Awesome UI's

[Beck]

Just had this link sent around work which is basically the imdb of UI's.

 

http://www.noteloop.com/kit/fui/

 

You can search by films, tv, designer and companies etc. 

 

Anyway, what are some of your favourite UI's?

 

I loved me some Dead Space:

Edited August 9, 2013 by Beck

[Buddy]

[blackdog]

Less is more, UIs should be reduced to the absolute minimal necessity, a thing we are more or less seeing; Dead Space is a great example, problem is more with FPSs.

 

The fluidness with which the player can interact with computer panels in the environments of Doom 3 is unparalleled and something more games should do. It's not about the aesthetics (which I like) but the interaction, so it would be best shown in video, if I could find some decent material instead of this shitty 240p:

 

 

in some documentary/interview i've heard Carmack saying this was his call, one of the objectives with that engine iteration, so kudos to him.

Edited August 9, 2013 by blackdog

[Beck]

Yeah less (or at least a customisable UI) is always preferred by myself. I love Dead Space's because the health and power levels are integrated into the suit. Whilst any menu's and oxygen levels pop out on a holographic screen so I only see them when I need/want to see them.

 

I'd love to do a bit of UI design if I was better at 2D stuff. Sadly I suck at it xD

[Puddy]

Dead Space is really neat in this regard. The UI adds to the tension since it's just objects in the actual gameworld (suit or holographic projections). There's no pausing. No big menus that cover the entire screen. It's all there and it makes you feel insanely uneasy (at least it did for me).

 

The Display system in Doom 3 is really sweet too!

[blackdog]

I'd love to do a bit of UI design if I was better at 2D stuff. Sadly I suck at it xD

 

I think UI work is more about the concept than the art. What is truly important is the experience and the flow of the informations (UX)... so if you have some ideas you should go ahead because you could come up with a cool concept that would then need just an art pass

 

I'd like to cite Carmack again, when talking about Wolfenstein 3D (or Doom) said that he requested and pushed to be able to play with the less button presses as possible... and in fact 3-4 taps and in those games you are playing!

 

I was baffled when I tried the Dead Space 3 demo, because with an in-game system that worked, they clearly didn't know how to make different* the game interface (menus), so they built this 3D thing that I found really annoying: with all those camera movements it didn't simply made you waste a lot of time, it was almost giving me motion sickness (first time ever).

Btw in contrast to the excellent in-game UI, Dead Space's menus were quite messy from the first game.

 

*this is an argument that should be discussed imo: in games there seems to be the tendency to redo everything every time, just because you need to change it to not give the customers something to gripe on "copy-pasting".

Then you get something awkward and unusable like the Assassin's Creed Animus' UI that is carried over an entire series of games :-/

Edited August 9, 2013 by blackdog

[-HP-]

+1 for Doom 3

 

And I agree that less is more!

 

This is bad in my opinion:

 

Also bad:

 

 

I way prefer to see contextual and minimal HUDs. This obviously depends heavily on the game, some games demand more prominent HUDs because of their complexity but I still believe a lot more work can still be put into making game HUDs be better.

 

Last of us is the perfect example of good contextual HUDs. If you don't need that kind of info, get it the fuck out of the screen!

 

[Thrik]

I've personally really been enjoying Skyrim's (console) UI. It's very easy for RPGs to end up with clutter dripping out their asses yet Skyrim manages to show you exactly what you need when you need it. Also the menus for managing inventory, magic, etc are sublime (although different on PC I think).

Some cues were taken from Fable I suspect, which typical of Lionhead games had a lot of thought put into its UI.

[Pampers]

+1 for Doom 3

 

And I agree that less is more!

 

This is bad in my opinion:

 

 

that is taken from when you freeze the game to open up all interactions you can do during combat, and is taken from a tutorial segment. So not really fair to use as an example

 

this is how it usually looks:

Edited August 9, 2013 by Pampers

[-HP-]

Hah, really? Fair enough, It's been a while since I played that game. 

[Zyn]

 

I know it's a joke HUD but I wanted to add that the HUD in Brink is almost as bad as this.

[selmitto]

Agree with Dead Space and Doom~ 

 

I wanna add Borderlands.

It was really immersive when I started playing it and an NPC upgraded my character's "vision" so I could see how many bullets I had left. It was so cool that it didn't simply pop up on my screen. It was LOADED! Each new feature got loaded on my HUD before being completely displayed. Simple, diegetic and immersive.

 

[Taylor]

I know it's a joke HUD but I wanted to add that the HUD in Brink is almost as bad as this.

[Taylor]

I actively hate the Borderlands menu interface.

[Vilham]

Dead space definitely has one of the best interfaces. The jacket in alone in the dark is also very cool, although the icons are a quite intrusive.

 

Edited August 10, 2013 by Vilham