The New GUI

Gnomre · Post by **Gnomre** » 18 Aug 2006, 09:19

Point 6 invalidates your entire list with its massive wrongness. Seriously, it is physically impossible to be anymore wrong... you have just set the speed of light of incorrectitude.

GUI has nothing to do with gameplay... HA. Gameplay DOES NOT HAPPEN without a GUI, it is the VERY CORE of gameplay...

zwzsg · Post by **zwzsg** » 18 Aug 2006, 09:50

TradeMark wrote:SO IT DOESNT MATTER FOR MOD MAKERS.

Stop talking non sense, will you?

Small exemple: if the GUI allow player to turn all their unit on high trajectory, it means the mod maker must make so no unit can crash and bug when set on high trajectory. If the gui allow high trajectory for only some unit, then the mod maker is free of the concern of what happens when a high velocity railgun is set on high velocity. Ok, I used "high trajectory" as a random exemple, but same apply to activation, cloack, reclaim, and basically every GUI action.

For instance, in TA, the GUI doesn't allow unit which can ressurect to reclaim, this is a GUI bug, which affect the modding, as I can't make a TA race where every cons can both rez and reclaim.

Or in TA, we couldn't make a unit with both a d-gun and a load button, because the two buttons were placed in the same emplacment in the GUI. And that made it impossible for Gnome to give the SWTA AT-AT both loading and "Charged Chingun".

Currently, as far as I know, all mods use 96x96 builpic. If the gui squeeze them to 62x46, the effort the mod maker has made to make pretty buildpic are wasted (and the mod makers get angry, like they currently do).

The biggest and most ambitious are called TC, short for Total Conversion. It mean they're trying to change everything they can, including the GUI, to give a different, new and refreshing, feeling to the game. For exemple, there's this TA mod called Talon, (ok, it's not a whole TC, just a new race) which completly replaced the GUI by a new GUI. check it out.

So as you can see, the GUI plays a very important role in modding.

TradeMark · Post by **TradeMark** » 18 Aug 2006, 09:51

I need to explain more: we dont need different GUI for playing some mod. We can play any mod with same GUI even now. So we dont need different GUIs for different mods.

Edit: and if some mod needs more buttons, we can add those in the every GUI.

And wtf? high traj is hardcoded in spring, its not scripted to some mod. Same with cloak commands etc. IF the GUI maker is that stupid he wont include those buttons, its his fault.
Edit: And i dont want "cool looking game", i want it to be practical to myself. Example: I want BIG minmap, many buildpics on one page. etc.

Das Bruce · Post by **Das Bruce** » 18 Aug 2006, 09:59

What if they want to do some mod specific gui things?

TradeMark · Post by **TradeMark** » 18 Aug 2006, 10:03

They dont need mod specific gui things. They havent needed for this far either.
Its all working fine now, dont mess with it now >__<

Das Bruce · Post by **Das Bruce** » 18 Aug 2006, 11:11

Who are you to tell every modder in the game what they do and don't need? Nobodies needed any of the features this far, that doesn't mean they can't make it better with them.

Its all working fine now, dont mess with it

If anybody else listened to that statement we'd still be living in caves.

Aun · Post by **Aun** » 18 Aug 2006, 11:24

Why don't we just give the player an option to choose their own GUI or use a mod-defined one? If the mod doesn't use a custom GUI it can use the default or something.

Would everybody be happy with what?

BvDorp · Post by **BvDorp** » 18 Aug 2006, 12:00

Aun wrote:Why don't we just give the player an option to choose their own GUI or use a mod-defined one? If the mod doesn't use a custom GUI it can use the default or something.

Would everybody be happy with what?

This wouldn't work out well, for the CEGUI Gui's will allow for much bigger changes than the standard GUI allows. For example, maybe some new mod will use buildpics with a different aspect ratio than the standard GUI uses.

Anyway, let some nice standard GUI be built (the one Ice designed) and offer mods the possibility to use their own GUI. This would satisfy, wouldn't it?

Post by **jcnossen** » 18 Aug 2006, 12:09

Why don't we just give the player an option to choose their own GUI or use a mod-defined one? If the mod doesn't use a custom GUI it can use the default or something.

Would everybody be happy with what?

Making everything a choice for everyone won't exactly result in good design. In any case, it will have to be mostly mod defined in the future, for the reason that the underlying scripting and game features will be defined by the mod as well.
However it could be possible to let the mod define the CEGUI buttons and control, and let the user select a skin.

Maelstrom · Post by **Maelstrom** » 18 Aug 2006, 13:00

Also, if done right, a mod dependancy could be used that contains a basic, Spring style GUI as it is now, and mods could use that, OR they could change little bits like graphics, OR they could totally rediesign it. If they are totally redesigning it, they are doing so for a reason, so it should be mod dependant, as the new GUI could add some special uber feature not included in the base, standard GUI package.

Das Bruce · Post by **Das Bruce** » 18 Aug 2006, 13:09

jcnossen wrote:
Why don't we just give the player an option to choose their own GUI or use a mod-defined one? If the mod doesn't use a custom GUI it can use the default or something.

Would everybody be happy with what?
Making everything a choice for everyone won't exactly result in good design. In any case, it will have to be mostly mod defined in the future, for the reason that the underlying scripting and game features will be defined by the mod as well.
However it could be possible to let the mod define the CEGUI buttons and control, and let the user select a skin.

Victory is mine!

TradeMark · Post by **TradeMark** » 18 Aug 2006, 13:12

Stop pasteing those big/stupid images pls.

If mod makers really make their own GUI, i need someone to hack spring and use my own GUI. kthx.

clericvash · Post by **clericvash** » 18 Aug 2006, 13:21

Das Bruce wrote:
jcnossen wrote:
Why don't we just give the player an option to choose their own GUI or use a mod-defined one? If the mod doesn't use a custom GUI it can use the default or something.

Would everybody be happy with what?
Making everything a choice for everyone won't exactly result in good design. In any case, it will have to be mostly mod defined in the future, for the reason that the underlying scripting and game features will be defined by the mod as well.
However it could be possible to let the mod define the CEGUI buttons and control, and let the user select a skin.
Victory is mine!

ahaha!

SwiftSpear · Post by **SwiftSpear** » 18 Aug 2006, 15:08

TradeMark wrote:ARGH.

1) I want it to be simple: only one GUI.
2) I dont want to learn 10 different GUIs and how to use them.
3) I would probably hate some mod specified GUIs more than the current GUI.
4) I dont want to fight for one more thing with the mod makers.
5) I dont care a shit how the mod looks for me, i just want same f****ng GUI for every mod.
6) GUI is not important for gameplay. SO IT DOESNT MATTER FOR MOD MAKERS.

No. Period. This is stupid and narrow minded and has no place in the thought stream for engine development. There's no good reason that an industrious modder shouldn't be able to make the spring engine work for a TBS game once it's properly abstracted. For a TBS the GUI requirements will be totally different for the GUI requirements for an RTS, similar things hold true for the making of tactical RTS games rather then the common strategically RTS's we mostly have right now for mods. mods where you literally build nothing don't need build and build resource GUI's cluttering up their screens. The goal here is the development of a game engine, not the development of a specific game. The limits of what the engine can do should be pushed by the modders, not the engine developers. Could you imagine what modding HL2 or unreal tournament would be like if the GUI's were not modifiable? Most of the best mods out there today would simply not exist.

AF · Post by AF » 18 Aug 2006, 16:16

ah now i see where arghs rant came from

http://fools.darkstars.co.uk

Fanger · Post by **Fanger** » 18 Aug 2006, 17:45

So let me get this straight...

It is ok for the modder to define what:

Sounds
Units
Artwork
Explosions
Buildings
Names
Faction Names
History
Balance
Scope
Features

are in a mod, but he is not allowed to define what his GUI looks like...WTF... you dont like my GUI to bad go play something else, cause chances are you wont like my mod anywho..

FLOZi · Post by **FLOZi** » 18 Aug 2006, 17:47

Das Bruce wrote:
jcnossen wrote:
Why don't we just give the player an option to choose their own GUI or use a mod-defined one? If the mod doesn't use a custom GUI it can use the default or something.

Would everybody be happy with what?
Making everything a choice for everyone won't exactly result in good design. In any case, it will have to be mostly mod defined in the future, for the reason that the underlying scripting and game features will be defined by the mod as well.
However it could be possible to let the mod define the CEGUI buttons and control, and let the user select a skin.
Victory is mine!

For once we agree.

There are several things that would be nice for 1944 that are not currently possible, GUI wise.

Post by **jcnossen** » 18 Aug 2006, 19:13

Sure trademark, have fun managing the <x> resource of a mod when the GUI only has metal and energy

TradeMark · Post by **TradeMark** » 18 Aug 2006, 20:30

My point was that its not necessary to change the whole GUI by a modder.

If mod needs more buttons and bars, then just make some dynamic GUI, but of course, it would be harder to code.

One thing which i like in spring: i can resize the minimap. And i dont want to lose that feature.
One thing which i hate in spring GUI: i can move the resource bar. And im sure that someone will make it even worser.
I really fear the upcoming GUIs that would be really buggy and unpractical / ugly.

At least make it possible to use own GUI if wanted, shouldnt be hard to code that kind of possibility.

And Fanger comment was really stupif. Like i should stop playing some mod because he makes ugly/unpractical layout?!!! Dont try to rule the world with a mod. Its just a mod.
GUI is not that important for gameplay that you really need to force us to use your GUI.

AF · Post by AF » 18 Aug 2006, 20:36

SILENCE

Modders will setup the default GUI.
The GUI used will be the one the modder intends
Should the user disagree they can go out of there way to change to another GUI possibly from another mod if the other modder allowed it.

Thus I can use the modders GUI, the GUi the modder used for a different faction, or a GUI I created/downloaded.

That seems fair right?

Spring RTS Engine

The New GUI