The UI design and User Experience of the livery screens is not great. I just sat through a load of extra clicks and time just trying to find what I needed. As a professional UI developer and sometimes designer I'd like to offer some of my thoughts on the UI and UX of the livery screen.
(I'm going to write Right Shoulder a lot... apologies)
1: Showing unnecessary items, with unnecessary grouping
So this is me trying to pick a new livery item for my Right Shoulder. In image 1 I can see a tiled grid of all "Right shoulder" cosmetics.
I pick the one I have highlighted:
and it takes me to a secondary grid of items, 90% of which is not relevant to Right Shoulder slot.
Why aren't all the "Right shoulder" items just displayed in a flat list when I pick "Right shoulder"?
What is the reasoning behind having to drop into a nested list of items of which I cannot equip to my Right Shoulder?
Solution: Filter out all non-equippable items to this slot and display them in a flat list.
2: UI design and discoverability of items
Why are you using a grid layout with no information about these items besides the graphic?
The only way I can read what the item is is by hovering over each one individually, and then the label appears all the way over on the other side of the screen. Relevant information should be near the area I'm interacting with.
Whatever happened to a good old card pattern with a thumbnail AND a description. Super quick mockup in Paint below:
Just have the items in a single column list, using a UI pattern like this (that you use in other areas of the game). People will be able to find the livery items they want quicker, and won't have a bunch of unnecessary items thrown at them
(I'm going to write Right Shoulder a lot... apologies)
1: Showing unnecessary items, with unnecessary grouping
So this is me trying to pick a new livery item for my Right Shoulder. In image 1 I can see a tiled grid of all "Right shoulder" cosmetics.
I pick the one I have highlighted:
and it takes me to a secondary grid of items, 90% of which is not relevant to Right Shoulder slot.
Why aren't all the "Right shoulder" items just displayed in a flat list when I pick "Right shoulder"?
What is the reasoning behind having to drop into a nested list of items of which I cannot equip to my Right Shoulder?
Solution: Filter out all non-equippable items to this slot and display them in a flat list.
2: UI design and discoverability of items
Why are you using a grid layout with no information about these items besides the graphic?
The only way I can read what the item is is by hovering over each one individually, and then the label appears all the way over on the other side of the screen. Relevant information should be near the area I'm interacting with.
Whatever happened to a good old card pattern with a thumbnail AND a description. Super quick mockup in Paint below:
- The user can clearly see the name of all items in a list
- The user can easily scan the entire list to find what they want instead of having to manually hover over each one.
Just have the items in a single column list, using a UI pattern like this (that you use in other areas of the game). People will be able to find the livery items they want quicker, and won't have a bunch of unnecessary items thrown at them