Really, how this interface LOOKS right now is VERY secondary to me. What's more important are the concepts behind it, like a "Station Welcome" screen, and a viewable character description, and how the inventory system would work with crafting and the economy, etc.

Brushed metal and Eurostile fonts can go, I think the ideas are more important.

As far as controlling a Capship in 3D, Why couldn't you fly it like usual and have others man the turrets? This would be the best and easiest way to implement it sooner rather than later.

Or you could have the kind of control that you do in games like Homeworld. I played the demo of that and it was relatively easy to figure out. But then that'll require a COMPLETE re-do of navigation.

Couple problems with flying the cap ships using the same interface we have now:

http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/3/11636

read the wiki post.
oooh, you see your ship and spots for the open ports.... visual interface. woot.

Leber, just got to this thread... wow. You outdid yourself. That's exactly the kind of interface I'd love to see.

shapes right on the money.

OK, starting layout with new framework.
I'll keep adding to it (hopefully) when I have nothing better to do. (You'll need the Macromedia Flash player to see it...)
Changed the font and basically copied the VO layout to make everyone happy re: graphics. More important is the content, but there ain't none right now. It's just a good example of the news crawl at this point...

LINK

Wow, this is really impressive man. I wonder if there's any way that this can be incorporated into the game without much hassle.

/me votes Lebermac an honorary dev.

> I wonder if there's any way that this can be incorporated into the game without much hassle.

Coming Soon^TM!! See the June 29^th News post: http://www.vendetta-online.com/h/news.html

Much of the development time was spent creating the new UI system, which while currently very unattractive, has loads of configuration potential, including the ability use user-configured skins, etc. It's our intention to open up much of the UI functionality to the userbase and let people create their own HUDs, menu interfaces, or whatever.

Yeah, my only problem with the original interface was the colors, they're a little jarring.

The new one is nice too, but the other one had this Starship troopers I'm-being-advertised-to feel

Yeah, Beo that's why I'm a-doin this. Mockup an interface so that users can get visual feedback on what the whole enchilada might look like, once everything is "in" there.

It gets reactions far better than a text description of a feature. When users can "see" what you're suggesting, I think that really gets the concept across. Plus, it sparks even more creativity I think.

Consolidating RelayeR's comments from other forum...

Instead of a verticle menu structure added to the horizontal *or* in addition to it, I'd like to suggest a 4 panel rotating structure.

1st panel, ships, weapons and ammo - default upon entering a station. This would facilitate reloads and changing loadouts/ships in a hurry.

2nd panel, stores - listing of tradegoods, inventory (minus weapons/ships), buy/sell function. Your one-stop shopping center.

3rd panel, navigation/information - containing the current nav-map and a place to place/read notes about other players and the universe. This area would also hold the current news function.

4th panel, the bar - a station-only chat area with a picture window view of the station exterior. Maybe put a table and a couple of glasses of some lovely concoction in the lower-foreground.

*bumping* for LostCommander

Is this still in progress, Leber?

Again, thanks for the bump. I will try to get around to actually reading this and replying to it over the next couple days.

Okay, so I finished... First, I apologize for yet another rather long post. Second, I am using the following to reference different button locations:
TOP Item
>> SIDE / OTHER Item

Currently, the station GUI is set up:
Buy
>> Buy Ship
Sell
>> Buy Ship
Ammo
>> Replenish All; Buy Ammo; Buy Ship
Ship
>> Ports; Equipment Inventory; Equip; Unequip; Unequip All; Equipment Description
Cargo
>> Ship Cargo; Unloaded Cargo; Load; Unload; Unload All; Unload and Sell; Unload and Sell All; Description
Wpn. Groups
>> Ports; Groups; Apply; Description
Character Info
>> Inventory (Universal; not sorted well); Description; Char Info
Mission
>> Available Missions; Info
News
>> News Articles; Read Article
----- Help
Leave Station
Set Home Station
Select Ship
Map
Options
-----
Chat (Includes Bar Chat)

Sometimes your current credits are shown (Buy, Sell, Ammo), sometimes not.

LeberMac’s suggested station GUI is setup:
Main
>> Station Welcome Message
>> >> Message; Set This As My Home Station; Leave The Station (Exit)
>> Local & Universal News & Events
>> >> Stories; Story Text
>> Station Bar: Bar Name
>> >> Bar Chat
>> Maps & Navigation
>> Help Screens
>> Options & Settings
Commerce
>> Your Station Inventory
>> >> Various Storages & Berths
>> Sell To Station From Inventory
>> Buy From Station To Inventory
>> Storage Management
>> Request Items (Procurement)
>> Sell Items In Station Store
Ships
Character
>> Character Information
>> >> Character Description; Hail Message
>> Guild Membership
>> >> Guild Member List; Guild Voting; Guild Bank; Guild Messages; Settings; Resign Position; Leave This Guild
>> License Levels
>> >> STUFF
>> Ratings & Badges
>> >> STUFF
>> Faction Standings
>> >> Bar Faction Standing Indicators (NO)
>> Inventory Manager
Build/Craft
Missions Available
-----
Chat

** Initial Responses -- I like the idea of an initial station welcome screen with a station-specific message. I think players should be able to leave the station, access maps and navigation, and access game options from anywhere in the station GUI, like the Devs have it now. I agree with you though that Set Home Station and Select Ship can probably be moved elsewhere. I like the idea of the station bar being its own tab and I agree that it should absorb Universal Chat. Also, if the bar has its own tab, it definitely should have a standing list of people in the bar.

I also like the character description bit. The Guild Membership tab is a welcome addition as well, especially the guild bank and daily withdrawal limit. However, the Resign Position and Leave This Guild buttons are unnecessary, not especially helpful/useful, and should be left out. The License Levels and Ratings & Badges, with all their content, is also all good stuff. The Inventory Manager tab should be under Commerce. Also, I would prefer if the arrows pointed towards the area they would expand, not the item to which the space would belong (I know, nit-pick point).

Rentable storage should only be item storage and ship berths. (See more later). Also, I would really like to replace your Sell To Station From Inventory, Buy From Station To Inventory, and Request Items (Procurement) tabs eliminated/consolidated into a Station Market tab. (See more later). My current thinking is that the possibility of the posting of more complicated missions by players should be ignored until something like the Station Market is in place and tested. It perhaps should even be reserved for the owners of stations and/or those with a certain level of faction standing.

Your second attempt at GUI tabs (http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/3/11492?page=4#137619) is MUCH better. I would like to see the tabs at the top look a lot like the ones we already have if possible... Also, I really sort of like the MOO III GUI. I also may be one of the 5 or so people on the planet that actually enjoyed the game and saw what the developers were trying for (and miserably failed to achieve)... Hmm, I see that as of Sunday, September 25, you already managed that. Uh, well, very nice.

Final Thoughts -- In general, I think everything needs fewer words in their titles (I know, might be a shock hearing that from my verbose posts such as this). I agree with The Noid that the right side buttons need to more clearly be a sub-menu. I would really suggest copy-pasting a screenshot of the current station GUI and then playing with that if it isn’t too hard. I think I would prefer that the sub-menu end up on the left-hand side of the screen. Kudos to Suicidal Lemming about “Don’t Make Me Think”.


** Interesting Bar Additions: >> If the bar has a list of people in the bar, I would like to be able to left-click select someone, and then automatically PM them every message until I deselect them. Also, there should be a bartender NPC. When the bartender receives a PM, it should have a couple generic responses, and a keyword response. You receive the keyword response if your PM includes a keyword. When PCs own stations, they should be able to set the 2-3 generic responses, the keyword, and the keyword response.


** On Faction Standing: >> Such strict polar opposites does not add much to the game, it detracts from it by limiting characters to a location on a line between two factions. I would prefer that the default view be close to what it is now (just a number between -1000 and +1000). However, I also agree that making the existence of opposing sides actually MEAN something WOULD add to the game, potentially significantly. I suggest that an alternate view be available -- a diamond. If you are at the bottom, you are hated by both factions, and both love you at the top. Your faction standing between opposing factions would be modified as follows:
If you have at least +0 faction standing, you gain half the standing you lose for actions against the opposing side.
While you have less than +900 faction standing with one side, you lose half the faction standing you gain from the other side.
While you have at least +900 faction standing, you take a double faction standing losses.

For example, say I have 850 Itani standing and 825 Serco standing. Then I gain 50 Itani standing to 900 for some trading mission; my Serco standing automatically drops 25 points (half of 50) to 800 on completion of the trade mission. I then gain 100 Serco standing to 900 with trading missions for them; my Itani standing doesn’t change because I have at least 900 with them. As a second example, if I had 0 Serco and 0 Itani, and killed a Serco CtC transport for -10 Serco, I would automatically gain 5 Itani standing.

My rationale for this is: Doing bad things to the bad guys makes you more popular; Doing nice things for the bad guys makes you less popular; Doing nice things for everyone is okay; If you are a highly respected member of society, doing bad things is considered MUCH worse than if you are a nobody (hello Martha Stewart). This also has the advantage of being a simple rule-based change to the current faction system, which thus hopefully would be relatively easy to implement.


** Rentable Storage: >> Additional spaces only complicate the matter. Also, at least for NPC stations, I would like to see your Storage Management automated out. That is simply one more hassle for the player to be concerned with, and does not exactly improve game play. Instead, I would like to see storage on existing NPC stations stay at some fixed cost (1-3cr/cu, 50-200cr/berth) per week (per week significantly reduces server computing time required), and this should only be ABOVE some freebie storage limit (1000cu, 3 berths). Existing NPC stations MUST have unlimited overall storage to allow for fluctuations in the size of the player base. Rentable storage should DEFINATELY be a recurring cost and be assessed on a real-time basis. The cost for renting at established NPC stations should NOT fluctuate. I hope you realize, LeberMac, that the most likely “In Demand” stations for storage will be newbie spawning areas... That is because a fair number of trail account and other newbie crap will end up there, supposedly taking up space. It would be ----- to charge newbies the most for station storage. [Edited]


** The Station Market: >> All existing NPC stations should have a station market. In this market, any player may post or claim a bid. All bids have a lifetime (days, hours, minutes, seconds), an item, a number, and a price. Whenever a new bid is posted in a station, the computer will automatically attempt to match it with a fulfilling bid (buy for sell, sell for buy). The station gets to keep the difference in the price. For example, if I wanted to sell 15 Valkyries whenever for 5kcr apiece, I would bid [INF Valkyrie 15 5000cr]. If player B wanted to by a Valkyrie, B could either manually scan through the posted sell bids or post a buy bid. If B posted a buy bid of [00:00:01:00 Valkyrie 1 6000cr], then the computer would sell B a Valkyrie for 6000cr, pocket 1000cr, give me 5000cr, and update my bid to [INF Valkyrie 14 5000cr].


Last Notes: I would like to see ammunition automatically bought and reloaded upon docking. When the crafting system is implemented, the ammunition should no longer automatically be bought from the station, but should still automatically be reloaded from a character’s station inventory when it is/becomes available.

If a character runs out of money to pay for storage, I recommend that the holding station place a lean on it. To do anything with the stuff, other than sell it, or to store any new stuff, you must pay all back-fees. A player may also opt to give all the withheld stuff to the station in exchange for a wavier of all storage back-fees.

I note that, if the Station Market is implemented with the Rentable Storage system, stuff being sold in the bid system would need to be assessed as stored to avoid players circumventing the pay-for-storage idea by "selling" 1,000,000cu of purified water for 10,000cr/cu and then canceling the bid when they wanted to retrieve the water...

Ohh, man LC you are working on this too much. But I like where yer going. Your "Martha Stewart" point on faction standings is excellent.

To address Rogue's inquiry as to "Is this still in progress..." I'll say not really.
The devs have indicated that they are almost done with this whole UI thing, so I've stopped working on it. I may tidy up that flash demo if I get around to it, but overall I've decided that putting more work into something that the devs say is already almost complete is a waste of my time. (Basically, I sense that any opportunity that I may have had to influence design and/or make suggestions is over, if indeed I ever really had an opportunity to provide input...)

So I look forward to the new GUI and making skins for it.

Thanks about the standings point. I guess I agree about the GUI. And, as for working on this -- I HAVE NOTHING ELSE TO DO AND IT IS DRIVING ME NUTS!!!

I haven't really had anything especially constructive to do since I graduated college last spring. I've moved back home for now, have no car, and work at Starbucks part-time (~25 hours / week). I miss my programming, my economics, my math, and my friends, so teh intarweb must needs make up for it since ping pong, pool, and Mario Kart: Double Dash by myself just wasn't cutting it.

Leber, I would love to see a Flash demonstration of this! Please?
/me pokes Leber
Come on Nemisis, don't mind the mean old woguewazer!

Why? Has nothing to do with Roguelazer (Who apparently hates anything that isn't text-based command-line entry... Hehe) The UI apparently is almost done, why should I spend a single minute more working on something to showcase ideas when the "accepting new ideas" phase of the project is over? (At least if it's about to be released I would hope to GOD the design phase of the project is over.)

I'll just wait to see what the devs have done on this. Can't wait!