? (Please enter as many items as you wish.)

I liked the additional detail that components get. They get stats and a big square and especially art! I liked the huge 3d spinnable mech prominently displayed at most times. I liked the full-screen option. I liked the non-exclusiveness of the full screen. More games should do this. I liked the sound effects of the menus and the sci-fi transparent blueness of the interface items. I liked that you can configure weapon groups outside of combat.

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?

Important interface items were too small: buttons, item/mech names, and the mechs themselves. Several times the small interface buttons slipped my eye and my scan of the interace left me lost. The buttons on the left-hand side should be bigger. Also, I had to squint to read the names of the mechs and components in the interface at 1920x1080 on my 17-inch monitor. I would advise bigger names for things in boxes in the interface. And speaking of those boxes - all components and mechs were displayed in a uniform box in the interface. I think this box was too small. I would be happier to see larger boxes in a 3-column layout so that i can even better enjoy the artwork and detail that goes into each box. That would also help with the difficulty in reading those boxes' titles.

Also having Champion mechs both have an icon denoting their Champion status and making them be listed out of order in every screen messed me up. I want to have all my Griffins under G for Griffin. Not one of them be "sticky" and the other 2 be lonely and incomplete without their heroic brother. Please, please don't incite my inner sperg by putting things out of order like that. It will give me a headache.

3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?

Eh. Serviceable. No substitute for Skype yet tho. Why not use Skype's API to create an in-game Skype interface. I've seen it in other games.

4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?

Boxes holding components or mechs too small. Titles for boxes also too small. Embiggen them a bit so they fit in a 3-column max layout and everybody will enjoy the artwork more.

5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?

I actually didn't drop. Are there changes?

6) Any other comments or concerns?

At this point I would be satisfied with switching over to the new UI, although I would be looking forward to tweaks to come in weekly patches. Go ahead and launch it and lets get this baby on the road!

Edited by Raiven, 16 January 2014 - 09:08 PM.

[Talys]

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview?

It looks clean and sharp. Visually nice for the most part though not really the direction I would have gone. I'm not a big fan of Hawken but honestly I prefer some aspects of that interface from what I've seen.

Love the mech views in general but it would be nice to rotate on the home screen.

Full screen is great.

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?

Overall I find this less intuitive than the current ui. I hope you are getting people who haven't
played MWO to test it. I have a feeling they might be lost.

The basics should be readily apparent; tutorials and training (need more), what mechs do I have and where can I buy new ones. What are my mechs equipped with and how do I change load-outs, upgrade etc. How do I select a game mode and launch. All the rest of the detailed info should be accessible as you explore and learn the interface not up front where it could overwhelm. Simple with expandable info is better for ease of use imho.

A sea of red 'Invalid' over identical engine icons doesn't sit well. Make it clear why they are invalid at least. I was looking for a way to change this to a list.

No load-outs or hard-points displayed for mechs I may purchase unless I'm blind. This is unacceptable.

I prefer the way we can select an area of a mech in ui 1.5 and see what's located there.

Default to C-bills when purchasing not MC.

In some cases things are located poorly. I don't want to have to mouse back and forth from one side of the screen to the other when doing related tasks.

Some of the pop-outs take up too much space.

I can't say I'm a fan of the camo system, I think a pallette would be better.

Edited by Talys, 16 January 2014 - 09:37 PM.

[MostlyHarmless]

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview? (Please enter as many items as you wish.)
Its a slow move in the right direction of interface.
The ability to view all the mechs that I own at once was really nice.
The ability to view inventory and sell equipment outside of the mechlab was great.
The frame rates on the one testing grounds map I was able to drop on were really good.

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?
After dropping in the testing grounds on crimson straights my cockpit loaded but then I had a yellow screen with text across it for a bit before the map textures would render.
The mechs in mechlab have messed up lighting, the light sources do not behave correctly with shadows appearing when there shouldn't be any and other times being brightly lit with no direct lighting source facing them.
Additionally rotating the mechs would cause each individual panel to have shadows rendered on them not in the same manner or type as the others directly around it.
The textures on the mechs appeared to be glitching as they rendered in the mech lab so that if you rotated the mech at a slow to moderate speed the mech's parts would flicker even with maintaining ~60fps.
The inability to organize your mechs outside of weight classes is annoying. Having your hunchbacks in three different places is not ideal, one as a hero, one as a champion, and the rest as normal mechs.
Having the trial mechs in your "owned" mech list is not something I enjoy, you should not see them unless you specifically select the trial mech tab.
Still way too many layers of tabs to have to deal with in customizing a mech.
The lack of any way to know the QUANTITY of heat sinks is problematic.
Without having played with some of these mechs since they were introduced during early closed beta I would have no idea how to know what hard points are available on the mech or where to look for them. The current learning curve here is way too high or new players coming into the game.

Smurfy is really about the ideal mechlab, its easy to use, very quick to learn and give more information while being more concise with how it relays it to you. To be honest the mech lab in early beta was much better than what I'm seeing for usability, intuition, and functionality as what is in UI 2.0 currently.


3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?
Still very limited in scope and ability, seems like there isn't much work that's been done here to make it any real sort of improvement past what we have had since closed beta.

4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?
A lot more work has been done here, not totally intuitive yet but much better than ui1.0

5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?
Well when the graphics stopped glitching it was fairly normal in the one drop in the testing grounds trying to replicate the really bad graphics problems that friends were seeing on crimson straight that prevented the game from being playable.

6) Any other comments or concerns?
If you value having a good reaction at launch please take a cue from EA's response to the BF4 issues and devote all the staff to fixing the issues in UI2.0 and not continuing development on anything else until you have a stable client to offer your customers.

[Void Angel]

1.I like the way things look in the new interface - just the general feel of the buttons and how the UI "feels."
I'm tempted to say "cockpit glass," but since I can only pick one, I'd have to go with the actual functionality of the MechLab and related interfaces.

2. I didn't use the Social system much - none of my friends were online at the right time.

3. I didn't get to the Store Menu - partly because I missed that there would be new items in there, and I wanted to test the MechLab

4. The interface looks nifty - and I love that you can now finally see the 'mech quirks in-game. However, the screens are far to "busy," and functionality is missing. Although I'm sure someone put thought and effort into laying it out logically, the UI feels extremely disorganized: more - a lot more - space has been given to overlarge, blocky icons, and certain functionality is missing compared to the live UI.

5. I am sorry to say it, but I hate the cockpit glass. It's like I'm looking through cheap plexiglass in a crop dusting helicopter or combine harvester instead of an armored glass transparency - I know it's going to be reduced in the live release, but I would be less than honest if I didn't tell you it adds nothing to the game for me. It's just one more thing to add to the distance haze and film grain to reduce my graphical quality and make 'mechs in plain sight sometimes hard to see.

6. Additionally:

• Unfortunately, the MechLab was particularly confusing. If there was a "save" button in the MechLab, it was well hidden - I had to go to Weapon Groups to get it to save, and lost a config by clicking on the wrong button at the top (no confirmation dialogue appeared.) Mouse-over tooltips would really have helped me make sense of what various icons meant, as well as clarifying button function. Some of the information in the MechLab was overlaid on the model of the Atlas I was working on, making it hard to distinguish. As well, the icons for the equpiment were HUGE, taking up a lot of space with relatively small letters. All the various drop boxes, check boxes, icons, and buttons felt packed into the screen like sardines in a can - with no frames or borders to separate and organize them. Some useful information isn't provided where it could be very useful: mech quirks while adjusting a loadout, for example, or the number of free space left on the chassis, nor any easy way to determine the number of heat sinks - other than inference from the Heat Management bar. At least the option to restrict ammo choices to weapons that are in your 'mech (and a notification, similar to heat sinks/engine issues,) would be amazing.
  
• The Mech Bay was another problem child. After I bought the Boar's Head to test, I had to try two filters before I could find the actual 'mech I'd just purchased instead of trying to buy another one. By the time I was ready to prep for drops, I was so tired from fighting with the MechLab that I didn't even try to re-organize my 'mech stable - but I'm not sure it can even be done. On the whole, the UI layout is just too... non-specific. It needs frames and borders so that there is a pattern to all the icons that your brain can make sense of. As-is, it just feels disconnected.

I really dislike giving all this negative feedback- there was stuff that I liked, but the negatives overshadowed those things for me. Seeing the 'mech quirks has been something I've been wanting to see forever; the way you've got the buttons that change based on what can and cannot go into a given component is slick. Though I found them poorly organized, the check boxes for AMS and the like were a nifty touch. Overall, I think I'm going to like the new interface once it is finished. However, the existing UI is much easier to use - the new interface had me a bit bewildered - and that's not easy to do. Putting in frames and borders to organize the new interface in a manner similar to the current UI will be extremely helpful - I'd even recommend putting corresponding information into the same places for ease of transition to the new UI.

Thanks for the chance to help test this UI - I really think it'll be excellent when it's done, and I appreciate the work that's already gone into it.

Edited by Void Angel, 16 January 2014 - 11:29 PM.

[Biruke]

Marvin Martian, on 16 January 2014 - 07:58 PM, said:

2) Can't see hardpoints or loadouts of mechs without purchasing them and then customizing them

this seems to be that main problem discussed in the international forums. I hope it gets noticed.

[roger5]

1) Like everyone else i like the new large 3D mech models on the main page and everywhere else.

2) Too much clicking and mouse travel between the different menus/submenus especially in the mechlab.
Also I feel like i'm only configuring the right arm on my mech when i'm adding or removing components in the lab.
Sometihing must be done the fix that, some sugestions and illustartions here were very good (make it like Smurfy, everything on one screen, including ARMOR).

Please add a double click to remove function to the mechlab, its needed.

It would be nice to somehow know what the new top speed will be when selecting engines of different sizes (like Smurfy )

I dont think anyone mentioned this so please add an ammo counter to the mechlab and mech info. I want to know how much and what type of ammo i have in my mech ! It should be included in the bottom information panel. (again like Smurfy hint hint)

Inventory should be somehow integrated into the mechlab.

3) Did not use, did not even notice it!

4) Did not use.

5) Mixed feelings on the cockpit glass, adds to immersion but obstructs the view too much sometimes.
I dont like driving my car or my mech with a dirty windshield lol, i hope your not planning to add a windshield wiper module
Otherwise no different than the current client, except maybie the in game lobby fonts were more pixelated and uglier in the preview.

6) The preview client was stable for me and i did not experience any crashes, i5 2500k,Nvidia 660, 8gb RAM.

[Jake Peril]

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview?

• Fast and responsive interface, overall game performance seems to be better (this could of course also be caused by the test server having less load to cope with).
  
• The inventory screen is a nice addition, more sorting functionality would be welcome (e.g. being able to sort for modules or components currently equipped on a 'Mech).
  
• The new cockpit glass is a nice detail, but the 'Mech bay cleaning crew could be doing a better job...

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?

• All of my feedback from the last test still applies:
  http://mwomercs.com/...67#entry2951167
  
• This version does not seem to be much of a step forwards from the previous one.
  Many, if not all, of the already mentioned design flaws are still present.
  
• New functions have been added, but the design decisions behind them are highly questionable.
  
• The 'Mech lab has not been improved at all, it is still a convoluted mess of hundreds of mouse clicks and missing information.
  I made a test of stopping time for modifying a configuration of a VTR-9S in both Smurfy's 'Mech lab and the in-game one:
  Smurfy: 02:12 minutes.
  UI 2.0: 03:52 minutes (and I already knew exactly what I wanted to achieve!).
  
• I experienced 3 crashes during the two hour test period, all of which locked up my computer, forcing me to do a hard reset.

3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?

• The icon to open the social interface is very small and hidden away at the bottom of the screen.
  
• It opens as an exclusive overlay instead of an additional panel on the side, making it impossible to use any other part of the UI until you close it.
  
• The friends list appears as a window (so does the chat window), but it can neither be moved nor resized.
  
• The chat window is on the far left side of the screen, instead of being attached to or in reach of the friends list, causing unnecessary mouse and eye movement.
  
• Multiple chat windows can not be opened, they overlap each other (or close the previous one), conversations with more than one person is thus restricted to the group chat.
  
• Messages to people currently in a game can not be sent until that person is back in the main menu, offline messages are impossible.
  
• So far I am not impressed, but at the most basic functionality is there.
  At the very least it is not worse than what we currently have, which would be an accomplishment in itself.

4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?

• I was unable to purchase a new 'Mech including the 'Mech bay it required, and instead of using the option in the lower left corner (which was present in all other parts of the interface) I had to open a seperate menu panel to do so.
  
• No important info on the 'Mech hardpoints or weapons loadout was available, how am I supposed to make an informed decision about my purchase?
  
• The default checkout currency is MC, which can lead to accidental purchases with real money instead of cbills.
  
• The color and camo scheme selection menu breaks the established user interface paradigm of sortable lists and mouse selection for a console-type selection wheel.
  Highly unintuitive and annoying.
  
• What is the purpose of having a "cart" and "checkout" button when you have to confirm your purchases seperately for each different subsection (i.e. purchasing 'Mechs, paints, components, consumables etc.), also there is no option to use mixed purchase currencies (e.g. MC for paint and cbills for components) on the same checkout.
  
• Overall I am unimpressed with the current barebone version of such an important feature.

5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?

• The new font used seems to be more readable on the static HUD elements (like the starting and end screen or fixed-distance HUD info), but does not scale well on variable distances (such as the floating targeting info boxes).
  
• The pre-game lobby chat was randomly broken (known issue).

6) Any other comments or concerns?

As I stated in the last feedback thread I am not a very vocal member of the community, and even when issuing criticism (mostly on TeamSpeak) I try to first understand the reasons behind certain developments and stay positive when offering my ideas of possible improvements (commonly called "constructive criticism").

I am not an interface designer, nor a programmer, but even for me this piece of software displays an enormous lack of experience, expertise and/or skill in most aspects.

Considering that this is the third test of a feature of such paramount importance to the further progression of the game (according to the developers) and there are only about two weeks remaining until the supposed release, it leaves me highly disappointed and skeptical of the future of MWO.

Edited by Jake Peril, 17 January 2014 - 06:40 PM.

[Deathlike]

Niko Snow, on 15 January 2014 - 10:29 AM, said:

3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?

I need to reanswer this since I got around to using it in the 2nd test.

It resembles UI 1.0 in terms of functionality than an improvement.

For instance, its visibility on your screen is poor.

Finding out you were being messaged was impossible to find out. This feels a lot like the times where the older versions of the UI that gave you ZERO notification. Even a simple popup somewhere on the lower part of the screen would suffice telling me "X said, Y message" or "A sent you an invite to Z-sized group" or "B sent you an friend invite."

While testing this component, the people that were on my friends list on TS could see me, but not each other. This continued on while the creation of the group, where they could still not see each other, while I could see them. This is not good.

Sending an invite works exactly as poorly as we have now... where sometimes it takes multiple invites before the button prompt comes up. That's not progress.

Finding out that the messaging screen holds me hostage is really not productive. Same goes for trying to choose mechs in a group/premade drop. At least I can "close" the chat window and make the selection, but that's not exactly the most intuitive or friendly system.

This seriously needs work just as much as the mechlab before I consider it functional.

Edited by Deathlike, 16 January 2014 - 10:57 PM.

[Hoaggie]

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview? (Please enter as many items as you wish.)

• I like the colors, overall blue if my favorite color.
  
• The game no longer crashes if you run the mechlab in full screen, so that’s nice (I would use alt+enter before)

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?

• The sound on every button, but lots of people are saying that.
  
• The massive screed spam of menus and sub menus.
  
• The unorganized pages of mech when you purchase a mech

3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?

• In one word, “wonky”
  
• Only 32 of my friends showed up, and friend requests that I did send took hours to show up, I didn’t get a chance to test the chat because none of my friends that are still playing were still on my list.

4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?

• Massive confusion, I just wanted to buy a mech, and I had to scroll through pages of screen spam

5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?

• Had no one said something about the font, I would not have noticed. It is really discouraging that features working from early closed beta are now non-functional.

6) Any other comments or concerns?

• You need to start a quality control department.
  
• It really seems like you went a totally different direction, and that’s not bad, but you also forgot the lessons learned from feedback over the last couple years. The mech configuration screen is now counter-intuitive, the pertinent information about a mech’s load out and hard point locations are difficult to find. I really can’t believe this has taken so long to develop this. It is functionally worse that what was there before.

[Javenri]

Sadly, I had not much time testing so, my feedback is rather incomplete. Maybe for a future test you can provide more time windows for testing?


1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview? (Please enter as many items as you wish.)

Selecting a mech is really easy now. Grouping is great.

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?

Complex mech bay; simpler is better. Not being able to evaluate my mech in a glance. Almost all players repeat the "provide a smurfy-type overview" comment for a good reason. It is fast, simple, and comprehensive. The reason why you have not implemented such a thing so far is beyond me.

3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?

N/A
4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?

N/A
5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?

N/A
6) Any other comments or concerns?

I would love to see the option to create saveble mech loadouts and a "strip mech" button. That would allow us for fast equipping/unequipping a mech from inventory.


As a general note: I have been hearing about UI 2.0 eversince I started playing on July 2013. UI this, UI that. Looking at the current result (although not knowing what other advantages it adds for designers), I believe it is only a small improvement (if any) from the UI 1.5. To my eyes, UI 2.0 right now looks like a huge misplacement of resources.

[Icould]

On question # 6: Why isn't this done already. Wasn't it supposed to be done a year ago? I don't think we ever got a satisfactory response to this question.

[Ravic]

Horus Heresy, on 16 January 2014 - 12:34 PM, said:

I've played for over a year and never posted on the forums, but after looking at the UI2.0 preview I feel the need to, because it is just so AWFUL when compared to the current UI, and it is certainly not what I would expect after months of dedicated work from PGI. The current UI is just fine and LOOKS so much better than the new UI. All the old one needs are a few tweaks, like you could put a drop down box under "owned mechs" that has them grouped by weight class, bam, there you go, you've got everything the new UI has to offer with none of the bugs.

My feelings exactly.

[Deathshade]

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview? (Please enter as many items as you wish.)
It seems you dumb down the interface. It is more drag a drop looking. Not sure if that is good though

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?
Not being able to see weapons on mechs. Nice fancy stats on viewing arcs and such but why

3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?
It needs to be easier to find. Didn't use it too much but played 4 mans. Why is everything else disabled while using it?
4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?
It works but the old was better. Ever heard of development loops? Never ending based on what people want. Now we want the old back.
5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?
Why did we do a re-design? I think that the old was fine and we seemed to have wasted loads of dev time just to redevelop something that was already done. Now you know why people get mad because you haven't worked on what was promised. We see you working on things that just aren't needed.
6) Any other comments or concerns?
5 has said enough. The game is getting less and less like a copy of MWLL which is good. Make your own game folks. :dead:

[Ubermunkey]

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview?
Ease of shifting weapon groupings outside of a round.
Sorted mechs make it slightly easier to find common designs, but 'specials' should be grouped with their standard bretheren.
2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview
UI loses some of the intuitive features in determining how many weapon hardpoints are available outside of the 'lab.'
Needs some form of 'strip gear/armor' functionality as removing weapons/gear is not as smooth without a double click remove feature.
Camo spec dial not as easy to use compared to existing camo editor.
Drop down menu format of mech lab not as intuitive as 'clicking' on hardpoints on your mech's paper doll. Also 3D representation of mech in lab helps show differences between side and center torsos.
Weapon/Engine/Equipment tabs in store need to have basic information (crits/tonnage) displayed to help beginners learn the weight and space requirements of weapons they would like to add without relying on a pop out menu that may not always be obvious to first time users.
3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?
Lack of communication during loading of matches between various sides.
4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?
Clunky, counter intuitive.
5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?
'Dirty glass' effect is good.
6) Any other comments or concerns?
Mech lab feature needs to be streamlined and less counter intuitive. Hero, Champion, and other special mechs need to be grouped with their respective designs, not set apart from the rest. This makes shifting between designs while leveling them easier. 3D paper doll of mech needs to be selectable to choose hardpoints for changes vs current pull down menu as the pull down menu is a slower means of making changes. Return of the 2D paper doll to select the various areas will also work well in this regard.

[Xagul]

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview? (Please enter as many items as you wish.)
The layout looks great, I like the colors of the UI and all the Dropdown menu´s.
I find everything on the first try; Mechlab, Mech Loadout, Skills etc. I didnt got any problems here.
Weapon config is a good idea BUT read "6)"


2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?
Weapon Config colors and the new Hardpoint Icons in the Mech Loadout.
The Play Now Buttom dont save my Game mode settings, everytime to click the game mode is annoying.


3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?
Looks good but why must it be allways in the front? I cant click anything when the group chat is up.
So someone in the group tells me that my Loadout sucks and explains why and give me atwise to setup a better Loadout, now i must click all the time the social window to get back to the chat and then close it because i want to change something...

THATS a no go! Put the chat frame on the right side so i can still interact with the UI or just spin my Mech 1000! times if I have to wait for group members! Sorry i like to spin my Ship in EVE


4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?
I didnt test the Store! No EU server´s no more money form me!


5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?
Looks like the same to me...


6) Any other comments or concerns?
Weapon Layout:
1. 99% off the players, like me, are a bit colorblind! That is a fact! Insteat of change the color of the number change the background of the number.
Much better to see.

2. I like to put weapons form the left side into 1 group but i dont know which weapon is on the left side. Mounted weapons should show where they are mounted, like in the right torsor, left arm etc.

Mech Overview:
(With this i mean the small Overview if I hover over 1 Mech and that Window that shows after 1 sec.)
This Overview need to show the Free Slot´s and the Heatsinks!

All the Mechs in the front-end are too shiny! Correct the lights.

Edited by Xagul, 17 January 2014 - 01:07 AM.

[Dorado]

This post is going to come across harsh and blunt, and I apologize in advance to the dev team for that, but somebody needs to snap your collective heads around and make you pay attention to the continuing issues that this game has if your bosses will not. I have been with MWO since the beginning and although I love all things Battletech and have since it was created, I am very concerned with what I've seen from Piranha since closed beta.

I am being so blunt and critical because I do not want to see what is most likely the last Mechwarrior game ruined and still have some slim hope for the longterm. It has gotten so bad that I have walked away from MWO for the last several months. I was hoping that UI 2.0, CW, and Clan Invasion would be worth my return. I have spent ridiculous amounts of money on this game so far, and you will get no more until revolutionary changes happen.

Niko Snow, on 15 January 2014 - 10:29 AM, said:

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview? (Please enter as many items as you wish.)

From a general looks standpoint, the graphical eye candy and general style has improved greatly compared to the current UI. That being said, I have several other issues with "UI 2.0".

Niko Snow, on 15 January 2014 - 10:29 AM, said:

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?

I didn't think it would be possible to make it more difficult to find and configure my mechs and equipment, but mission accomplished. Overall the mech configuration experience is -much- worse than it was before. It takes longer, is more confusing, and the UI does not lend itself to the process. You guys need to go back to the drawing board on this part of the UI. There is no place in the UI that I could find which will let me even see an overview of the current fit on my mech like in the current UI. If you need inspiration for a redesign, mwo.smurfy-net.de.

If what I saw today is the best you can do for a mech building interface, you should simply remove the feature from the in-game client, buy out smurfy, and implement a web-based configuration and hangar management feature instead. I'm totally serious. What I saw today is genuinely That Bad ™. Pretty much any of the fan-created web-based mech builders run circles around mech building in the client, current version or UI 2.0. You guys should look at these for ideas on how to do it properly.

Feature Addition: The ability to save a loadout so that a mech chassis can be quickly reconfigured would be ideal.

Niko Snow, on 15 January 2014 - 10:29 AM, said:

3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?

Unfinished? Completely useless? Not only does it go full screen and prevent me from doing anything else in the game while simply having a chat convo with one person, it is just a reskinned version of the failed social interface that the current UI has. Again yet another redesign that has actually made things worse and not better. I'm hoping that what I saw today was simply a placeholder/reskin of the social interface in the current UI and you guys know this is not acceptable for a finished product. If that is not the case, then back to the drawing board for this as well.

Feature Addition: In-Game VoiP.

Niko Snow, on 15 January 2014 - 10:29 AM, said:

4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?

The entire theme of tiles and rows of icons plastered all over the screen leaves much to be desired and doesn't lend to the "shopping" experience. If I am going shopping for something, the presentation should be much better and the ability to inspect the mech and what it comes with should provide much detail. Not just a little icon tile. No way I'm dropping big $$$ on a single chassis based on the limited information given on clicking a tile.

Niko Snow, on 15 January 2014 - 10:29 AM, said:

5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?

More crisp, easier on the eyes. Overall I like it. It is just evolutionary though, not revolutionary.

Niko Snow, on 15 January 2014 - 10:29 AM, said:

6) Any other comments or concerns?

It saddens me that all this UI 2.0 work is required for eagerly awaited features like CW, Lobby, and Clans, but in my humble opinion, the UI has actually taken steps back, not advanced. I was also surprised that after all the time that has been spent on this by the dev team that it is still in this state.

After seeing the front-end interface today, it made me seriously question the expertise of your UX team. Not necessarily their expertise with their UI design software, but their fundamental understanding of what good UI design methodology is and how it should benefit the end-user. Bring in a consultant or whatever you need to do to fix the mess before your customers are stuck with this train wreck.

For example, it is a ridiculous waste of space when I go to select an engine to install, to have 47 bazillion tiles of the EXACT SAME GRAPHIC for the engine repeated in rows and columns that take up most of the now full screen mech builder. ONE icon for the category is all that is needed. You would be much better off listing the variants of that category with a larger/crisper font than what I saw today.

Another thing that surprised me is the extra amount of load this UI put on my GPU compared to the current UI. There is absolutely no good reason at all that the front-end of a game should peg my GPU's at max utilization and ramp my heat up to 90c. I am going to chalk this up to "this is a beta" and is not yet optimized. I experienced the same thing in-game, and that is more understandable since the quality of the eye candy overall has improved.

It is high time that you expose all graphical tweaks the render engine allows us to do instead of users having to continue to hack config files. Also, DX11. Get it done. I expected both in UI 2.0, yet all I saw was a reskin of the current settings UI.

I could go on, but I think my point is clear. Needs work, needs miles and miles of work. I hope it won't take as long as I suspect it will to fix all these issues since all the other long-promised features hinge on UI 2.0.

[THE ERASER]

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview? (Please enter as many items as you wish.)
- To have a Full screen is awesome.

- The Mech to be displayed in a bigger size and well illuminated

- The Selection area of the Mech list that you own is great.

- The "new" (Well it's seems new to me) polished font type In-game and in the front end is great! It's much clearer and readable. Even the Warnings like "UAC/5 Jamming" is way better to read.

- Weapon group selection in the Mechlab is Awesome.

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?
- The progresion from the "intro Screen" (Cryengine 3/Nvidia promo) to the Login and then to the "home" screen after I launch the game from the Patcher, shouldn't get first the window mode to log in to the game and after that the full screen mode comes up. It should be full screen or window mode all the way after the launch of the game if it's configured the way to be window mode or to be full screen in the settings.

- A separate setting for both the "In Game" screen mode and a setting for "Home/Mechlab/Store" Screen mode would be awesome.

- Double Click for equipping or unequipped items, to Configure Mechs. The button is simply too small sometimes to be used and sometimes I miss the buttons even at Standard Full HD Resolution. This comes in Handy in the Cockpit section where you can equip your cockpit items.

- Cockpit section to equip your cockpit items, you should be able double click on the pre equipped/installed cockpit items list right below to clear them. Faster and easier for everyone, specialy if you got special items like the X-Mas lights from 2012 – 2013. You can't unequip it because if its "mounted" it's not in the collection any more of the buyable or equip able items.

- Please change the color palette selection. It's really worse to search for your color. Too many clicks are required to find your color in the categories if you want to paint or apply Colors that you don't own and are sometimes premium if you got some 3 color paint pattern selected. If you choose a paint pattern it would be better to have, a list format with filter with common, special and unique paint pattern to search and select from. For the Color them self would be better to have a similar color selection like when you use MS Paint or other Paint program. You get a window with a predefined color selection listed if you click on the Color. It's much easier.

- If you purchase/buy a Mech the pre selected selection for your currencies should be C-Bills and not MC's. Or you get customer support tickets increase because they didn't want to buy a non Hero/Champion Mech with MC's. Too much trouble in the end for you and your support team and too much negative experience for the player in my opinion. If you buy or Purchase a Hero, Champion Mech it's clear you should get only the MC option.

- More prominent List filter options. It's gray on black/grey. You can't see the options.

- Is there a quit game Button in the Home Screen? I don't want to log out of the game to quit it and Alt + F4 is really not the first choice to close a game in this IT decade.

- The Mech stats like tonnage/the available tonnage indication and Speed in the Mechlab is too low, below of the screen and to tiny to read. It should be in the upper part of the screen to reduce eye travel/scan time if you equip weapons/Equipments.

- I miss the Save button or the checkout button on the right side of the screen. Its counter intuitive if you drag & drop or double click weapons/Equipments to the Mech to equip them and save the current change. It's counterintuitive to go back the mechlab menus to prompt the, "would you like to save" dialogue. And also because of the fullscreen the focus is in the upper part of the menu screens.

3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?
- It feels strange to block out all the information and screen elements with a fulls screen window with semi transparent black background if you go to the social tab.

- Its sometimes unresponsive if you call it up. I had to click it 2- 4 times before it came up.

- It would be better if you got something like a Right or Left sidebar window that you can pop up like the old interface.

4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?
- I Like assortment but I miss the old filter, Categories for the Mech classes (Hero, Champion, Assault, Heavy, Medium, Light.

5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?
- The Fonts are way better to read now and also the warnings like "new & fresh"

- The weapon group switch to single fire in one group is strange, you don't see which weapon would be firing in the sequence. It was way better before.

6) Any other comments or concerns?
Keep it up boy's! I see it will be an intensive effort to migrate to the new UI for me because of the "problem" point that I listed.

Edited by THE ERASER, 17 January 2014 - 01:32 AM.

[ReguIus]

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview? (Please enter as many items as you wish.)

The styling looks great, much more like a real game interface now. The amount of featurers included seems satisfying and the overall outlook is a success.

Inventory screen is nice.

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?

The mechlab. It's a shame because it *is* the most important part of it for me. I will tell you some key concerns. First of all, there was no proper overview screen of your mech. This is particularly annoying due to the fact that even the current mechlab has this kind of function and it takes unnecessary time to look into each section of the mech just to see what's in there. I aknowledge the fact that I might have simply missed this feature. In that case, consider better positioning because this really *is* something you want to see first when you enter the lab.

Secondly the allocation of screen space didn't make sense to me. The inventory window on the left takes up way too much space. On the other hand, the space on the right side of the screen (where your 'Mech is shown) doesn't utilize almost any of the screen space there.

Also the fact that there is so much unnecessary information displayed makes finding the important parts that much harder. The "shopping cart" window is ok - that feature is actually nice to have. On the other hand the premium time window has no place there. This information would be better off in a bar on some edge of the screen, making room for the lab itself which should be the priority there.

To sum up the things that bug me:

-Useless information taking up screen space
-Not all available screen space is utilized
-No Mech overview screen

3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?

They seem to work ok. Truth be told, I was more interested in the lab functions so this section went largely over my head...

4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?

Good work on the UI, like I said. All these things look good and work reasonably well for me.

5) What are your impressions of the in-game interface?

Apparently not much has changed from the current build. Unfortunately I didn't get to play around with things that long until the test ended.

6) Any other comments or concerns?

I see you've added an inventory screen which shows items you own and their quantity. One of the most annoying things about the current mech lab is the fact that I *know* I own an XL 275 engine yet I can't remember what mech has it and I own over 60 mechs. So I would suggest that you expand the inventory so that for example when you hover your mouse over "XL 275" it will open a list (like a tooltip) that shows you exactly what mechs currently use this engine. That would save a bucketload of time you'd otherwise have to spend prancing around the lab.

If you really want to please a lot of people then do this:

The engine list in the lab *always* shows you what engines you own, regardless if they're being in use or not (yellow color that says "in use" for example to indicate this)

Now when you go on about making your mechs you can still use this engine in the new build - it simply removes the engine from whatever mech it was equipped on first. Again, this saves time. It's not reasonable to assume that people are willing to buy new XL engines every time they can't be arsed to look for them.

That would be all... have at it...

Edited by Kurbutti, 17 January 2014 - 01:50 AM.

[SuperBroHeroFella]

I am not impressed, but i hope you find my comments useful.

Quote

1) What is it that you like about the UI 2.0 Preview? (Please enter as many items as you wish.)

• Needless to say, the eyecandy.
  
• 360° mech view at all times
  
• Fullscreen, though i liked to multitask on my desktop. When joining a game make it blink in the taskbar please dont drag me back into the game.
  
• More color
  
• More open, though places are not used as well.

Quote

2) What do you like least about the UI 2.0 Preview?

• It is certainly not intuitive
  
• The "mech doll" is gone, which feels strange and disconnected from my mech
  
• Too many spreadsheets with too many similiar elements,not distinctive
  
• Please let us resize the main content window!! I dont want 7 columns of the same images on my screen
  
• Too many clicks. I have to remember information while searching for other information, hows that good?
  
• Make the click sound optional please
  
• Important information is hard to find; there's almost no visible effects on the mech itself, showing hardpoints etc.
  
• No efficient summaries; No effecient display of optimizing one's configuration
  
• Filters are ok, but still need work
  
• Background got stale already, bring in some little details like technicians and ammo buggies; different lightning
  
• STILL NO LORE INFORMATION
  
• The Social part is a joke, i cant multitask, no VoIP
  
• Please add a cockpit view mode to the settings and let us change the POV, the cockpit glass transparency and the cockpit light with a slider!
  
• The text is difficult to read at times

Quote

3) What are your impressions of the Social system in the Front-End?

• You really have to work on this one. Multitasking, VoIP, etc.

Quote

4) What are your impressions of the Store menus in the Front-End?

• Needs more information from the devs, like twitter and so on, also isnt using all space.

Quote

6) Any other comments or concerns?[color=#959595] [/color]

It is not the UI of a "thinking persons shooter" yet. Theres still much to do. Also please copy Smurfys Mechlab for the Mechlab..... Its too hard to do stuff...
Thanks for your hard work though.

Edited by Pilot of the Cock Pit, 17 January 2014 - 03:31 AM.