Interface Suggestions

Hi guys. I've had a few ideas about how to improve the game's interface and here's what I came up with. Bear with me, please.


Game Lobby Suggestions

1. Kick & Ban option in game room. The ability to kick and ban people from your game in the game lobby. This would be an improvement to game control as several times I'd have spammers in my room and couldn't do anything. This would also be good for team games and certain game types, where you can have a partner coming but another player joined instead.

2. Ready button spam control. Just like global, you should be able use the game room Ready button only once. Spammers of "I'm ready" often lag the whole lobby for everyone.

3. Spectator team in game lobby. A special team in games, for players who want to spectate. Also nice when getting ready for a team game and picking teams.

4. Add a player counter in the game lobby (possibly room too). It would be nice to be able to see how many players are currently in my game and it's difficult to see when just scrolling down considering how many can enter and leave at a time, which leads to a confusing situation--even more so in scenarios, where all the players have a grey shield next to them. This makes it all too difficult to count the number of players in the game and a counter would be rather nice.


In Game Suggestions

5. Hotkeys for unit selection. This is my most complicated suggestion. On the move units menu (the little pop up box), when you hover above one of the units and press a number (1-9), it would add that number of that unit type into the selection. Pressing space would be the same as hitting the little green button confirming your selection. Ctrl + Space, Alt + Space and Shift + Space could work as move using the several transports in the game (transport, air transport and submarines).

6. Display the current SP pool. In the players menu during a game, it would be displayed the current SP that will be shared between winning players.

7. Ability to cancel Peace/Alliance/Duel requests. Be able to cancel a request that was sent in the same turn.

8. Units in transports stay in transports until moved manually. You currently have to select the units you want to put in a transport even if you've moved them to that city before in that same transport. My idea would skip this step, assuming said units are already in the transport and when you click and drag out of the city, they will move inside the transport.

9. Click and drag moving everything but militia. Be able to click and drag to move everything except militia. It is already present, but it is somewhat inconsistent, as sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.

10. Better contrast for defense lines. Some player colors make it easier to see defense lines and some make it harder. It would be cool if they had a darker/lighter tone to improve contrast and make it easier for us to see them.

11. Insta-build units. When you click on a city or country, next to the dropdown where you select which unit type to autoproduce, it could have a button to build those units, instead of having to go to the cities menu > auto produce tab > execute orders (3 clicks instead of 1).

12. Selecting multiple cities. You'd be able to shift+click and select multiple cities to build units from. They could have a dotted white line surrounding the city icon to display that they are selected. Clicking a city without Shift+click would deselect all others. Units available would be limited to the common units available between the cities (so selecting Kiev and Odessa won't let you build submarines).

13. Stealth detection lines only. Add a button near the visibility toggle to display ONLY the stealth detection lines. Turning the visibility lines on lags the game A LOT depending on how many units you have. Having this feature would make it easier to arrange Sentry Planes.


General Suggestions

14. Chat improvements. I hate when PRs and CLN chat disappear from my chat log when I'm switching screens. My suggestion is for current room chat to be erased, but not CLN and PRs. Another thing I quite don't like is how when you scroll up your chat window, whenever someone else writes something, the window is instantly scrolled to the latest message. My suggestion is for it to be fixed whenever you manually scroll up.

15. Filter casual games by the ones you are currently in. Additional filter option in the casual games to display only the games you are currently in.

16. Coalition's Message of the Day. Whenever a player joins, he is showed the coalition's message of the day, that could be changed by leaders using the /motd command.

Forum Suggestions

17. Ability to edit your post when not on the first page. This is a forum suggestion. When you are the creator of a thread and you are on the second/third pages you can't edit your post without going back to the 1st page. I think would be a nice addition having the edit button right there if you need it.

18. Improving forum posts' readability by shortening post width. Texts with long lines are hard to read, this suggestion is just to shorten the width of the posts, so lines are shorter and readability is improved (you can see the need for this right in this post).

Added suggestions

19. Change the timer font. The current one, Comic Sans MS, just looks cheesy.

20. Be able to sell back the units bought in the same turn. if you bought marines to attack a certain city, then it seems like the range is not sufficient, it would be great to be able to sell them back with the ( -) button.

One trillion percent yes.

I agree with all of this

Wr1tt3n by notserral, 16.04.2012 at 12:23

Hi guys. I've had a few ideas about how to improve the game's interface and here's what I came up with. Bear with me, please.
2. Ready button spam control. Just like global, you should be able use the game room Ready button only once. Spammers of "I'm ready" often lag the whole lobby for everyone.

5. Chat improvements. Another thing I quite don't like is how when you scroll up your chat window, whenever someone else writes something, the window is instantly scrolled to the latest message. My suggestion is for it to be fixed whenever you manually scroll up.

Top 2 priority IMO, but all are good. Nice post

Agreed, very nice thread indeed.

All good ideas, and most should be rather easy to implement, with the others not being ridiculously difficult. In addition, every single suggestion makes sense. Please put this in the game!

I'll just mention the ones I don't agree with:

8 is already in the game. The ones with stars on them are the ones you're in, and I don't think the game should bury your head in the sand. Plus, the starred games (which you are participating in) come first so no problem there.

15 is only a problem if you have a huge screen. My resolution is 1280*1024 and I actually get annoyed but the small width of the lines.

---

And I want to add a few more.

17. Change the timer font. The current one, Comic Sans MS, just looks cheesy. My fourth-ever post and first-ever thread in this forum actually dealt with this. I proposed a digital clock-style display (would give it a James Bond/Tom Clancy kind of feel with the nukes and all that), but if that's too hard to implement, at least put a more serious font in. Comic Sans is silly.

The following is not so much an interface suggestion, but...
18. Make a proper help section. Integrate stuff from the FAQ and have a nice layout. Just bringing up the rather lacklustre tutorial is not good enough.

Wr1tt3n by YOBA, 16.04.2012 at 14:19

I'll just mention the ones I don't agree with:

8 is already in the game. The ones with stars on them are the ones you're in, and I don't think the game should bury your head in the sand. Plus, the starred games (which you are participating in) come first so no problem there.

15 is only a problem if you have a huge screen. My resolution is 1280*1024 and I actually get annoyed but the small width of the lines.

---

And I want to add a few more.

17. Change the timer font. The current one, Comic Sans MS, just looks cheesy. My fourth-ever post and first-ever thread in this forum actually dealt with this. I proposed a digital clock-style display (would give it a James Bond/Tom Clancy kind of feel with the nukes and all that), but if that's too hard to implement, at least put a more serious font in. Comic Sans is silly.

The following is not so much an interface suggestion, but...
18. Make a proper help section. Integrate stuff from the FAQ and have a nice layout. Just bringing up the rather lacklustre tutorial is not good enough.

Lol! I was just thinking about the comic sans font xD (It would be cool if when the clock is in the last 10 seconds it makes a beeping noise similar to the timer in the Quake series when in the last 5 seconds of a powerup, yeah i'm weird).


Above all, every suggestion is very excellent!

Wr1tt3n by YOBA, 16.04.2012 at 14:19

8 is already in the game. The ones with stars on them are the ones you're in, and I don't think the game should bury your head in the sand. Plus, the starred games (which you are participating in) come first so no problem there.

Problem is, when you're in turn 30+, they start not coming first, or only coming first after a few seconds or more. And with the huge amount of casual games, it's incredibly slow to scroll. Having a filter to making it faster would be much better.

And I good readability should always be aimed for, regardless of what screen resolution you use, yobs.

One more I remembered just now:

19. Add a player counter in the game lobby (possibly room too). I want to be able to see how many players are currently in my game and it's difficult to see when just scrolling down considering how many can enter and leave at a time, which leads to a confusing situation--even more so in scenarios, where all the players have a grey shield next to them. This makes it all too difficult to count the number of players in the game and a counter would be rather nice.

Wr1tt3n by notserral, 16.04.2012 at 15:27

And I good readability should always be aimed for, regardless of what screen resolution you use, yobs.

The whole point of my post was that your problem derives from having an enormous screen resolution. Most people using laptops or netbooks won't have this problem, only people with 20-inch+ beasts.

Great suggestions indeed ,

6. Ability to edit your post when not on the first page.
come on, how many times will you edit ur post! thats quite laziness .

more suggestion :

20.to be able to sell back the units u just bought in the same turn, for example : if you bought marines to attack a certain city, then it seems like the range is not sufficient, it would be great to be able to sell them back with the ( -) button.

Wr1tt3n by YOBA, 16.04.2012 at 15:52

The whole point of my post was that your problem derives from having an enormous screen resolution. Most people using laptops or netbooks won't have this problem, only people with 20-inch+ beasts.

So people with 20 in+ beasts should just drop them for better readability? :p

Your argument is flawed :p

Wr1tt3n by AirForCe, 16.04.2012 at 16:02

Great suggestions indeed ,

6. Ability to edit your post when not on the first page.
come on, how many times will you edit ur post! thats quite laziness .

more suggestion :

20.to be able to sell back the units u just bought in the same turn, for example : if you bought marines to attack a certain city, then it seems like the range is not sufficient, it would be great to be able to sell them back with the ( -) button.

This, though it's not necessarily interface-related.

I also though 6 was pretty lazy too, LOL. It's definitely not the top priority, but it wouldn't be bad by all means to have such a feature.

Everything sounds good just ivan and amok's opinions...

Wr1tt3n by YOBA, 16.04.2012 at 16:35

Wr1tt3n by AirForCe, 16.04.2012 at 16:02

Great suggestions indeed ,

6. Ability to edit your post when not on the first page.
come on, how many times will you edit ur post! thats quite laziness .

more suggestion :

20.to be able to sell back the units u just bought in the same turn, for example : if you bought marines to attack a certain city, then it seems like the range is not sufficient, it would be great to be able to sell them back with the ( -) button.

This, though it's not necessarily interface-related.

I also though 6 was pretty lazy too, LOL. It's definitely not the top priority, but it wouldn't be bad by all means to have such a feature.

hmm well it can be included in the In game suggestions.

Added another suggestion

16. Coalition's Message of the Day. Whenever a player joins, he is showed the coalition's message of the day, that could be changed by leaders using the /motd command.

Game Lobby Suggestions:

- add game presets (like euro+ 3m 10k no rares, world game 20pl 100 turns etc. )

In Game Suggestions:

- Ability to undo moves anytime

Wr1tt3n by Fruit, 16.04.2012 at 12:42

I agree with all of this

+1

^this all of it <3

I find no errors so I support this with LilD Hearts <3

Thanks for the suggestions guys, most of them are pretty sensible and doable. Now just need to find some spare time to get to some of them.

This sounds really good!

Very good idea's. I support them all! Nice work Pulse!

Very good ideas. I suppose most of them.

Thank you, gentlemen. You make me feel all fuzzy and warm inside.

Wr1tt3n by notserral, 02.06.2012 at 22:02

8. Units in transports stay in transports until moved manually. You currently have to select the units you want to put in a transport even if you've moved them to that city before in that same transport. My idea would skip this step, assuming said units are already in the transport and when you click and drag out of the city, they will move inside the transport.

9. Click and drag moving everything but militia. Be able to click and drag to move everything except militia. It is already present, but it is somewhat inconsistent, as sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.

8. i'm assuming this would not count for marines in subs.
9. this is ok for sky menace, but not for GW or MOS, because it will mean infantry will move with marines.

The thread of the century

Wr1tt3n by notserral, 16.04.2012 at 12:23

Hi guys. I've had a few ideas about how to improve the game's interface and here's what I came up with. Bear with me, please.
...

Just to let you know that I used this thread's ideas for some recent changes: http://afterwind.com/events/news_comments.php?news_id=65.

Cheers!