Matrix Games Forums

Zen question for today....
 
If a user cannot be bothered to read a message before answering, then how can the programmer be bothered to predict which button the user will click and what action the user wants that to take. 
 

 

 
 
There, I flamed myself - thus absolving you of having to do it.
 
 

You are both indeed correct, but from different ways of looking at the screens provided.

The interface of the game should:

1. show which reinforcements you have yet to allocate and ...

2. take you to the Victory Conditions screen for the particular nation concerned and allow you to allocate them.

Lets hope all these issues can be addressed in time, and not nitpick too much.

Murat,
 
I think you are missing the point that was being made:
Interface issues ARE game killers. Not in the sens that the game is unplayable, but in the sens that the game will not be played.

And interfaces are also difficult to reach common ground on, as this thread shows. People react differently and like different styles.

ORIGINAL: Murat

The top window asks you if you want to RETURN AND PLACE. The second one asks if you want to PROCEED. As far as the english language is concerned they are correct and consistent. Again, this is only a trap for people who do not watch what they are doing. Many programs, especially with EULAs, switch up the messages above the botton to force people to pay attention to what they are actually clicking on and agreeing to.

Why in the world would anyone want to play a game where a EULA is the model for the interface???[&:]

Seriously, if you cannot take the time to read a popup then don't play the game, any game. If you just click the popups without reading them then you deserve whatever happens. I never said EULA was the model for the interface my point was that people should pay attention to what they are doing and varied interfaces (like the left button not always bieng the positive result) is conducive to this, which is a benefit.

ORIGINAL: Murat

Seriously, if you cannot take the time to read a popup then don't play the game, any game. If you just click the popups without reading them then you deserve whatever happens.

Well, any game that has a punishing interface deserves to lose customers. I haven't bought EiA yet, and can't say that your defense of the game is doing it any favors.

The issue is not so much "not reading the popup" as it is inadvertently clicking the wrong button to confirm from force of habit.

this interface is far from punishing.  if a player can't be bothered to read what is in front of him and would rather just click away, i fail to see how thats the programmers fault.

Todd

Game interface inconsistency might not be a flaw in your eyes, you might be happy if there is 50 copies of the game sold to 50 hardcore PBEM devotees. 
 
I would however be surprised if the developers that have invested time and money in this product share your view and its unnecisary to attack people that tries to help the developers to improve this product.

ORIGINAL: carnifex

Here's an example of pop-up windows which are inconsistent. These are displayed sequentially. In the Reinforcement phase, first you see this one:



In this case YES means NO. If you click YES you DO NOT PROCEED.

The next window is shown right after that one. In this case, YES means PROCEED.



YES should always mean "go ahead". NO should always mean "cancel action".

I agree with this point.

In the first case the consequence of the action is more clearly spelled out. If you exit you will lose factors (except naval).

In the second case the action should have the consequence more clearly spelled out. "If you exit now you will have no preset victory conditions defined for this conflict. Would you like to return and select preset victory conditions? Yes. No." Or something like it might be more appropriate. Perhaps preset victory conditions are not necessary but only predetermine the outcome of a conflict once you win or lose? If so, that information should be explicitly stated.

I'd like to weigh in on the "friendliness of the user interface debate". Some of us are new to the EiA universe. We may have never played the board game. Don't forget that the user interface is how we experience the game. It IS the game. If the user interface is the least bit confusing you risk losing your fan base. I have beta tested games in the past and user interfaces can make or break a game. If the user interface seems buggy or idiosynratic, people think the game is buggy or idiosyncratic. Would you buy a car of the driver's side door opened backwards at night and forwards during the day?

Making the consequences of a decision clear to the user is a good thing. It is very easy for a programmer to type the consequences of a decision into the game engine. Why make it confusing to understand?

Believe me, if people volunteer that there is something confusing about a game interface there will be at least 10 others who will say nothing. The guys who say nothing will likely remember that Matrix games are hard to understand. If they do, they might just look someplace else for their next purchase.

I say this with all due respect. I'm liking this game and I just want to help improve it.




GSB

Zaquex,

I am not sure if your comment was directed at me, but I'll respond anyways.

I have not said the interface is perfect, IMO it does need some improvements.  That said, I found the issue Carnifex seems to be having the most trouble with to be triavial at best, and a nuisance at worst.  Thats just my opinion, and to be frank, my overall enjoyment of the game does not depend on those two screens being similar.

This game was designed, IMO, to appeal to the majority of people out there who might be interested in playing it.  Is it going to appeal to everybody?  No.  Would I like some things to be different?  Sure.  Do I hope those things get changed?  Yes.  Am I going to stop playing if they aren't addressed?  Seriosuly, I have better things to worry about in a game if a certain table is in descending as opposed to ascending order of information, and the fact of the matter is, it takes less time to read those screens and decide what to do as opposed to typing up the complaint about them.
I submit that if spending three seconds on what the screen says before clicking the button you want to click is a game killer for you, then it's not the games problem.  Besides, if you make a mistake, its just as easy to load the last phase autosave and rectify it.

Todd

A couple of points maybe to take into consideration.

This game is a computer adaptation of a 'boardgame', which dictates how the game works and not necessarily how we would like it to work. And that is what people who have played the boardgame for decades will expect to see.

The length of time the current version of the game has been in development. Some people have been on these boards for years waiting for the game to be released.

Most if not all the programming has been done by one man. And what a great job he has done so far, bearing in mind that the nature of the game (EiA) relies on human input and not necessarily AI.

Yes there are lots of things that can be made better, but if we keep the criticism constructive, then surely EiA will become the game everybody wants. But it fundamentaly still has to be EiA, and not just another strategic Napoleonic computer game that falls by the wayside.

I for one am looking forward to playing this game for a few years yet and will be patient enough to see how it develops, and throw in a few (hopefully) helpful contributions now and then.

ORIGINAL: Thresh

Zaquex,

I am not sure if your comment was directed at me, but I'll respond anyways.

I have not said the interface is perfect, IMO it does need some improvements.  That said, I found the issue Carnifex seems to be having the most trouble with to be triavial at best, and a nuisance at worst.  Thats just my opinion, and to be frank, my overall enjoyment of the game does not depend on those two screens being similar.

This game was designed, IMO, to appeal to the majority of people out there who might be interested in playing it.  Is it going to appeal to everybody?  No.  Would I like some things to be different?  Sure.  Do I hope those things get changed?  Yes.  Am I going to stop playing if they aren't addressed?  Seriosuly, I have better things to worry about in a game if a certain table is in descending as opposed to ascending order of information, and the fact of the matter is, it takes less time to read those screens and decide what to do as opposed to typing up the complaint about them.
I submit that if spending three seconds on what the screen says before clicking the button you want to click is a game killer for you, then it's not the games problem.  Besides, if you make a mistake, its just as easy to load the last phase autosave and rectify it.

Todd

It was actually not adressed to you, and its not game breaking for me how the buttons are labeled and I have all respect for Marshall and his team for getting this project this far.

I do however want to see this game be a success and be continually developed and supported and to this the game interface is crucial.

GSB says it pretty well in his post, and hacking on people who wants to take there time to help is counterproductive.

Murat, in my humble opinion you're - in your zeal - doing this game a disservice, and not only in this thread. You seem to refute pretty simple and obvious comments/suggestions because you think game should be "hard" (which, for you, means also counter-intuitive, having the bad UI by design and many other things).
 
IMO carnifex is 100% right - UI boxes should be designed and worded so that Yes always means "advance, proceed" and No means "cancel and go back". Bombarding the user with sequantial boxes where Yes means "forward" then "back" then "forward" again is very bad game design.
 
And I also agree with whoever said that bad UI **IS** the killer issue with wargames like this. Fixed, and low resolution is also a killer issue I might add (and I expect you to ridicule me for not realising how "hard" this game is meant to be).

Thank you Oleg i completly endorse your post

ORIGINAL: Grapeshot Bob

Believe me, if people volunteer that there is something confusing about a game interface there will be at least 10 others who will say nothing. The guys who say nothing will likely remember that Matrix games are hard to understand. If they do, they might just look someplace else for their next purchase.

And some place else will not likely be much different (eyes of the beholder). Every game has an interface learning curve, mostly because we are dealing with independent programmers in a non-standard industry (read: hobby) and that will never change. The argument seems to be with the tolerance level that some players have over others. Veterans of EiA have more tolerance because they believe that the end result (flawed or not) is to follow the rules as written. Those that are new to the game want conformity to logic, not so much to the rules as a priority, while learning the game.

For the record (and the only reason I have responded), the first priority was to satisfying the needs of those EiA veterans that have waited too long for this system to be ported and unfortunately, with all the change ups that this project endured, there were some “in your face” items (read: interface) that were deemed low priority and thus neglected before release.

Apologies to none, best to all . . . enjoy!

Richard

As a former boardgamer, I've found nothing egregiously problematic in the interface. I just wish I could play two nations against the AI at the same time without running into non-existent password errors. Frustrating.

ORIGINAL: Mynok


As a former boardgamer, I've found nothing egregiously problematic in the interface. I just wish I could play two nations against the AI at the same time without running into non-existent password errors. Frustrating.

Mynok,

Disable password protection in the options menu. If that does not solve the problem in your current game, it will for any new games you start.

Richard

Is the area south of Vienna supposed to be called Gratz, rather than Graz?  Maybe it's a Napoleonic spelling.
 
For the Victory Points chart, maybe these percentage bars could be color-coded for each major power?  Green for being ahead, yellow be being on track, and red for being behind.  Just showing "17%" doesn't help much without calculating where in the game you are, which the computer already knows.  So if I'm at 17% victory at the 16% mark then that could be green, but if I'm at 17% at the 18% mark then that could be red. 

I absolutely love EiA, and I intend to play the heck out of the PC version... and I think the interface is a disaster.

Feedback is very poor. Methods of control are highly inconsistent. Dialog boxes are inconsistent as previously mentioned. The fonts are miserable and again inconsistent. The map is hard to "read" (e.g. you cannot see garrison strengths at a glance, garrison, corp, and depot counters are not differentiated by size as they were, VERY WISELY, in the board game, and so on). Almost no useful right click functionality. No drag and drop. No resizable windows. No standard dialog box/window controls. And so on and so on and so on...

I ave 7 experienced EiA players tackling a PBEM agme and we are all banging our heads hard against the interface. Help us play your game that we have officially invested in!!

Edit: Regarding the victory points screen and the polictiual status display: horrible. Just use numbers, seriously. The diplomacy and surrender screens? Extremely painful to use... Ok I won't start again I will never stop.