Vastly improve chat ui

[Gerdofal]

I've lost track of the number of players, especially new players, having trouble with the chat ui.

The main problems I see are:

- Default message lifetime is very short, and only about two messages can usually be seen.
- There are weird usability issues, such as replies sometimes working but also sometimes just clearing the TO field such that nothing at all can be sent
- Pressing "2" to open the window, then using movement keys to go up the history, often results in confusion
- It's a huge waste of screen real estate, mainly because the font is quite large. Maybe this was for VR? I don't play in VR so I don't know if a large font is needed for this.
- And finally, there is a ton of NPC spam. This wouldn't be a big problem, except it is very hard for new players to tell the difference between a npc ship message actually sent to them, a random npc broadcast to everyone, and a message another player sent out.

I'm not quite sure how to fix it, except maybe reducing the font. It seems like chat is one of those things that needs to show all the time, but we can't currently give it that amount of screen space. Maybe make some more use of colors to differentiate NPC from player? Or use a different font for NPC spam?

Love to hear ideas.

 

[BinakAlgo]

Well, the problems remain for VR, if the font was bigger to us to see it is not working. And I agree completely that it needs a re-working, especially the "fading" time as you say. Something must be done but we must meditate carefully about what and how.

 

[Micha]

The font isn't too big. Not everybody plays on an 80" TV sitting right in front of it. Or has young eyes. But perhaps it could be made an option.

Usability is, however, a bit issue with all the recent changes. The main one which constantly gets me is that you now need to hit "enter" first when sending a second message:
1. Open message panel.
2. Send first message
3. Start typing next message - oops, launching chaff, going into Silent Mode, and deploying landing gear instead!

With the "tabs" things have gotten a bit more manageable. Oddly enough you can't put the "Local" chat into its own tab though; it always stays with the NPC chatter and other announcements.

NPC chatter needs rework too - 99% of it is just inane and should never be broadcast through the System. Most of it shouldn't be broadcast outside the ships! There should be an option to filter the "flavour text" ones out. Still need the pirate chatter, but that's only "local".
One idea for NPC chatter would be to tie it into USS's - perhaps a system-wide "mayday" when a new pirate USS starts? That way it'd actually be useful!