GUI Brainstorming

[Teh Matt]

I like it! It seems to fit in much better with the speedometer than the previous bar did.

[Dakal]

I like it! It seems to fit in much better with the speedometer than the previous bar did.

thanks.

I made some new zippers too. why? just for fun.

one example:

[charlie]

That zipper looks awesome!

Suggestions:
- yellow might be more visible
- you could perhaps animate it with a glow effect or transitioning between different colors as an alternative to it being yellow

[Auria]

Hi Dakal,

thanks a lot for now I added the red zipper icon. Sadly on lower resolutions, the scaling down is not too pretty, but for now this will do

(I suppose you release those under CC-BY-SA 3.0?)

[Dakal]

Hi Dakal,

thanks a lot for now I added the red zipper icon. Sadly on lower resolutions, the scaling down is not too pretty, but for now this will do

(I suppose you release those under CC-BY-SA 3.0?)

Yes of course, sorry i forget the license file all the time. But you can consider here and now that all my next contributions for stk will be under CC BY SA 3.0

About the icon problem with lower resolutions, i see ... and it's very ugly. This is not only a lower resolution problem with 1920x1080 it's also pixelized.
How we can fix this problem without use svg ? Fixed size of png?

[Auria]

Re the scalign down issue, I'm not sure. Perhaps by convincing irrlicht to generate mipmaps, not exactly sure how. Will need to investigate

But I just wanted to show you this screenshot of current SVN. Looks familiar, doesn't it?

(of course eventually there will be something nicer there than "cannot access server" )

[Dakal]

Re the scalign down issue, I'm not sure. Perhaps by convincing irrlicht to generate mipmaps, not exactly sure how. Will need to investigate

But I just wanted to show you this screenshot of current SVN. Looks familiar, doesn't it?

(of course eventually there will be something nicer there than "cannot access server" )

It's strangly familiar indeed ... i'm glad you use it.

[qubodup]

Awesomeost graphics!

[adelroth]

Not sure if this fits here. Anyway...

It is always difficult finding a compromise between the needs of beginners and experts in programmes and STK is no exception. Some people would like to tweak everything in the game and have therefore as many options as possible in the settings. But this can easily overwhelm beginners and possibly even deter them. For this group of people it is important to keep the GUI simple.

So how about STK starts as default in a kind of kiosk mode with only the most basic options (more or less how it is at the moment). But optionally you could switch to an advanced mode with many more options such as tweaking of kart physics, managing addons or starting in reverse order of overall standings in grand prix. In advanced mode experimental features could also be introduced (and tested). If they don't work for you simply switch them off again.

Cheers.

[Arthur]

Advanced tweaking can be done in the XML files, and experimental features are introduced in the SVN version. While it would be nice to have this more sophisticated, I very much doubt we have enough devs to justify doing it in the way you described.

Still, nice idea. I just don't see it happen too soon.

[adelroth]

My proposal is surely a bit selfish. I understand that the contributors are concerned about overblowing the GUI. However I would like some more control about the game behaviour (e.g. start in reverse order in the grand prix) but can not be bothered with tweaking XML files. There are probably quite a few people in the same situation and therefore implementing a kiosk and an advanced mode might be a good (medium term) compromise.

[Auria]

Hi,

So how about STK starts as default in a kind of kiosk mode with only the most basic options (more or less how it is at the moment). But optionally you could switch to an advanced mode with many more options such as tweaking of kart physics, managing addons or starting in reverse order of overall standings in grand prix. In advanced mode experimental features could also be introduced (and tested). If they don't work for you simply switch them off again.

regarding tweaking kart physics : currently, our physics engine does not allow for this. STK 0.8 is where the physics are planned to be overhauled

Managing add-ons is actually currently being worked on and may even appear as soon as 0.7.1

Starting in reverse order, we'll need to discuss that

In general, we are not in favor of an advanced mode, we rather want to make something that all nicely fits together without such UI modes (which, in the end, are confusing to most users and more work to maintain for us)

[adelroth]

Card physics is actually not important for me. For the most part I think they are fine as they are and I just used it as an example (others may think differently).
I know that an AddOn manager is currently developed and really look forward to it. In addition it would be nice if you could also set up your own grand prix.
But starting in reverse order would be really nice to have. Since opinions are divided about that, it would be best to simply implement a switch in the settings. This would probably not even be too difficult. The main argument against this (and many other) feature(s) is overblowing the GUI.
I think many people would like to be able to do more adjustments to STK and this would also be in the spirit of OSS. Therefore the suggestion of an advanced settings mode. The argument about tweaking the XML files instead is surely valid, but this requires some level of coding skills (that I don't have) and is not appropriate for every kind of feature (sometimes you may just like to make some little adjustment during the game).

[Arthur]

Basic XML doesn't require you to have much programming skills; you just tweak things like

{l Code}: {l Select All Code}

    <explosion time="2" radius="5" />

to e.g.

{l Code}: {l Select All Code}

    <explosion time="3" radius="8" />

and such.

And yes, you can make your own GP's though it requires you make a custom XML file. But this isn't hard either, just look at the XML for Penguin Playground GP:

{l Code}: {l Select All Code}

<supertuxkart_grand_prix name="Penguin Playground">

    <track id="sandtrack"    laps="3" />
    <track id="snowmountain" laps="3" />
    <track id="olivermath"   laps="4" />
    <track id="scotland"     laps="3" />
    <track id="jungle"       laps="2" />
 
</supertuxkart_grand_prix>

See? Not too difficult.

[hiker]

Hi,

Card physics is actually not important for me.

well, I think you might be a minority here The kart physics is (imho) one of the weakest points of STK - but then again, I am a developer, so good to know what players actually think

...

But starting in reverse order would be really nice to have.

Open the file data/stk_config.xml in your favourite text editor, search for the lines:

{l Code}: {l Select All Code}

  <!-- Scores are the number of points given when the race ends,
       order is most-points-first or most-points-last. -->
  <grand-prix order = "most-points-first">


And change from "most-points-first" to "most-points-last". Save the file, and restart stk (you might have to be administrator to write the file, depending on where it is installed).

Cheers,
Joerg

[adelroth]

Excellent! Can create my own Grand Prix and start in reverse order now

Only thing missing for me is the personal handicap. Hopefully in a not too distant future...

Cheers.

[Dakal]

I was thinking about a colour code for backgrounds again, like my first post. And i think it's not a very good idea finally, because it's hard to have a unified GUI with. So another idea here:

[Auria]

Hi Dakal,

those background are kind of nice, they look like STK pajamas
but i need to say that the stripes make me dizzy also the colors are very bright, I'm not sure that text would be easy to read on top of that?

[Kinsu]

Hello everyone ! As an STK newbie, this is my first post on this forum

Dakal, I wanted to say the second welcome menu GUI you designed is really pretty (although, I think icons don't have to be so much colored, the buttons background is to my mind sufficient to suggest the color code to players' mind). The yellow bottom bar for the options is a good response to the yellow logo, and the important functions are bigger than the others, which is a real improvment compared to the 0.6 GUI.

For the inner menus, you don't necessarily have to put an entirely colored background : the color does not have to be the main of the screen to produce the desired effect. If you choose a neutral background (a gray tinted one for example, as the cool flag that is on the main menu and that creates this so great and "racing" atmosphere) and put your colors in buttons and bars (the characters selection bar, the kart's performance area...), it could also be fine. And it reinforce the one and only strong identity of the GUI which count at least as 1/3 of the game one I think.

Concerning the speed-o-meter, yours is great. Somehow, I really appreciate the light ingame GUI, and I really think a round speedometer with a pointer is a must have for STK. It can't be more toonish. And in addition to the cool gauge, I think it doesn't need to be change, at least now.

--
Kinsu
Please don't take my words too heavily, and if I say something wrong about the game don't hesitate to tell me, as I said I'm a real STK newbie !

[STKRudy85]

I post my suggestion here look at this screenshot :

Capture-Fenêtre sans nom-4-400x300.png (213.12 KiB) Viewed 11776 times

Can a separation be added ? Something like this ?

Capture-Fenêtre sans nom-4-400x300-0.png (207.38 KiB) Viewed 11776 times

[Kinsu]

I think it would be a good thing (maybe a thinner border would be alright ).

[Auria]

hmm well that's probably not as easy as it seems : we can't just rely on the background color, since some tracks use it for sky. We would need to manually clear the borders to black I think

[hiker]

hmm well that's probably not as easy as it seems : we can't just rely on the background color, since some tracks use it for sky. We would need to manually clear the borders to black I think

Could we just draw two black (or white) rectangles in the race gui, before we draw any text? This way we wouldn't have to worry about changing the scale depending on resolution etc.

Cheers,
Joerg

[samuncle]

Based on dakal's work

[Auria]

Samuncle, that's interesting, but we need to know where the text would go, and where the help and options menu would go