The new GUI

by Aardappel_ on 09/20/2006 21:51, 134 messages, last message: 11/20/2006 16:00, 92616 views, last view: 05/19/2024 18:14

I just mentioned it in another post, and also on IRC, and it dawned on me it could be beneficial to tell people about it before I implement it.

So in the beginning, there was the current menu system. Super simple and effective, but not very pretty and flexible. Its been on the list for getting a more serious replacement for a LONG time.

The #1 thing that has always bugged me for in-game GUIs is that its "modal". You are either in the game, or you are in the menus, and you are blocked from the game until you explicitly cancel the menu. I prefer UIs where I can do everything all the time, less mental and physical switching all the time, less clumsy.

But how should that work? my initial idea for that you can see at work if you fire up the rpg prototype work (commandline -grpg). Here, the menu is always visible on the side of the screen, and you can scroll through options while you are running through the gameworld. leftmouse always activates, wether its attack (the default) or an actualy menu. Conceptually beautiful and simple.

However, in using it I noticed that it was clumsier than expected. It being on the sides meant dealing with say an NPC means you have to see whats active on the left while pointing at the NPC in the middle, which was uncomfortable. I don't know if anyone else tried using it, I'd love to hear feadback.

So the new plan is actually an older idea I had, but which I thought was unpractical: Do menus fully inside the 3d world. Go close to an NPC, and a bunch of options/icons pop up over his head in 3d. Press ESC, and the main menu launches in front of you, in the 3d world. You can now select menu items simply... with your crosshair! Can't read it? move closer. Large menu that doesn't fit on screen? walk further away! Close the menu? you don't have to, it will automatically dissapear if you are a certain distance from it (though ESC will still work too).

You can have multiple menus open (main menu, NPCs, your inventory, etc etc), and they will overlap depending on which one you are closest to (so switching between menus, should they overlap, is again a question of moving around). ESC goes back or closes the closest one, keep pressing to close all menus manually.

My big initial problem was what happens if an NPC stands in a small indoor environment, and the menu doesn't fit in the 3d space above his head. My solution now is simple: I draw menus on top of the world no matter what, or maybe just for the frontmost menu.

There have been games that have used the crosshair for in-game screens you can click on (Doom 3 is an excellent example), but never before has it been used consistently for everything. I think the modelessness (no switching between crosshair and mousecursor) and the fact that you can control everything with existing controls (movement + shoot) will make it one of the best game UIs ever. But feel free to give your critical comments.

btw this menu overhaul will also mean more different UI elements, i.e. icons in the UI, maybe sliders for numerical values and all that jazz.

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#75: Re: ..

by Passa on 09/30/2006 23:58, refers to #74

because im REALLY an idiot i forgot to put a link

http://members.iinet.net.au/~passarello/sauerbraten.exe

hit me plz kthnxbai

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#76: ..

by Drakas on 10/01/2006 00:01

http://sourceforge.net/cvs/?group_id=102911

cvs -d:pserver:anonymous@sauerbraten.cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/sauerbraten login
<press enter>

cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@sauerbraten.cvs.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/sauerbraten co -P src

This will download all the files and then you will be able to compile all yourself.
If you need help on how to compile on Windows, Google for mingw, gcc.exe and "compiling linux software on windows".
On Linux it's easy - do the commands above, `cd src/`, `make` :) and then run :)

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#77: ..

by CrazyTB on 10/01/2006 01:30

As I said before, a 3D menu would be nice for RPG menus, but not for FPS.

In fact, (I'm repeating myself here) I think menus related to current gameworld (in other words, the rpg menus) could be 3D. But map menus, config menus, server menus and all interface that is not related to current gameworld/map should not be displayed inside it.

Thinking about 3D menus in edit mode, I wouldn't like to keep moving and moving and flying just to find the menu item I need. Sometimes I won't even want to rotate myself, because current camera angle is used for some entities.

There are three things in current "conventional" interfaces that are not present in current 3D menu idea:
1. current interfaces have keyboard support (which is a lot faster than mouse)
2. current interfaces have a mouse that can move around (instead of a fixed crosshair at middle of screen).
3. current interfaces work even if you are dead, lagged, or even stuck in scenario (and yes, this sometimes happen).
4. current interfaces work even if your mouse sensibility is too high/too low. I wonder how would be adjust it using 3D menus.

Maybe another idea is: instead of YOU moving around to see and select the menu, the menu itself moves in 3D in front of you.


You people talk about "typing" icon above people head, and also interface widgets. I've just found EDM and it already have these two features. No, I don't want to start any flame war.

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#78: ..

by CrazyTB on 10/01/2006 01:31

huh, not three things anymore, they are four now. :)

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#79: ..

by vcatkiller on 10/01/2006 10:34

Just buzzing around with this and tried something I usually like doing, ie hold tab to check score while still running down a passage. All well and good but you leave the scores halfway down the passage. Will you be making the score screen stay a fixed distance from the player? Or do you actually have to stop still and become a target just to check the scores?

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#80: ..

by chead on 10/01/2006 14:27

Yeah, I know the new menu is really beta and stuff, but sometimes those radical (as in very different) ideas aren't very radical (as in cool) at all... Maybe there's still something that we don't know about that's going to make it all better, but I don't see what it could be. It just doesn't work imo.

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#81: the height of the menu

by Der/Nalia on 10/02/2006 05:34

in the mod i'm making, we had to increase the eyeheight to 45, and we then moved teh menu up 25 ... units...

but the cursor still sees the menu where it was originally, so that the cursor is way below the menu and it is often hard to see what the cursor is over

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#82: ..

by jake2.0 on 10/02/2006 20:51

Is there a way to compile the current CVS
using the old menus? Maybe there's a
secret switch for it already?

I'm asking because I'd like to work with
the new sauer bots, without 3D GUI.

Sauerbraten's awesome, Aard!
Bots are kewl too, Quinn!

3D GUI will be cool too... I imagine these
things can take a long time to get right.

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#83: checked out at last

by MeatROme on 10/26/2006 18:24

finally came around to checking out what promises the current CVS holds ...

I really like the look-n-feel of the new menu!

Nice "death view" effect too - is it planned to further adapt it ... into a swooping "death cam" maybe?
Chase-CAMs for spectators would be awesome too, BTW ;-)

Anyway - if I die in a bottomless pit I can't really see my score ... but that's really no big deal ... what /is/, is that the scores menu should really have a "always in front of user"-flag, don't you think? To allow for easy "running while checking the scoretab".
It has no clickable entries, so it kinda drops outa the usual menu concept anyway.

JM2CW

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#84: ..

by makkE on 10/26/2006 22:37

I like the new menus too. (cvs) the only thing I don´t like is how they get squished and streched looking up/down.

It´s a bit weird at first, but after a few minutes it becomes comfortable.

And I agree that the scores should maybe not be in 3d space. I myself, and many people have said they like to take a quick look at the scores while running around..

I like the sliders and info stuff. The tabs are cool too.

I can give them a graphical overhaul if you want, but atm I am concentrating on new hudguns first. The current version is fine for a start imho.

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#85: CVS menus...

by metlslime on 10/27/2006 00:21

they look good, but the usability hasn't really improved.

One suggestion is the use more of the space around the player for menus -- the game UI lets players look in all directions on the inside of a sphere -- why is only a tiny portion of that sphere occupied by menu? By expanding the amount of sphere-surface that is used for menu, you solve two problems at once:

1. the readability of menu items, becuase more screen pixels can be devoted to the same amount of text. If the menu is big enough, we might even be able to fix it to be centered around the player, to eliminate the need/desire to continually move towards the menu just to read it clearly, which is often foiled by obstacles in the world.

2. the problem of selecting small menu items with a high mouse sensitivity. Having one sensitivity that is used both for looking around a 360-degree environment and a <5 degree UI makes it impossible for both activities to be comfortable.

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#86: Re: CVS menus...

by Aardappel_ on 10/27/2006 01:39, refers to #85

people asking for the scores menu to be fixed in front of the player, and the idea that we should use all space around the player both don't get the fundamental concept of the menus: the menus exist in WORLDSPACE, not EYESPACE.

So you move around the menu, not the menu around you. Want to see more or less? move around.

Having some menus be attached to your camera would be very confusing, and wouldn't allow you to zoom in and out anymore, or perform gameplay actions and the menu simultaneously. The "main menu" is not the only kind of menu.

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#87: Re: CVS menus...

by rancor on 10/27/2006 04:41, refers to #86

I get the concept, however this ignores the following very common use case: you're running along, know that you're safe, keep running, hit tab to check the score. Of course, this wouldn't be nearly as common if there was an Unreal style HUD score display.

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#88: Re: CVS menus...

by MeatROme on 10/27/2006 05:17, refers to #86

I think we /do/ get the concept;
that's at least why I requested _only_ the scores menu to behave "out of line".

There's no interaction with it,
it's purely informational ... and it's usefulness is indeed severely hampered by the otherwise beautiful (and perfectly usable) approach of worldspace menus.

Maybe what I want to say is:
Let's make the scoretab not be a menu.
;-)

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#89: Re: CVS menus...

by MeatROme on 10/27/2006 05:35, refers to #87

oups - cross posting ...
I'd still like to see a complete scoretab available - you're suggestion sounds like just a frag-counter and maybe indication of distance to next player (above u/below u/both), right?!

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#90: ..

by Passa on 10/27/2006 08:34

"So you move around the menu, not the menu around you. Want to see more or less? move around."

It might be difficult to do in a tight instagib match though. If I had to stop every time I wanted to check the scores I'm a sitting target.

I think metlslime already pointed this out, but the menu seems to spawn too far away from the player. I find that I move up to read it properly, then click something, and it spawns further away again, and once again I have to move up.

Nice sliders though, and the tabs are very cool.

Any chance of making the menu slightly more opaque?

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#91: Re: CVS menus...

by metlslime on 10/27/2006 08:58, refers to #86

okay, I do keep forgetting about the RPG needs for menus, as I generally only use the FPS game. With the RPG needs in mind:

1. There is currently a problem where every child menu spawns based on player position, rather than parent menu position. The result is that, if you need to get closer to use the menu, you end up having to walk towards each sucessive menu. Unless you find a nice long hallway to start with, you'll end up against a wall with no way to get closer. So an easy fix that seems like it would make a big improvement is opening any child in the same place as the parent. Only the initial top menu would spawn based on player position -- the main menu and the showscores menu, since neither of these have parents. (obviously NPC interaction menus would work as they currently do, since they are anchored to NPCs.)

2. I also think there could be room for improvement in the way the billboard rotates to meet the camera. Currently it is view-plane-parallel on the horizontal axis, but the vertical axis is always vertical in world space. I'm just guessing here, but it seems like making it view-plane-parallel on both axes would feel better. That way, items at the top or bottom of the menus would come forward to meet the player the same way the left and right sides of wider menus do. This would make them bigger on screen and easier to target accurately.

Sorry for the deluge of suggestions, but it seems better than just complaining.

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#92: Re: CVS menus...

by rancor on 10/27/2006 11:37, refers to #89

So would I, but it doesn't seem nearly as urgent if you had a HUD. My thought was to display rank/winning/score/difference, rank/you/score/difference between you and the next highest player.

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#93: ..

by makkE on 10/27/2006 12:40

How about a compromise?

Make the scoreboard "fly in" in a fancy way, but then stick like the old one. Release tab and is swhooshes out again.

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#94: Re: CVS menus...

by Shadow(tehschool) on 10/27/2006 17:18, refers to #86

"people asking for the scores menu to be fixed in front of the player, and the idea that we should use all space around the player both don't get the fundamental concept of the menus: the menus exist in WORLDSPACE, not EYESPACE"

We get the concept. But frankly, it's not a very good concept. Fine, the menus are usable when you're not in the middle of battle, but the scoreboard is rediculous. Next you'll want to make the HUD in the game world and we'll have to go to the center of the map to have a robot tell us how much health we have left. Besides, it doesn't make the game any more seamless, since a huge menu spawning out of the ground is rediculously fictitious, even for an FPS like Sauer.

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