Pretty Easy to use Vs Lots of Features

[ZellSF]

So because it's a gaming application it must completely ignore good interface design in favor of annoying you? That's really, really not good reasoning.

[smoth]

I have heard many people with that mentality zell, I'll paraphrase for you:

It's a game it must completely ignore graphic design in favor of lesser graphics to not reduce the gameplay quality?

people seem to think that there are invisible sliders where usability cannot go with a well prepared layout. That people cannot have a good looking cake that tastes good.

I think what the question really should be is does an advanced interface with complex features or simple interface with reduced features appeal to you. Advanced interfaces are not friendly to beginners but get huge amounts of love from vets of the stuff. Ultimately I think the lobby should be simple with and advanced feature button to open up the lobby once the user is less bewildered by it.

[AF]

No because its a gaming application we shouldnt design it with a word processor application in mind

Do you turn your xbox on and find a windows 95 style program with rectangular buttons and clunky scrollbars? Or do you see flashy transitions and skinned buttons? People here are expecting a game when they download the installer and run the lobby, we need to give them a proper frontend not a hodge podge of standard windows controls.

Even websites do a better job of usability while not using a single standard GUI kit control.

What's more, who said that usability and gaming dont mix? graphics are a core part of usability, and to say that you cant have good user interface design with good graphics is quite insulting to game developers.

Now I know I could build a uber fancy graphical frontend that would wow everybody and be extremely easy and intuitive to use, yet you Zeixx would absolutely hate it because of that. You want the program to run windowed and you want it to look just like all the other windows on your desktop. You want consistency on a desktop scale.

Most games on the other hand do not do this because they run full screen. This is the norm. Spring lobby clients are the exception not the rule because of how they run windowed trying to fit into the desktop looknfeel.

So while I'm aware of a minority who will always want windows style windowed lobbies, I dont want to know what the minority wants, I want to know what the majority wants. There'll always be some way of pleasing the minority but there is little information on what the majority wants. Its always the niche minority dictating what they want.


hmmm smoth you posted while I was typing, but I agree with you!!!

[ZellSF]

people seem to think that there are invisible sliders where usability cannot go with a well prepared layout. That people cannot have a good looking cake that tastes good.

Placing things where they aren't expected to be, making them behave ways they aren't supposed to be and using animations to distract you from what you're supposed to be doing, isn't good for usability. You can however avoid doing all that and still end up with a good looking layout.

So while I'm aware of a minority who will always want windows style windowed lobbies

I'm going to guess that it's just a wild guess that that is actually a "minority" as computers are important tools, they're used to do work, chat, entertain, you can't just make an application that requires a bit of waiting fullscreen and demanding of all your attention. It just doesn't make sense.

[AF]

I'm going to guess that it's just a wild guess that that is actually a "minority" as computers are important tools, they're used to do work, chat, entertain, you can't just make an application that requires a bit of waiting fullscreen and demanding of all your attention. It just doesn't make sense.

Now imagine if this was done by 99% of all commercial games, oh wait, it is done this way by 99%+ of all commercial games.

Now if we were talking about MS Word or firefox even then there are users who expect it to run full screen. Statistics from windows feedback program and usability studies also show most people tend to focus on one task at a time.

Are you suggesting that games like starcraft Total Annihilation supreme commander, all the Command and Conquer series, galactic civilization etc etc should never have bothered writing front ends in their engines and instead made programs that did the same job and looked like the rest of windows?

[ZellSF]

Now imagine if this was done by 99% of all commercial games, oh wait, it is done this way by 99%+ of all commercial games.

Now if we had the same amount of users as 99% of all commercial games, I would agree it would be a decent idea; we don't.

Now if we were talking about MS Word or firefox even then there are users who expect it to run full screen. Statistics from windows feedback program and usability studies also show most people tend to focus on one task at a time.

Yes, and the task where you're idling waiting for a game (or just chatting) should be a background task, and not the focused one.

[Jasper1984]

Not allowing people to run windowed is just a bad idea. People currently do other stuff while they wait, and they won't be able to do this as conveniently as they are used to. The practical effect could just be that people decide to not wait, and just play way less games. I can not necessarilly alt-tab, at least spring itself cant.(If an error brings me out of it and i go back the resolution gets set to my default.) Even if i could, i wouldn't like alt-tabbing to/from full screen for the lobby.

If 99% of the other games have it full screen, and there was waiting time before starting a game, they were simply wrong in doing so.

I do think, however, that making the interface (preferably optionally) more game-like is a good idea. Also, perhaps the mods should be able to provide different looks too, and even define behavior of some parts.(Like, perhaps, the campaign selection and such.)
Can the current lobby do this, switch theme? 'sudo springlobby' gives me 'the serious theme', so for linux, so the answer is probably a yes. (Then probably windows too.) If i am right, that is excellent, we got optionally system theme, and can modify to 'game' themes.(Within the restrictions gtk(?) has.)

Edit: Internet messengers might want to launch programs that interact between users too. Basically spring lobby is a internet messenger. It is too much to ask that it is implemented as such, but i just gotta say it :). (Ok that wouldn't be very game-like either.)

[YokoZar]

I'm going to guess that it's just a wild guess that that is actually a "minority" as computers are important tools, they're used to do work, chat, entertain, you can't just make an application that requires a bit of waiting fullscreen and demanding of all your attention. It just doesn't make sense.

Now imagine if this was done by 99% of all commercial games, oh wait, it is done this way by 99%+ of all commercial games.

The lobby is the interface. The players want to play the game, not the interface. If it helps, think of the difference between Steam and Half Life here.

A lobby client is something I want to leave open and wait until my friends come online to form a game. It's a glorified chat, IM, and game launcher application. Demanding users pay attention to the lobby client during that game setup process with flashy movies, sounds, and so on is counter to that goal.

[Masure]

Steam is the best example of an efficient and beautiful HMI. No pimp for nothing, games advertisement and shop is nice and clear.

[AF]

steam btw makes no effort to make its buttons and ui controls fit in with the rest of the system.

[hoijui]

Steam, though it kind of sticks to the basics, it lacks the performance expected for that. it is very unresponsive. the idea of Steam is good. if it is so unresponsive cause they use their own GUI stuff, then it is a really stupid idea to not use native GUI.

[AF]

Indeed it is unresponsive but not because it doesn't use native GUI controls. There's this grand illusion that native == responsive which in some cases is a load of tosh.

To hammer the point, lets look at an example where there are no native controls defined, facebook. When you click a button on facebook the response is not immediate. There's no ticker symbol it just stays the same and only changes when the action has actually occurred, so if your on a slow connection or facebook has heavy load it is very unresponsive and users are left scratching their heads.

Thus I would blame the GUI programmers at steam, not the decision to use custom GUI controls.

[Tobi]

The fact you write your own GUI controls however does mean that YOU need to worry about responsiveness, instead of being able to blame it to the operating system / framework / whatever. (And in general this operating system / framework / whatever will already have fully debugged working responsive controls.)

In other words, I think writing your own GUI controls is silly for anything were you don't have either very much money (to pay developers), very much time, or don't have good operating system / framework GUI controls.

(Unless you write GUI controls as a hobby ofc, then it doesn't matter )

[momfreeek]

With any other game. the lobbies are simple and graphical. Every stage through website/box, installation. lobby and game has a unified style. You always feel like you're in the game and it never becomes hard work to figure out what you're supposed to be doing. The fact that spring is free doesn't even work to its advantage in these stages. If you've payed money for a game, you're probably prepared to make a little effort to get the thing working. If its downloaded for free, you can just drop it at anytime and not lose a thing. You don't waste another hour on something thats unfamiliar and puts you off in the first 10 mins.

Steam is kind of different.. it hosts many games which all have different styles. Still, go to the steam website, download steam, install it and run it and you are faced with a unified style thoughout. You are never faced with a large number of confusing controls, and if you see a windows control its probably a fatal error.

I wouldn't change to a simple client now, cause I appreciate the features, but back then a simple client with just the few important buttons would been far more inviting. If you want to minimise the number of players lost in their initial few steps, I think a simplified lobby with a unified spring style would be a very good thing. I guess you could hide all the features inside it too, but if that confuses the focus why bother? We already have well supported, full featured clients.

[Jasper1984]

Firstly, of course the makers should decide what (not) to do with the lobby, thank you for what we have. Further is it established that at least the ability to be windowed is a 'requirement'. Edit: questionmark.. how did i forget to put it here

Secondly, i really like how springlobby integrates with my desktop, but i wouldn't really mind if it didn't and look good. (See attachment, btw i usually have all my windows full-screen.) This thread seems to have good ideas on how to design the lobby.(I suppose you should read it before making more suggestions.) They already have the idea of allowing one to download via the lobby itself,('get games' in one of the pics) which i think is a good one. Could make downloading mods, otacontent, and new maps much more user friendly.

Installing spring itself on linux is pretty easy. I have never installed it on windows, so i wouldn't know if it is an hassle.

Game recording selection could be nicer. Days ago, hours ago, minutes ago, optionally, would be nice. Also a picture somehow representing the match would also be nice, if anyone finds a good way of doing it.

Maybe the lobby should differentiate between both binary and mods so that other games may plug in in the future. Already seen a little discussion about Glest on this. This can also help get more people in on testing newer versions. Last version seemed to make everyone a test subject, inefficient since a few actually produce feedback. People hosting should defaultly use the newest stable version, and it should put a good notice when you try an older one. Both mod, engine devs and regular users can use this. Combining engine and mod devs might prevent mods plugging engine bugs aswel. (Not sure if that happens, anyway could produce some useful modder-dev interaction.)

Can we say something about what mods place is in the lobby? Or what modders want for it? I think they should have an ability to have a look some dynamic things. I do not think they should be able to turn off seeing other mods in the list unless set so by the user.
When we have campaign and/or missions how do we should that to the user? I think mods should have a lot of freedom in this, but a list of nicely separated pictures with a title and maybe a short text beneath would be a good way of doing missions. Also, missions not in reach yet shouldn't be doable. Might of course not be that simple, for instance maybe a mods wants to give choices during the campaign, like C&C, Dungeon Keeper, etc. did. That would be more work, making more missions, of course, and could, for instance make use of a map. Missions(Edit: as-in lone missions outside campaign.) do not fit in a linear pattern and should probably be represented as such.
PS i played with bold to mark a headline inside each text, good/bad? Edit: removed it.. might give people wrong idea.