Obsidian's Pillars of Eternity [BETA RELEASED, GO TO THE NEW THREAD]

[Blaine]

I like the look of the portraits in that mockup. They look a lot like IWD portraits

That's because they're taken directly from IWD.

 

[Arkeus]

That's because they're taken directly from IWD.

No, they are all original PE characters that we know about from the kickstarter:

Well, except for the ranger pet.

 

[DraQ]

I hope hidden object/trap detection is fast, having to click and wait 1 or 2 seconds even sounds like a chore while exploring and promotes an artificial aproach to the content instead of just naturaly moving around.

Taking the time to observe the environment is artificial ?

I think you should have to go slowly, but that there should also be visual "tells" that hint to the player that he should slow down even before the detection kicks in.

The problem here is evidently the player not being able to see how slow movement correlates with searching in an isometric game. They may know it, but the game has no tools to show it without turining it into annyoing little minigame.

OTOH such problem wouldn't exist in an FPP game, because you could simply tie detection to being swept by player's vision cone, with time required being much lower than it would have to be for iso (since we aren't talking about sweeping the entire area pretty much anything that would be too long for waggling your mouse wildly to be an effective tactics would be long enough) and statistics plus modifiers (like illumination) determining the maximium detection distance. Then the player wanting to scan area wouldn't have to artifically slow down, since slowing down would be a result of examining the area thoroughly.

tl;dr
Superiority of FPP for exploration has been confirmed once again.

 

[Blaine]

No, they are all original PE characters that we know about from the kickstarter:

Oh yeah... I was confused by all the mockups.

 

[DraQ]

Whoever puts important UI elements in the fucking corners need to stop trying UI design.

BEST UI EVER!!!!!1

 

[DragoFireheart]

That UI is horrible. Holy shit.

 

[DragoFireheart]

Whoever puts important UI elements in the fucking corners need to stop trying UI design.

BEST UI EVER!!!!!1

Maybe they picked up some tips from Bethesda?

 

[Infinitron]

FFS that's a photoshop by DraQ

 

[Aeschylus]

That UI is horrible. Holy shit.

I think your irony meter is broken.

 

[DragoFireheart]

That UI is horrible. Holy shit.

I think your irony meter is broken.

It's under maintenance today. Working as intended.

 

[Excidium]

Whoever puts important UI elements in the fucking corners need to stop trying UI design.

Yeah, clickable UI elements should never be in the quickest and easiest place to reach them.

So you're playing on 640x480?

 

[Kirtai]

For maximum annoyance it should have been placed one pixel away from the bottom, to deceive people into thinking they could use the edge of the screen as a guide.

 

[Kirtai]

Whoever puts important UI elements in the fucking corners need to stop trying UI design.

Yeah, clickable UI elements should never be in the quickest and easiest place to reach them.

So you're playing on 640x480?

The fastest places to reach on the screen with a mouse are the four corners (right after the current pointer location), even at 1920x1200.

 

[DraQ]

Whoever puts important UI elements in the fucking corners need to stop trying UI design.

Yeah, clickable UI elements should never be in the quickest and easiest place to reach them.

So you're playing on 640x480?

The fastest places to reach on the screen with a mouse are the four corners (right after the current pointer location), even at 1920x1200.

Excidium needs to upgrade to faster cursor, it seems.

 

[Excidium]

If you are so concerned with speed you won't be clicking in the first place. I'd rather have things in places that are comfortable to look at, and on the screens of the size they are nowadays that's the center. Have fun playing shifting your view to the center where your characters are, to the bottom left where portraits, buffs and skills are and to the bottom right where the combat log is all the fucking time.

 

[Kirtai]

It's not just speed, it's precision. The corners are important since you can hit them with perfect accuracy and zero effort.

Note that I'm talking about often used clickable elements here. Stuff you won't be regularly clicking such as the typical combat log shouldn't really be taking up spots like that if there's something better that can go there.

 

[Excidium]

The combat log there is certainly the biggest aggravator.

 

[Blaine]

The fastest places to reach on the screen with a mouse are the four corners (right after the current pointer location), even at 1920x1200.

Where the fuck are you guys getting this nonsense?

It's not just speed, it's precision. The corners are important since you can hit them with perfect accuracy and zero effort.

What the fuck are you using as a mouse? A motion-sensing cinderblock lashed to the end of a ten-foot pole?

 

[coffeetable]

The fastest places to reach on the screen with a mouse are the four corners (right after the current pointer location), even at 1920x1200.

Where the fuck are you guys getting this nonsense?

View attachment 1624

Quick question: where's the start menu button?

Now: where's the close window button?

And back button on your browser?

Okay. Next.

Where're the tabs on your browser?

Where's the scroll bar?

How about the taskbar? The tray?

 

[coffeetable]

Most important buttons go in the corner because you can drag the mouse very quickly in their rough direction and guarantee that you'll end up over it.

 

[Blaine]

Quick question: where's the start menu button?

Now: where's the close window button?

And back button on your browser?

Okay. Next.

Where're the tabs on your browser?

Where's the scroll bar?

How about the taskbar? The tray?

Browser tabs start from left to right because that's the most sensible layout for them. The other elements you mentioned are in the corners to leave central space for process icons, the address bar, and (depending on OS) the header text inset in the window frame.

Putting everything in the corners might be important for elderly persons with glaucoma using trackballs. For everyone else, it's utterly negligible, and using the central top or bottom is most efficient (OS X does this with its dock, though fuck Macintosh).

 

[Excidium]

I'll gladly sacrifice some miliseconds for not straining my fucking eyes

 

[BBMorti]

The fastest places to reach on the screen with a mouse are the four corners (right after the current pointer location), even at 1920x1200.

Where the fuck are you guys getting this nonsense?

View attachment 1624

Quick question: where's the start menu button?

Now: where's the close window button?

And back button on your browser?

Okay. Next.

Where're the tabs on your browser?

Where's the scroll bar?

How about the taskbar? The tray?

 

[Kirtai]

The fastest places to reach on the screen with a mouse are the four corners (right after the current pointer location), even at 1920x1200.

Where the fuck are you guys getting this nonsense?

You may want to look up Fitt's Law, but basically the edges of the screen act as backstops for the pointer so anything stuck to an edge is an infinitely tall or wide target. Things in the corner are both. Hitting a corner only needs you to move the mouse more than the minimum distance in vaguely the right direction. No precision required.

For everyone else, it's utterly negligible, and using the central top or bottom is most efficient (OS X does this with its dock, though fuck Macintosh).

Yeah, the edges are the next easiest after the corners. Items stuck to the top or bottom are effectively infinitely tall targets.

 

[DraQ]

Where the fuck are you guys getting this nonsense?

View attachment 1625

Pedestrian mind spotted.

Distance alone matters little on the screen if you are using mouse, because you can move mouse at nearly arbitrary speeds.

What matters is the tradeoff between precision and distance. Large precise movements are slow. Imprecise movements are fast regardless of distance and extremely short range movements are fast regardless of precision. Intermediate movements are slow.

For corners you effectively need no precision, because reaching the corner is just the matter of swinging your mouse wildly in corner's general direction - the cursor will hit one of the adjacent edges and then slide towards the corner where it will remain trapped.

If you want controls to be quickly accessible, you can either:

-Put them where the cursor is (right click menu) ensuring player will only have to cover a tiny fraction of the screen, albiet with very precise movement.
-Put them in the corner and make them touch the edges, allowing player to place cursor over the desired controls with a single swing.
-Put them under rebindable hotkeys
-Try some radial menu or some other thingamajig that combines placing controls under cursor (virtually) and no precision requirement by, for example, taking only angle and not distance.

Having to snipe with your mouse is good for FPSes, not GUIs