Matrix Games Forums

I have been looking into the player interface for playing over the internet.

One thing that I think is required is a little information form/screen that lets the player know what everyone else is doing. Here is a mock up. Though what I am showing here is large, in the program it would be quite small. That is why I have abbreviated the country names (instead of using flags). I want as small a footprint on the screen real estate as possible.

The top of the form would name the current phase. The active side would get the yellow background and the inactive side the gray background. During production, all the major powers would be active - yellow background. The words to the left of the country abbreviations display status and when there are multiple subphases, it shows the name of the subphase (abbreviated).

I was thinking of 5 players when I made up this example. The China/USA player has finished the reinforcement phase for China and is currently placing the USA reinforcements on the map. The France/USSR player started with the USSR and is currently removing air units. Once that is done he will go onto France. The CW player is still pondering which units to scrap and the other two players (Germany/Vichy France & Italy/Japan) are waiting for their turn to go through the reinforcement phase.

I could add additional information, such as which players are playing which major powers, but that doesn't seem necessary. Once a game has started, everyone will know pretty quickly who is playing which countries. I put Vichy France at the bottom of the form so it will be easy to lop it off when Vichy France doesn't exist.

Comments?

Good.
Probably this form can be called from the place in the status bar where the game is stating which phase / step you are in.

I am not sure I understand what the status means here. Does this mean that MWIF is running for Internet mode for Allies but not Axis?

It would be nice to see some sort of indication of whether players are connected to the internet and awake -- or at least to distinguish between players who have the MWIF process running on their pCs and those who don't currently.

ORIGINAL: wfzimmerman

I am not sure I understand what the status means here. Does this mean that MWIF is running for Internet mode for Allies but not Axis?

It would be nice to see some sort of indication of whether players are connected to the internet and awake -- or at least to distinguish between players who have the MWIF process running on their pCs and those who don't currently.

Good point. I will add a small circle colored green if the major power is on-line and a small red square if they are not.

Status colors indicate whether the player is currently making decision for the major power. Most decisions are made by a single major power and if you are playing several, then only one of them is Active at any point in time. When a side is making a decision, that is the responsibility of the team leader for the side; therefore just the team leader will be Active when a side is making a decision (e.g., asking for a reroll for initiative).

A ping feature would be very nice. If you want a players attention, press a ping button (the little active/inactive status circle?), and the players computer should will make a ping noise (or a windows alert could pop up or something).

This will be very useful if I spend 8 minutes doing something (land moves, for instance) and my opponent gets a bit bored and does something else.
Ping should have a separate volume setting from the game music!

ORIGINAL: Incy
A ping feature would be very nice. If you want a players attention, press a ping button (the little active/inactive status circle?), and the players computer should will make a ping noise (or a windows alert could pop up or something).

This will be very useful if I spend 8 minutes doing something (land moves, for instance) and my opponent gets a bit bored and does something else.
Ping should have a separate volume setting from the game music!

Rather than a sound, or in addition to a sound, perhaps a text message? Many players turn the sound off physically (i.e., at the speakers). I cuold make the message blink too.

I understand the problem you are describing but would like a more general solution. Perhaps a short list of standard messages?

Your turn!

I'm done! (for informing your teammates)

??? others ???

Open a window that grabs focus. That way if I'm using a full screen program, I'll see an alert appear above what I'm doing. That and make the feature un-spammable, like a 30 second timer.

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

ORIGINAL: Incy
A ping feature would be very nice. If you want a players attention, press a ping button (the little active/inactive status circle?), and the players computer should will make a ping noise (or a windows alert could pop up or something).

This will be very useful if I spend 8 minutes doing something (land moves, for instance) and my opponent gets a bit bored and does something else.
Ping should have a separate volume setting from the game music!

Rather than a sound, or in addition to a sound, perhaps a text message? Many players turn the sound off physically (i.e., at the speakers). I cuold make the message blink too.

I understand the problem you are describing but would like a more general solution. Perhaps a short list of standard messages?

Your turn!

I'm done! (for informing your teammates)

??? others ???

How about:

The rules clearly allow this.

You're ahead, so I resign.

Prepare to die!

That should pretty much cover it.

ORIGINAL: Zorachus99

Open a window that grabs focus. That way if I'm using a full screen program, I'll see an alert appear above what I'm doing. That and make the feature un-spammable, like a 30 second timer.

I hate windows that steal focus.

See http://www.nimblebooks.com/wordpress/20 ... ing-focus/

ORIGINAL: wfzimmerman

ORIGINAL: Zorachus99

Open a window that grabs focus. That way if I'm using a full screen program, I'll see an alert appear above what I'm doing. That and make the feature un-spammable, like a 30 second timer.

I hate windows that steal focus.

Well, if you are playing a game of MWIF over the internet, I would think that being informed that it is your turn to move would not be an inconvenience. That's even if you were in the middle of donig something on the side.

But if I am wrong, it is easy enough to make the message grabbing focus optional. Though I prefer to keep the number of optional aspects of the player interface within reason.

It isn't the application that steals focus, it's the other player that "taps you" to let you know you're up. If you don't like it, let the other player know!

A popup is nice, but doesn't allow me to go away from the computer. I would like to be able to turn off regular sound, but turn up the volume of a "ping", so that I'll know it's my turn even if doing something else in the next room.

ORIGINAL: Incy

It isn't the application that steals focus, it's the other player that "taps you" to let you know you're up. If you don't like it, let the other player know!

A popup is nice, but doesn't allow me to go away from the computer. I would like to be able to turn off regular sound, but turn up the volume of a "ping", so that I'll know it's my turn even if doing something else in the next room.

I didn't mean to imply No to the ping. I just want it to be supplemented with a visual in case the speakers are off (or the player doesn't have speakers[X(]).

Why not just allow the player to set how messages from other players are brought to his attention? If you want noise, ask for it, if you want popups, ask for that.

There is also the possibility of a system tray icon that can change state as an alert, and tooltips that appear attached to the system tray icon.

ORIGINAL: amwild

Why not just allow the player to set how messages from other players are brought to his attention? If you want noise, ask for it, if you want popups, ask for that.

There is also the possibility of a system tray icon that can change state as an alert, and tooltips that appear attached to the system tray icon.

Ok.

Given your advice, I am now thinking of an indicator (button with text?) that says "New Message" or some such. Clicking on it would bring up a list of messages received that have not yet been viewed. The indicator would change color(s)/shape depending on its status.

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

ORIGINAL: amwild

Why not just allow the player to set how messages from other players are brought to his attention? If you want noise, ask for it, if you want popups, ask for that.

There is also the possibility of a system tray icon that can change state as an alert, and tooltips that appear attached to the system tray icon.

Ok.

Given your advice, I am now thinking of an indicator (button with text?) that says "New Message" or some such. Clicking on it would bring up a list of messages received that have not yet been viewed. The indicator would change color(s)/shape depending on its status.

I thinnk this kind of functionality allready exists in any of the messenger product out there, Yahoo, MSN, Skype, ICQ comes to mind, whiuch I assume that you will be able to run in the background.
Let Steve focus on developing MWIF not a chat/messaging product.

One cannot assume that one's MWiF opponents will have any messenger product (or that they would want to get one, either).
 
I imagine that any messaging module attached to MWiF would be exclusively used either to tell players that it is their turn to play or make some sort of decision, or to inform them of the outcome of a battle or other key in-game event. It hardly needs to be used to pass on idle chitchat or trash talk.

ORIGINAL: composer99
One cannot assume that one's MWiF opponents will have any messenger product (or that they would want to get one, either).

I imagine that any messaging module attached to MWiF would be exclusively used either to tell players that it is their turn to play or make some sort of decision, or to inform them of the outcome of a battle or other key in-game event. It hardly needs to be used to pass on idle chitchat or trash talk.

It is very easy to send simple text messages between players. Code to do that was in CWIF and I retained it in MWIF. The program is already sending thousands of messages (as simple text strings) between players for game events so sending a personal text message/string is trivial.

The difficulty arises when bells and whistles start to get attached to the simple text message. I intend to provide some of those (e.g., a history of messages received/sent and the ability to go back and reread earlier messages). However, there are a lot of additional features possible - it could evolve to a complete file directory or database system. c92nichj was correct in reminding me to not let this get out of hand with feature creep.

That said, I still would like to hear ideas from people on commnications between players and I might cherry pick a few of them to include in MWIF product 1.

An in game way for all the members of a side to share plans & strategy is always good, especially if, as you suggest, you would have a message history to go back and review.

ORIGINAL: Jimm

An in game way for all the members of a side to share plans & strategy is always good, especially if, as you suggest, you would have a message history to go back and review.

Yes. Although I think all I will provide on that is the ability to direct a text message to multiple people at once. The choices for addressees would be: everyone, everyone on my side, specific player(s). If people want to exchange JPGs, they would have to do that outside the game.

ORIGINAL: Shannon V. OKeets

ORIGINAL: Jimm

An in game way for all the members of a side to share plans & strategy is always good, especially if, as you suggest, you would have a message history to go back and review.

Yes. Although I think all I will provide on that is the ability to direct a text message to multiple people at once. The choices for addressees would be: everyone, everyone on my side, specific player(s). If people want to exchange JPGs, they would have to do that outside the game.

Quite so, or cc by tick boxes perhaps.