UI & UX Planet Coaster (and zoo) 1 vs 2

[FutureFear]

I was excited to play Planet coaster 2 today, until the UI and UX became quite frustrating and cumbersome to handle. (on PC)

@frontier:
I don't understand why so many UI and UX changes are made and things are placed behind several more clicks, different menus and lack of or different short-cut keys, let alone change our keyboard inputs.
I can understand changes if they would improve the UI/UX but in general we all know more clicks = bad.
I can also understand it's not easy to design UI and UX for crossplatforms.
However when you're releasing the game on many different platform it seems obvious to take those UI/UX needs into account for that platform.

Same is true for camera controls when building coasters; where is the free camera movement when editing/building the coaster? (didn't see/find any controls/toggles)
The camera setting are found in the coaster edit setting tab (quite well hidden) -> remains clunky UI though.

 

[ohirome]

It's completely bummed me out haha. It's like playing an entirely different game. I'm uninstalling and reinstalling currently, but the free camera is in there. It's just so, so cumbersome for PC players.

 

[Nemmie]

The free camera?
If you mean the more precise one, you can just press T like in the first game to activate it

 

[Swjosdotschka]

The UI is a living nightmare for me, not gonna lie. Menue in menue in menue, not intuitive at all, not logical even.

 

[FutureFear]

The free camera?
If you mean the more precise one, you can just press T like in the first game to activate it

I mean when building a coaster, the camera moves and adjusts with each peace of the coaster you build.
-> In the old game, we have the option to toggle this on an off, with a (small) button on the building UI.

 

[FutureFear]

The UI is a living nightmare for me, not gonna lie. Menue in menue in menue, not intuitive at all, not logical even.

True, and as a (graphic) designer myself it's even more frustrating given it's my job to create UI/UX.
The pain of seeing such a clunky UI on an otherwise really fun game is so sad.

The worst part is knowing what is possible in UI design and having the skills to fix it and yet remain powerless to actually change it in the game.
Also it's not that they can't make good UI, because several things were good in Planet Coaster 1 and Planet Zoo.
It's like inventing a square wheel when you already have a round one... lolz.

 

[sma97]

There is a free camera mode when building coasters. It is in the configuration tab of the menu that appears in the right of the screen while building coasters.

 

[FutureFear]

There is a free camera mode when building coasters. It is in the configuration tab of the menu that appears in the right of the screen while building coasters.

Thanks!
It's still quite well hidden though behind another tab & click...

 

[wyldremix]

The UI has been such a negative experience for me that I've found myself only being able to play around with the game for short periods of time before the frustration sets in. Things just seemed so much easier and user friendly to do in the first PlanCo and in PlanZoo compared with this one. One of my biggest dislikes has been building pieces clumped in with the scenery menus and why is everything so blueprint forward over custom - rides and scenery both. I don't want to use someone else's creations, but design and create my own, that's what makes the game so much more fun by being able to put your own spin on everything. Things just seem like they have become way to overly complicated compared to the earlier planet titles which makes no sense why this direction was chosen.

 

[Ramm]

It is because Planet Coaster 2 is a console game.

People who play it on their tv from a distance on the sofa in the living room probably only can bare so much information on the screen.

While normal PC people have a decent desktop on their desk usually, most with multiple monitor setups too so we are used to seeing information.

Now we have to keep clicking to figure out where we are and what we want.

We just need a complete redesign for the Planet Coaster 2 PC UI because this sh*t is unbearable.

UI design just went completely downhill in the past few years. Blame consoles, tablets and smartphones for it.

A good UI designer that can design good, initiative UI's for PC software is worth gold. Look at older games that are PC only. All have genious UI's.

Consoles, tablets and smartphones came into the picture and it all went downhill.

We are to suffer because casual players somehow need this

 

[Swjosdotschka]

The UI has been such a negative experience for me that I've found myself only being able to play around with the game for short periods of time before the frustration sets in. Things just seemed so much easier and user friendly to do in the first PlanCo and in PlanZoo compared with this one. One of my biggest dislikes has been building pieces clumped in with the scenery menus and why is everything so blueprint forward over custom - rides and scenery both. I don't want to use someone else's creations, but design and create my own, that's what makes the game so much more fun by being able to put your own spin on everything. Things just seem like they have become way to overly complicated compared to the earlier planet titles which makes no sense why this direction was chosen.

So much this. The game has made it more complicated for me to be creative on my own. Put a hurdle on it. Blueprints seem to be prefered over custom and the building menue is just so clustered.
I can also agree I can only play for a short period of time before I rage quit and I haven't been motivated to play for days now. For a brand new game I looked forward to, that's not normal for me.

 

[eznapor]

Completely agree with everything here. The UI is abysmal, and I don't understand why they didn't just build on Planet Zoo's excellent UI. I hope in this coming update in December, the "UI enhancements" will be fixing all of this and returning it to the design language of Planet Coaster 1 and Planet Zoo. Otherwise this game will be an embarrassment for them, their design integrity, and their legacy of computer games.

 

[FutureFear]

It is because Planet Coaster 2 is a console game.

People who play it on their tv from a distance on the sofa in the living room probably only can bare so much information on the screen.

While normal PC people have a decent desktop on their desk usually, most with multiple monitor setups too so we are used to seeing information.

Now we have to keep clicking to figure out where we are and what we want.

We just need a complete redesign for the Planet Coaster 2 PC UI because this sh*t is unbearable.

UI design just went completely downhill in the past few years. Blame consoles, tablets and smartphones for it.

A good UI designer that can design good, initiative UI's for PC software is worth gold. Look at older games that are PC only. All have genious UI's.

Consoles, tablets and smartphones came into the picture and it all went downhill.

We are to suffer because casual players somehow need this

Exactly as I said, crossplatform UI design isn't easy, different controls, different view distance, etc.
However it doesn't mean they should only design for one type of platform. They released the game on multiple, thus should consider UI/UX for all of them.

As a designer myself that has worked on UI/UX for websites I'm quite familiar with working crossplatforms, especially PC vs Mobile.
A game is to some extend a really complex and multifunctional website anyway on PC; the basics stay the same for UI/UX.
A good UI can get the user easily to where they want to go, with as little effort as possible; it should feel "natural" and "obvious" for the user.
Thus less clicks aka easy access to "main" menus. -> For PlanCo2 that would be the custom building menu and ride menus; where as blueprints should be a secondary menu. Or even better, give the user/player the option to customize it; given we have two distinct groups of player in the community. (custom builders & blueprint users)

Honestly I don't even understand how this UI got passed QA; even less given they have two perfect examples made already and a huge amount data from the community on their preferences and what they liked/disliked in the two previous Planet games.
They have/had..??? a good UI designer, so I wonder what happened?

I do want to say though that older PC games might have had better UI, but they also were far less complex in what was possible in those games.
The complexity of PlanCo2 does add to it's complexity in designing good UI, but it's doable.
I wouldn't dare to say I'm a gold worthy UI designer myself, but I'm quite sure I could make PlanCo's 2 UI a lot better for PC.