UI Inconsistencies need to be sorted out still

Sylow · Aug 10, 2021

We still have a number of UI inconsistencies. Just to list some:

1. Community Goal page not built for any other input than the mouse.

Steps to reproduce:

Go to Starport Services.
Go to Mission Board.
Go to Community goals and select an active community goal.
Try to get to the "Progress" and "Information" fields on top by using any other input than the mouse pointer.
Try to leave the community goal page by using UI back.

The UI up/down/left/right can only be used to navigate a part of this interface, while other parts are forgotten. And the standard UI back is, once again, forgotten.

Fix: Upgrade the interface to use existing input bindings.

2. Ground Terminal not really built for any input device.

Steps to reproduce:

Go to any ground terminal. Note that you at this moment are using keyboard and mouse.
Use the ground terminal. Note that the mouse still turns your camera, you are unable to move, but the game now wants you to navigate the menu on the terminal by using UI up/down/left/right.
Select any menu on the ground terminal.
It now switches to the HUD menu, where you can use your mouse for input again.

Sidenote: this -might- be better for somebody not using a HOTAS, as he probably then has the UI up/down/left/right on the keyboard. But due to how the menus are nested, most HOTAS users have one 4 way switch with up/down/left/right and one 4 way switch with up/down/previous panel/next panel. And while ground combat got its own section on the keyboard binding menu, this UI section is shared. Which means that anybody using such a configuration, whenever using a ground terminal, has to switch to the joystick for just one menu item, then return to keyboard and mouse. That is really bad UI design.

Fix option 1: the clumsy solution is to move the UI bindings to space and give us a second set of UI bindings for ground gameplay. Not beautiful, not good in any way, but definitely matching FDs standard since a while.

Fix option 2: change the one "on-terminal" menu in game to already open as HUD menu. There is no real advantage to the current implementation and the change would make the UI more consistent and better to use.

3. Inconsistent Galaxy and System map.

Steps to reproduce:

Go to Apex, select the "long range shuttle" option.
Select a nearby system.
Click it once. See that it draws a line there, nothing else happens.
Click it again. See that it gets centered. (Yes, double-clicks in this game work even if you wait a minute in between. )
Long-click it. See that the game switches to the system map.
Click a planet with an Apex-Destination. See that it gets marked, but not much else happens.
Click it again. See that it gets centered.
Long-click it. See that the game switches to the planetary map.
Click an Apex-Destination on the planetary map. See that it gets centered already on the first click.
Click it as much as you like. See that there is no double-click action present.
Long-click it to book your flight.
Don't take the taxi, but rather now go to your ship. (Yes, Odyssey indeed has a small appendage where you can enter and fly spaceships! )
Go to the left side panel, select "Galaxy Map"
Select a nearby system.
Click it once. See that nothing happens.
Double-click it. See that it gets centered.
Long-click it. See that you plot a route to it.
Use UI right to get to the right side menu. See that you now have to use UI down for 8! times to get to the system map. Above it, there is an option which already is selected, several things which you don't really need, etc. Also note that the "show trade data" and "buy trade data" are far apart.
After using UI down for 8 times, to do the same which the similar galaxy map for Apex is the default action, you can switch to the system map.
Click once on a planet with bases on it. See that you get the right side menu, nothing else happens.
Click on it again (see "very long double-click") and see that it gets centered.
Long-click on it and see that it plots a route to this body.
If you want to zoom in (the default action of the Apex menu) you here have to use UI right and then "only" 7 times UI down. Do that so you are now on the planet map.
Click a base just once. See that it not only gets the right side menu, but also gets centered.
Click it as much as you like. See that there is no double-click action present.
Long-click it. See that you plot a route to it.
Now ponder how different the two interfaces are, and why people consider the new interface to be clumsy and cumbersome. (If you really want to find out, launch Horizon and see how many key presses you have to do there to achieve the same goal. You might be surprised on how efficient it is and wonder, where those people who designed that interface might work by now. )

Possible fix: Note that you use long-click for all the Apex default action. You use double-click to center a system, a single short click does nothing. So an compact solution could be:

In the galaxy map a single-click on a system centers it. (Both Apex and ship based.)
In the galaxy map a double-click on a system plots the route to this system. (Ship based only.)
In the galaxy map a long-click on a system switches to the system map. (Both Apex and ship based. )
In the system map a single-click on a body centers it. (Both Apex and ship-based. )
In the system map a double-click on body plots the route to it. (Ship based only. )
In the galaxy map a long-click on a body switches to the planetary map (Both Apex and ship based. )
In the planetary map a single-click on a base centers it. (No change needed here. )
In the planetary map a double-click on a base plots the route to it. (Both Apex and ship based. )
In the planetary map a long-click on a base plots the route to it. (No change needed here. It's not completely consistent to the design, but people might be used to it. So unless we have something better, we can also keep it like this. )

Note that this is merely one idea on how to make things more efficient. A number of others are possible. At any rate, this fix would give the maps for the galaxy, systems and planets a more consistend behaviour, no matter if you use Apex or your own ship, while also putting the most frequenty used actions on the input button, instead of hiding them at a rather inconvenient 7th or 8th place in a menu on the side.

Sylow · Aug 10, 2021

And yes. I know that "Suggestions" is where ideas and suggestions go to die. I don't expect any developer to ever take a look at this. But the bug report thing does not allow me to add anything of this size.

Elfener · Aug 10, 2021

2. No, I like being able to look around while using a terminal - it's not like you can use a mouse on most of the cockpit UI either.

Sylow · Aug 10, 2021

Elfener said:
2. No, I like being able to look around while using a terminal - it's not like you can use a mouse on most of the cockpit UI either.

But you can't look around while actually using it. It is just the first menu. Does the ability that you can look around in that one state of the terminal, having used it but not selected anything yet, really make a difference for you? And is that difference really more important than consistent UI design and more important than everybody who does not play with exactly your keybinding setup?

Sylow · Aug 16, 2021

A number of views, no comments. Does that mean that nobody cares, or that people agree but have given up on it?

Fake Newts · Aug 16, 2021

Probably a combination of the two.

This forum does have a large "it's fine how it is even/especially if it's on fire and kicking you in the balls at the same time" contingent, who probably think terrible UI is immersive for some reason (it's a dystopian future? I guess?). Then there's the contingent who just pass by once in a while to dream about how cool it'd be to drink a cocktail with Chewbacca while browsing their collection of space vinyl in a game that clearly doesn't exist and would be absurdly boring if it did.

Long lists of irritating UI inconsistencies are for a niche audience.

FX2K · Aug 16, 2021

Just a few observations from me, recently...

4. Passenger Missions board.
When you open the missions board, using mouse input and go through the motions to select a passenger mission and assign cabins, you cannot select the top row of passenger cabins at all. (or at least, I can't 3440x1440).

If I then use my hotas instead, when I press up, I get a faction info popup from the previous screen, it shouldn't exist here, but I can then move the selection to the top row of passenger cabins.

5. After a long break, I decided to unlock Broo yesterday. After delivering the rare commodity, my inventory would still show it existing in my inventory, overlaid with inventory empty (or similar). If I then went to any of the options in the right inventory panel, to discard the non-existent items, the popup menu would show and would become locked in.
Leaving the station and jumping out of the system would still show me having this in my inventory and trigger interdictions / the illegal cargo notice.
Re-logging, rectified it.

6. Sometimes, when you go to the left panel > contacts, to request docking, the menu can stick and no input from a hotas works at all. You have to look away from the UI panel, go back to it, change tabs, then change back again, for it to work as expected.

Sylow · Aug 16, 2021

FX2K said:
Just a few observations from me, recently...

Thanks. Please keep it coming. I only wrote the most striking things i saw and i admit that i for example have not even tried a passenger mission yet since Odyssey launched. In the unlikely case that a developer ever bothers to care for it, the more we have, the better.

Sylow · Aug 18, 2021

And again it's slipping down the list. I should add some point like "and make these improvements open only" into the suggestion and it would ride a dead horse to stay at the top of the list for weeks to come...

zombieapocalypse · Aug 18, 2021

The ground terminals are such a horrible user experience. Just take me straight to a dedicated menu screen.

Sylow · Aug 20, 2021

zombieapocalypse said:
The ground terminals are such a horrible user experience. Just take me straight to a dedicated menu screen.

Aye. And to keep the thread more on top, i would suggest to keep the current design for Open, to maximize the grief there, while PG and solo players should get all the UI upgrades.

Sylow · Aug 23, 2021

It's monday. And the open vs. closed discussion for the HUD still has not caught on.

T200 · Aug 23, 2021

Fake Newts said:
Probably a combination of the two.

This forum does have a large "it's fine how it is even/especially if it's on fire and kicking you in the balls at the same time" contingent, who probably think terrible UI is immersive for some reason (it's a dystopian future? I guess?). Then there's the contingent who just pass by once in a while to dream about how cool it'd be to drink a cocktail with Chewbacca while browsing their collection of space vinyl in a game that clearly doesn't exist and would be absurdly boring if it did.

Long lists of irritating UI inconsistencies are for a niche audience.

I mean I like immersive stuff that's complicated but I'm not really a fan of the interfaces in elite because they don't contribute to a really immersive environment.

Sylow · Aug 25, 2021

Fake Newts said:
Long lists of irritating UI inconsistencies are for a niche audience.

Actually i think no. Improving the UI would make things much more convenient for any active player. (Sidenote: i strongly believe that we have a good number of people in the forums, who since years are not actually playing any more. And i also have to admit that since Odyssey, my activity levels are down. )

The problem rather might be that the thing is a bit to theoretical. People just handle the downgraded and non-intuitive interface and get along with it. Making it more consistent and streamlined would drastically improve their gaming experience, but before the change is not made, they don't realize it and rather focus on more glamourous parts.

Which of course might very well be what you wrote in your posting, and i just spelled it out differently.

Fake Newts · Aug 25, 2021

It was just a joke implying that threads about concrete and universal improvements to the game are less appealing to the forumgoers than yet another slap fight about open vs solo. I was commenting on the forums rather than the game.

Sylow · Aug 25, 2021

Fake Newts said:
It was just a joke implying that threads about concrete and universal improvements to the game are less appealing to the forumgoers than yet another slap fight about open vs solo. I was commenting on the forums rather than the game.

That unfortunately is not a joke but a very accurate observation.

HRDiagram · Aug 25, 2021

Fake Newts said:
It was just a joke implying that threads about concrete and universal improvements to the game are less appealing to the forumgoers than yet another slap fight about open vs solo. I was commenting on the forums rather than the game.

This

If you want to spot a good, QoL suggestion on this section of the forums, look for the threads with no responses.

I just wish the CMs or Devs had a way to acknowledge that the post has been checked.

Many great suggestions die in silence,whilst the latest Open vs Solo, or Teleportation, threads always gain audience and never go anywhere.