Messages

241

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 05, 2013, 06:37:29 pm »

I really like that you added back in the total column and changed the figure to the right to be the lifetime improvement of a stat. That's pretty awesome.

Well, to be fair, I wasn't thinking of a lifetime sum of stat improvements, but rather temporary ones. As in, how much it has grown since the end of the last mission. This would show exactly how much exp the soldier has earned after each mission and avoids overly long numbers crowding the graph (image what would be having several +150-ish in every character in a later game phase. Not exactly visually appealing).


EDIT:

Sorry. Just seen your edit. Deleted half of this post in consequence of it. I really like it as it is now (the second picture). Very clever way to reorganize the screen, I must admit. I totally subscribe for that version, as even the screen looks very well balanced right now.

EDIT 2:

And here's a slightly retouched version of mine. I get the feeling the portrait frame looks a bit better when separated. Also added a slight black edge around the picture to stop the light brown from the coveralls to merge with the light purple and gray from the frame. What do you folks think?

242

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 05, 2013, 02:57:13 pm »

I hope you take no offense 54x, but I made another edit based on your latest changes. First I better explain what I thought it was wrong with your latest mockup. I found it easier to make my points directly on the image.



(Accidentally saved in jpeg, so sorry for the low quality)

Either way, after taking a good look at it, I feel the current stats should be plainly visible, hence why we should keep the original stats column. I do like your base stats at the bottom of each bar (reinforces the idea of base value, and the faded colour conveys the notion that these "belong to the past" and are not so important anymore), though, so I think that's a keeper. Additionally instead of having the current stats at the end of each bar, why not showing the value change instead? Also, at this point, I believe the little pencil icon is now useless because name changing can be handled at the customize menu.

Based on these, here's my latest mockup:



Although it reverts back a little to the original, I feel it conveys information more effectively, and adds just the right bits of additional data in a simple and non-busy way. Positioning the scrolling arrows back at the top also means the player doesn't need to move around between scrolling profiles, changing the name, and closing the menu.

243

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 05, 2013, 02:49:28 am »

I'd still really like to see a readout of the base stats versus the improved stats in numbers on that graph, and just display the base stats for psi power. (That way it will be obvious to people that it doesn't improve)

Yeah, I sort of agree with that too. I really liked the way you improved the stats bars.

244

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 05, 2013, 02:36:23 am »

That's a very good point, however we can always squash the graph up a bit again, and there's additional horizontal room to squash the paperdoll. I can do another mockup if the palette problems aren't an issue- I'm looking into that now, I just have to rebuild the basescape palette in an actual .PAL file first so I can load it over the paperdoll images.

Due to this I kinda switched opinions again, though, so might still be preferable to get the full body paperdoll on the separate customize screen after all. Having lots of readily available information in the same screen is good, but keeping squashing things for the sake of superfluous and purely aesthetic content without measuring the consequences shouldn't really be the way, methinks. A character screen should be concise. The reason why I first suggested this portrait thingy is because it would allow the player to identify individual soldiers easily while keeping most of the original looks intact.

Besides there also this thread, which proposes the creation of a stat-accessible equip/customize screen, which would likely work better with what you're trying to do here.

245

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 05, 2013, 12:44:16 am »

Why would you want to use personal armor paperdolls in this case either way? What really matters is to identify the soldier, not to show him wearing a suit of armor (although it would be cool to have something like that too). For that a simple cutout of the coveralls paperdolls serves perfectly. Unless you're already thinking armor customization features and mods, which isn't really the point here, anyway.

246

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 04, 2013, 09:53:46 pm »

I do believe modifying the graphics slightly would make it legal (especially considering the openxcom mods site, containing many graphics mods made from edited pieces belonging to the original graphics). I'll try to find out more about this matter. In the meantime, there's nothing stopping us from making more drafts.

247

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 04, 2013, 09:38:06 pm »

That would imply replacing all soldier faces. But I do believe modified artwork would be legally allowed. Perhaps if the portraits are slightly edited / improved.

Keeping the faces but creating new clothes to replace the coveralls, for instance.

248

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 04, 2013, 09:29:14 pm »

Can that be done in the long run?

249

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 04, 2013, 09:26:21 pm »

one word:

palette.

inventory screens use battlescape palette, not basescape.

Does that mean it's impossible to use character portraits in the stat screens?

250

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 04, 2013, 02:56:36 pm »

there is one more thing that might become a problem: with the full soldier displayed, the rest is squashed together, which works in english, but the descriptions might be longer in other languages. that would be one real reason for limiting the image to the soldier's head in this view

That's a very important point you got there. I completely forgot about it. In that case, a concept like this will require some serious testing with all translations available, in case it goes ahead.

EDIT:

And here's another portrait-only quick draft I came up with, by using some of 54x's wonderful space-saving ideas, but based on moriarty's point regarding sentence length in other languages, thus reverting back to the old full screen bar chart. I used the little pencil icon to replace the "Customize" button and paired it right next to the character photo, because I think it makes little sense to have a customization menu and have separate button for editing the name exclusively. I did enjoy 54x's improved bar numbering system as well, but considering I'm using MSpaint to do these, it would be far too much work for me to edit it all properly at this moment. Although I like it, I still can't shake the feeling it is looking a little too hackish. So please edit away.

251

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 04, 2013, 02:29:52 pm »

those helmet-less versions for the equip screen have been done before, and yes, I also think those are way cooler than the original

about the "full soldier" vs. "only face" in the equip screen, I'm still not sure. but that mock-up looks so cool, I would really like to see that in the game

For me, it boils down too how much condensed information the character profile conveys at once. If all of this is directly accessible to the player in a single screen, not it will only save a lot of time, but it also leaves enough room for advanced soldier customization mods. I think 54x came up with a great concept here, the only downside being that the screen may feel a little too crowded/busy, which might lead to some confusion, especially with the new players. I too get the impression that we're messing with the smoothness and the simplicity of the original design here, which was quite frankly brilliant, in my opinion. But still, this is one of those cases where I believe the quicker access to essential information justifies mutilating the original menu designs.

252

Suggestions / Re: The unused? PSI button

« on: January 04, 2013, 01:53:34 pm »

Psi in my psi? It's more likely than you think.

But seriously, now, I can see the use of it for multiplayer games, but I don't really think the player should have the power to make a psi-powered alien use his own psi-powers on other people. It sounds not only incredibly game breaking, but also theoretically absurd, even from a sci-fi point of view.

253

Suggestions / Re: Character portraits on soldier stat screens, or gender field

« on: January 04, 2013, 01:42:55 pm »

That's a very interesting mockup 54x, but personally, I still think the soldier's face should be displayed in the character profile, because it allows for quicker identification, and helps the player to familiarize with the character, even when he/she is behind a heavy suit of armor. Perhaps we can make it so that the profile shows a helmet-less version of the armored suits, kinda like they did in TFTD. It's a character chart after all. Why wouldn't it include the soldier's face by default?

254

Suggestions / Re: Alien Melee Attacks

« on: January 04, 2013, 01:34:38 am »

Makes no difference to me.                                                                                                                                                          ^
                                                                                                                                                                                                     |
Also, use the MODIFY POST button, instead of triple posting, please. It's right here ------------------------------------------------------

255

Suggestions / Re: Alien Melee Attacks

« on: January 03, 2013, 09:23:57 pm »

They might work as decent placeholders, but in the long run, I still believe we should ask a proper pixel artist to do set of icons.