Ingame display of ship status

[Stirbelwurm]

Hey there,

I've been playing the Engineer class for a while now and I quite like it, although I feel like that this class is the most tedious one to play. This has several reasons in my opinion, but I want to focus on one of them in this thread. It's about the thing the Engineer is mainly built around: the actual reparing and keeping the ship in shape.

Right now you are constantly running around the ship, trying to find anything that needs your attention. The thing that helps you with that are those floating icons that show you where there is something to repair. Although they do help you to find the stuff you want to repair, they only give you somewhat of an overview of the ship, if the ship itself is small. On bigger ships like the Galeon you quickly have problems with actually noticing when something gets damaged heavily and where your attention is needed the most.

The most obvious solution, for me, to that would be the permanent display of all parts on one fixed part of the screen. That way you could determine the state of your ship with a quick glance. I already wanted to post this thread earlier, but then I learned about the spectator mode and the fact, that there in fact is such a display of the ships state in the game already!

This lead to the conclusion, that you guys willfully excluded such an overview from the ingame perspective. I can only guess why this was done this way, but I think it would either be a gameplay or a design decision (only display the most basic info on the guy and let everyone figure out the rest themself / don't clutter up the screen with too much information).


Well, because this is the case, I'll now have to argue why I think GoIo would benefit from such an interface update.

First would be the fact, that the Engineer would actually be able to fulfill his role in the team better, than he can do it now. The most important thing an Engineer can do (within the scope of his class) is to repair the right stuff at the right time. So a good Engineer distinguishes himself from the rest, by applying his own ressources to the most important parts at the right time. With such an update you'd actually help the Engineer to do what he is supposed to do. Since I believe that the basic actions of Gunners and Pilots (shooting and flying) are in themself more enjoyable because of their very nature, I'd say that such support for the Engineer class is justified.

Then there is the teamplay aspect. Guns of Icarus is a teambased game, so everything that improves teamplay, also improves the game itself. With a fixed display of the ships parts you could also add an indication, when someone is repairing / rebuilding certain parts. I don't know how many times my friend yelled at me to repair the hull / balloon / engines or whatever, when I actually was doing just that at that very moment. When you see that something is being repaired just now, you can also use that information to distribute your own ressources more efficiently.
You could say that such a thing could also be solved by communicating more with your team (by voice chat for example), but I'm not going to tell them everytime I repair or rebuild something and then there are also those players that don't have a microphone, this would also help them alot.

Then there is the part of noticing when something has been destroyed on your ship. This would also obviously help you with that. Now, one might argue that noticing such things also belongs to the "skills" of an Engineer. Well, I guess you can argue both ways. For me this would mainly be a convenience feature, which is not about "dumbing the game down", but rather enabling the Engineer to be more effective at what he does.




Sooo, lots of words, I guess I was rambling on too much Since I had some time on my hands, I prepared a screenshot with how I imagined this:

(sorry about the low graphics quality, my laptop can't handle much more )

It's obviously just a concept, but I tried to make as less distracting as possible, so it only takes up a small amount of space, while still providing a good amount of information. Basically, what I did there was to add little symbols right next to the ship parts, which show you when a part is being repaired / rebuilt, when it's on fire or when a gun is curretly manned. Destroyed parts have a red border, damaged ones a light colored one and fully repaired parts have a dark border. This should enable a team to work together more effectively, which imo also leads to a better game experience.


That's about it for now and I'd like to hear what you guys think about that!

[Moo]

This idea has already been suggested here, here, and here (and maybe elsewhere too).
The problem I see with it, and your example screen demonstrates well, is that it's actually harder to see at a glance what needs repairing, as everything is always present, rather than just the things that need repairing. Also, how do you tell which gun or engine is which? With moving icons, that is much less of an issue.

[Rainer Zu Fall]

I quite honestly have to say that I don't like the idea. This game is pretty good considering the HUD. Mainly because there almost isn't any kind of HUD. That makes it more difficult to play, agreed, but that's the fun about it: It really feels like it.

[James T. Kirk]

The best way I see this implemented is a bit more detailed display (like the spectator one) when holding a button (shift or control for example).

This would keep the screen clear for Gunners and could be called on demand for a Pilot, but keeps all your finger positions cleared up for an Engineer.

It might take a second or so to load (simulated loading) so that having that "Engineer's instinct" is advantageous, but it could help newer people get a feel for the ship and old hands get an overview when needed.

[N-Sunderland]

I don't see what's wrong with the current system. It takes a quick glance in the general direction of a part to see if it's damaged or not. Not to mention that on most ships you're usually only allocated a few parts, so there really isn't much to watch over.

[Stirbelwurm]

I have to admit, that I already anticipated, that people wouldn't like the fact, that I proposed to add new UI elements, altough I didn't think that everyone is against it ;)

Well, I already made my point on how I believe it could improve teamplay, so I'm not going to repeat myself.

I agree, that it's nice to have a simple UI, but there is a limit on how simple something can be and how useful at the same time.
What you see right now are your items, the text chat (which I completely overlook most of the time, unfortunately), the kill / destroy messages, the compass, team orders, game score and the "augmented reality" style ship parts state. What I'm trying to say is, that there already is quite some stuff shown on your screen, so I don't see such a change as a break in the immersion of the game.

Also thanks to Moo, for pointing me to other threads about the topic, it was an interesting read, especially because there was also a response from Muse. Seems like most people are rather conservative about this topic ;) I also want to point out, that I didn't want to replace the current display of the part state, because I agree that it is helpful for new players.



Anyway, I'm not going to give up this easily ;) Alright, how about this:
Instead of an UI addition, you could create an ingame item, which displays the information the way I described it and showed in the picture. Something like a dashboard or something. You could install such a dashboard on strategically convenient spots, where a passing Engineer could take a quick look to see the overall state of the ship, where repairs are going on and where he has to go next. Maybe not on a Squid, but bigger ships like Galeon or ships where you can't see everything at once, like on the Spire, this could be really helpful, without breaking the immersion of the game!

I had a similiar idea about some kind of a map table somewhere on the ship, maybe even with drawing on it or something, but that's not the topic now.


So, this altered suggestion would be somewhat more difficult to implement, but what do you guys think about that?

[Seamus S]

Honestly, I think by the time you run to a dashboard to look you could much more quickly look around the standard display.

The situation you are trying to fix might be addressed in other ways. Having an option to move the parts destroyed messages to a more prominent location might help. There might be other ways to tweak the UI to draw attention to damage as well. Here are just a few ideas off the top of my head:

Maybe the regular damage icons could appear at the bottom middle or top middle part of the screen and then slide to their correct place on the side. Most people focus on the middle of the screen, so this woud call more attention to the icons when they first appear. They might even come in a bit larger or flash once or twice for emphasis before moving to their assigned location.

When the hull is almost dead the screen changes to reflect the ships failing health. Usually by this time the entire crew is well aware of their ship's precarious position. Having some sort of screen flash when the armor starts taking hits might help too. I know there are already visual cues engineers can watch for, but when your on a gun or otherwise busy they're very easy to miss.

Sound effects would be a big help. Auditory cues are great. I always know to look to the baloon when I hear that unmistakable sound of carronade fire. New audio cues have also made knowing when the pilot is stressing the engines much simpler. Unique, recognizable cues for when armor, weapons or engines are taking hits would be great.