It's time for the second ever weekly discussion topic, everyone! Before we continue, I'd like to thank everyone for all the interesting engagement we got on the last post. I was unsure if anyone would even comment at all, so seeing it be so active was really nice. Anyway, let's get to it; this week's discussion topic is Game UIs.
A UI (User Interface) is something that everyone should be familiar with nowadays; It is the visual and tangible way that we interact with computers, whether that be games or other programs. Specifically in relation to gaming, the UI represents the HUD (Heads-Up Display), the menus, and other things like status bars and dialogue boxes which all fall under the general term "UI". (This discussion was actually originally just going to be about HUDs, as it is the UI element you will be seeing the most in a lot of cases, but I thought to expand it to encompass all elements as they often go hand in hand.) UIs can range from minimalistic to works of art in their own right, depending on the type of game and the design philosophies of the UI developers. A good UI should be easily navigable for the player; ease of selecting different options, clear display of critical information, and minimal confusion as to what any given button or toggle will do. The amount of information that must be displayed by the UI can range from minimal in a puzzle or traditional FPS game to massive in a simulation or a strategy game. It is an aspect of games we play that many don't give a second thought to, but is very important for both accessibility and style.
Here are some questions and subtopics that I encourage people to discuss:
- What games have you favorite UIs? What about specifically favorite HUD, or favorite main menu?
- Do you prefer more stylish UIs or more utilitarian ones? What games have a good union of form and function when it comes to this?
- How much do you value the customization of the UI? Do you often find yourself fine-tuning the HUD and other elements in games that allow it?
- Do you prefer maximum information conveyed by the UI, even if it's at the cost of easy readability?
- When toggling subtitles, should the options for it be under Audio Settings or Video Settings, or its own category? (This single specific question has been a raging debate for many years in gaming circles.)
Also feel free to bring up anything you like related to the topic! If you have suggestions for future discussion topics, leave them in the suggestion thread.
Additional Resources
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Game UI Database, a resource for browsing different game's UIs
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Interface In Game, another resource for browsing different game's UIs (also contains additional information and articles)
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~~List of all Weekly Discussion Topics~~ (still being a bit lazy, I'll have this up later today or tomorrow (feel free to kick me awake if I haven't done it by then))
/rant incoming
I honestly believe a HUD minimap is one of the worst game UI elements a game can have. There is rarely a canonical explanation to begin with as to why your character magically knows the layout of rooms they haven’t entered and even worse that they know the position of enemies.
Even further, in the rare case that it does make canonical sense, you find yourself staring at this little 2D representation of the map that frankly looks terrible in comparison to the game world, yet you are forced to use it for navigation.
The most egregious example of this is GTA V and RDR2. In GTA, you could maybe explain that there is a GPS, but why isn’t this mended with the phone your character has? And in RDR2? No explanation at all. It’s near impossible to get from A to B in RDR without missing a turn because I’m usually trying to pay attention to the environment. This absolutely does not foster exploration. It becomes a checklist of locations to visit and naturally finding elements in the game world rarely happens.
An example of this being done well is something like Watch Dogs or Assassin’s Creed where you could argue in Watch Dogs that their augmented reality tech makes sense to be able to get the drop on enemies and building layout. AC has the whole simulation aspect.
Another example is something like The Crew where you can reliably disable the map entirely with the overhead GPS line that guides the player. More games would benefit from this by keeping your eyes on the world.
I’d love to see more games where disabling the map doesn’t ruin gameplay. In AC and Watch Dogs, they were mostly made for this and a large portion of the game can be played almost entirely HUD-less.
One last thought to leave on is that of you feel you absolutely must guide the player by map, why not make the map in-engine like many journals in games. Hell, RDR2 has an in-world journal that feels super life-like. Why not extend this to the map?
/end rant
I agree that it does take away from the immersion. But IMHO there are two different things here, at least in RDR2. The HUD is by far the biggest problem in the game. But it can be disabled (on PS4, hold DOWN arrow and then you get the option to switch it off). Doing this was the single best thing I ever did in RDR2 (well, apart from replacing the in-game music with Bob Dylan's soundtrack to Sam Peckinpah's Pat Garrett. Seriously, try it.. :-) ) . The downside is you often find yourself getting battered by surprise gangs of bounty hunters.
I feel the map is not so much of an issue, though as you suggest, a series of proper maps in your satchel, similar to the treasure maps, and obtainable in stores, etc. would have been amazing.
For anyone replaying single player, switching off the weapons reticle and the HUD makes the game unbelievably immense. That for me was worth the 5x increase in dying!
Oh, I absolutely did, and for exploring it adds a ton to the experience, but when trying to complete missions, there will be a dozen points marked on the minimap and no visual cues otherwise. Or if I need to travel to a mission, same thing. I disable it when I can, but I find myself having to re-enable every 10 minutes.
Yeah, that's sadly true—shame you can't do the missions without the map/hud, some sort of paper trail would have been much more atmospheric... In general, I'd have liked to have seen a bit more balance between the character-driven—but extremely controlled—missions and the free roaming. I replay a lot (still my overall fave game), but mostly just free roam. For me, switching off the HUD really opened things up, slowed me down, made me aware of sounds, etc.