Lately I've been reviewing text-based menu systems. I was rather impressed by The Architect by Oh_Man who has posted a video showing a complex dropship menu system which can be used for all kinds of cool gameplay dynamics.

Whilst in theory it sounds awesome, I'm wondering of the actual practibility of such a system, considering:
1. A large part of the game will be spent in the menu system, and players won't be able to talk to each other. Could be annoying.
2. This system may be too complex, confusing, or even intolerable for the average player.

BENEFITS

• Gameplay interactivity all under one system
  
• Allows for limitless items without using units
  
• Lots of information can be stored
  
• Can perform complex commands
  

DRAWBACKS

• Players can't talk during menu operation
  
• Can be confusing
  
• Chews up gameplay time
  
• Trigger heavy
  

So the question is, will it work? Will players like such a system or is the system too complex and too annoying?

I havent played his map, but i would assume there is an exit menu feature as well as a way to pull the menu back up.

Yeah it works. You can use binary countoffs to transfer counts from one DC to another which are triggered by actions in the menu. You can detect what "button" a player presses by various types of held items by workers. They way I set it up is I made four probes and four drones hold four different types of things. Then, I can detect each one uniquely when they exit the dropship.

So the trick for triggering it really is just to get familiar with binary countoffs to perform count transfers, multiplication and division.

I played his map, it worked really well. I didn't have trouble talking since it only refreshes the menu text when it disappears.

I'm not asking for trigger advice. I'm asking whether or not this system will simply be 'liked' from a gameplay perspective by the average player. If you refer to my two numbered points in my original post, you can see the dilemma.


This is potentially problematic for two reasons. 1. If the text isn't refreshed and the player is still using the menu, this will be confusing. 2. If a player is trying to read the menu and other players are typing, it will delete the top lines of the text message (assuming it's reached the full 11 lines).

Er, I tried to say "of course it works" as in you can play a game with it. I've played multiple maps. So then the rest of my post is explaining that given that the system works from a gameplay perspective it becomes merely a matter of implementation. And since you listed "trigger heavy" as a drawback, I talked about that. No need to be so defensive.

Nah dude I'm not being defensive, just objective. I appreciate your input, but I need help in reference to my previous points.

1. Definitely a system for a single player game. The best compromise I've seen is to display the text in intervals of time to allow players to message each other. This however is pretty tedious and not a perfect solution.
2. It can be very simple if presented in a simple fashion. You have to design the use of the carrier in a way that makes sense for gameplay. For example, having each button in the carrier correspond to a specific spell won't make much sense if you use two types of workers, as memorizing what slot does what can be difficult. If you however attempt to make it clear what button does what (perhaps like Fwop_'s) by laying out the button locations next to iconic units.

Why wouldn't the text be refreshed? It fades out after however many seconds. That's when it refreshes.


Oh well. It'll refresh in a few seconds. It's not a big deal unless someone's purposely spamming, in which case you can squelch them.

When I used this system in his map, I found that it worked exceptionally well from a player's perspective. It's intuitive, functional, and stylish. I spent considerable time sitting in town browsing the menus, and it was really implemented well. I carried on a conversation with him at the same time without any problems.

The only real potential issues I see are those that affect the mapmaker (string limits, for example). Otherwise, from just the perspective of a player, it's a very effective system.

Hmm... don't suppose anyone could send me the demo for The Architect?

I will be releasing the Act 1 demo this month - stay tuned.

I also recommend:
Cataclysm, by Fwop
Lost Souls, by Cecil

Both use the shuttle menu system. I can't seem to find Lost Souls anywhere on SEN DLDB. Maybe Cecil should put it up? (Damn you Cecil for not finishing that map!)



Post has been edited 2 time(s), last time on Dec 10 2012, 6:15 pm by Oh_Man.

Thank you for finding the cataclysm map. I searched for a while last night and even broke SEN in doing so

By the way, I'm wondering how in Cataclysm the dropship menu system works? Somehow it is able to distinguish between the same unit type (as in 4 Probes and 4 SCVs). In other words, how do you determine which Probe is being dropped? Below is a screenshot of what I'm referring to...

http://www.staredit.net/342563/

I tried explaining it here. If you look at the corner of the Cataclysm map you can see the workers next to things to hold. You can see clearly in my Lost Souls RPG map how it works.

In other words, make each worker hold something different. Detect the thing they are holding, not the worker itself.

You detect the probe and scv AND the powerups.
1. Probe Mineral Chunk 1
2. Probe Mineral Chunk 2
3. Probe Vespene Gas 1
4. Probe Vespene Gas 2
5. SCV Mineral Chunk 1
6. SCV Mineral Chunk 2
7. SCV Vespene Gas 1
8. SCV Vespene Gas 2

Well no, he asked how they did it in Cataclysm, and that's not how they did it.

It uses 8 unique resources, and never detects the actual worker.

In fact, if you search the text triggers for Cataclysm, there's not a single instance of "Terran SCV" used anywhere.

Really..? What are the 8 resource types? I thought there was only 4. Or did you mean including other holdables that aren't resources?

Yer Cataclysm did use 8 unique resources.
Mineral Chunk 1 + 2
Terran Vespene 1 + 2
Zerg Vespene 1 + 2
Protoss Vespene 1 + 2

For complex systems, text based menus are a very viable option. In multiplayer maps you can use the leaderboard (if it's free) to show whether a player is in menu or not. That or some other method should help alleviate the communication problems.

Lethal and I used an extensive text-based system in Nightfall a few years ago. I've uploaded a video of it (and a little extra):
The items were represented by units but interacted with textually. When the Menu is brought up, the items are removed so that they don't cause any interference with the clicking. The menu was not at all complete (e.g. database was functional but empty). For the record, Nightfall didn't use EUDs in any way.