UI improvements

[eigenface]

Here's a list of UI problems I noticed in the dark mod. I suspect most of these are already known. I don't know where exactly to draw the line between bug and less-than-ideal feature, so I'll just list everything that jumped out at me. I may add to the list later, in reply posts.

 

1) If you're in the shop, and you quickload, the next time you hit escape to bring up the menu, you'll see the shop.

 

2) The last time you click in the menu, it can count as a click in the game also. For example, if you enter the menu with your blackjack selected and then click 'resume game', when you resume you'll immediately swing your blackjack.

 

3) Leaning doesn't appear to affect arrow origin. When I leaned around a corner in Thief, I could fire an arrow around the corner. In dark mod, when I lean around a corner and fire and arrow, it hits the wall as if it came from my location prior to leaning.

 

4) You can't go from no weapon selected to having a weapon selected by using the 'next weapon' key. The same thing seems to work fine with the 'next item' key, however; if you have no item selected and hit 'next item', you get an item selected. But if you have no weapon selected, the 'next weapon' key does nothing, even if you do have some weapons in inventory. To make matters worse, the 'next weapon' key switches you to no weapon selected if you don't have the weapon in the next weapon slot. In other words, if you have the sword selected (slot 2) but you don't have any broadheads (slot 3), the 'next weapon' key switches you to no weapon selected, and then the 'next weapon' key becomes useless - the only way to get a weapon selected again is to hit the number key for its slot. This makes the whole 'next weapon/prev weapon' interface almost useless unless you have all the slots filled, because empty slots block you from selecting the weapons beyond them.

 

5) You can't frob and put out lights unless you can pick them up. There are candles you can't pick up, and therefore cannot put out by frobbing. You should be able to put out all candles by frobbing.

 

6) Some candles cannot be pushed by running into them, although other candles can. I suspect this is a level design issue (a flag was not set on some candles), but it may be an editor issue also - the default should be all small objects are pushable.

 

7) The mission stats screen displays zero bodies found, after I watched an AI find a body and comment on it. This was playing No Honor Among Thieves 1/3.

 

8) The mission stats screen displays zero stealth score. Maybe I suck just that much, or maybe it's a bug. This was playing No Honor Among Thieves 1/3.

 

9) The mission stats screen displays no difficulty level, just a blank space after 'difficulty level:' This was playing No Honor Among Thieves 1/3.

[Bikerdude]

we have a thread called "things-that-could-be-improved" prob best move this post to there...

 

welcome btw.

[Noisycricket]

Things seem to get buried in that thread, i'd be nice to keep track of some things. I wish we had a features or wish list forum..

 

my .02.

[Tels]

Here's a list of UI problems I noticed in the dark mod. I suspect most of these are already known. I don't know where exactly to draw the line between bug and less-than-ideal feature, so I'll just list everything that jumped out at me. I may add to the list later, in reply posts.

 

1) If you're in the shop, and you quickload, the next time you hit escape to bring up the menu, you'll see the shop.

 

This is debatable as bug-or-feature: If you leave the menu, you always end up where you where before in the menu. So if you are in the audio-settings and leave and re-enter the menu, you are still in the audio-settings. Quickload does not save nor restore the menu position, so quickload in the shop will bring up - the shop!

 

Do you feel this should at least for save/load be different? (Technical note: I am not even sure we are able to store the menu position in the savegame, there is only limited access to the GUI from the C++ code which does the save/load stuff).

 

2) The last time you click in the menu, it can count as a click in the game also. For example, if you enter the menu with your blackjack selected and then click 'resume game', when you resume you'll immediately swing your blackjack.

 

That is a bug (and can have quite drastic gameplay consequences), please file search if it isn't already tracked, then file at http://bugs.angua.at/

 

3) Leaning doesn't appear to affect arrow origin. When I leaned around a corner in Thief, I could fire an arrow around the corner. In dark mod, when I lean around a corner and fire and arrow, it hits the wall as if it came from my location prior to leaning.

 

A bug, too, but I *think* it either is already tracked, or somebody already did some work on it. I don't remember exactly, but leaning is quite tricky and we had some revisions to it already. Maybe you can make a very small testmap (one room, one ledge, the player + arrow) where we can test this quickly?

 

Edit: Here is one bug mentioned, but I am not sure it covers your problem (it seems about the reverse problem, the AI not hitting you):

 

http://bugs.angua.at/view.php?id=1435

 

4) You can't go from no weapon selected to having a weapon selected by using the 'next weapon' key. The same thing seems to work fine with the 'next item' key, however; if you have no item selected and hit 'next item', you get an item selected. But if you have no weapon selected, the 'next weapon' key does nothing, even if you do have some weapons in inventory. To make matters worse, the 'next weapon' key switches you to no weapon selected if you don't have the weapon in the next weapon slot. In other words, if you have the sword selected (slot 2) but you don't have any broadheads (slot 3), the 'next weapon' key switches you to no weapon selected, and then the 'next weapon' key becomes useless - the only way to get a weapon selected again is to hit the number key for its slot. This makes the whole 'next weapon/prev weapon' interface almost useless unless you have all the slots filled, because empty slots block you from selecting the weapons beyond them.

 

I agree that the "next weapon" button should skip empty slots and also work from "the go". However, I think having a hole in the slots can be covered by pressing "next" twice? I usually use the mouse to scroll through weapons, and I can't remember havng problems switching arrows when I have f.i. no gas arrow.

 

5) You can't frob and put out lights unless you can pick them up. There are candles you can't pick up, and therefore cannot put out by frobbing. You should be able to put out all candles by frobbing.

 

This should be only old candles (or candles the mapper constructed manually instead of using our automatic candles). E.g. this are all mapping errors. Do you have any specific in mind where this happens?

 

6) Some candles cannot be pushed by running into them, although other candles can. I suspect this is a level design issue (a flag was not set on some candles), but it may be an editor issue also - the default should be all small objects are pushable.

 

See above, can you provide examples? Maybe there is a missing default setting on some candle. (Or, the mapper did add static candles instead of moveables, it has sadly become lately a trend to make way too many moveable objects just statics, which totally breaks player expectation and provides inconsistencies (what? why can I pick up this apple but not this?) etc.

 

7) The mission stats screen displays zero bodies found, after I watched an AI find a body and comment on it. This was playing No Honor Among Thieves 1/3.

 

8) The mission stats screen displays zero stealth score. Maybe I suck just that much, or maybe it's a bug. This was playing No Honor Among Thieves 1/3.

 

9) The mission stats screen displays no difficulty level, just a blank space after 'difficulty level:' This was playing No Honor Among Thieves 1/3.

 

The mission stats screen needs an overhaul

[eigenface]

1) The problem is, if you're in the shop menu, and you quickload a game where you're half-way through the level, you'll then be able to press escape and access the shop menu, half way through the level. This seems completely illogical and broken, and the priority should be preventing that situation. Hopefully, there's a way to reset the menu state, so once the menu state is reset, you'll go to the main menu screen when you press escape. Perhaps the menu state should be reset when you load a game (this would solve the problem.) Or perhaps the menu state should be reset whenever you press escape, effectively becoming a stateless menu which always begins on the main menu screen (this actually makes more sense to me, is simpler, and is how menus work in thief and the majority of other games.)

 

2) Added the bug.

 

3) Having trouble reproducing this now, so I'll wait. Maybe I was just doing something wrong.

 

4) Okay, on closer examination here's what's happening: 'prev weapon' works pretty well, meaning it skips over empty slots and allows you to cycle through all your weapons from last slot to first slot. However, if you're on slot 1 and you hit 'prev weapon' you switch to no weapon selected, and cannot leave that state. It would be better if 'prev weapon' wrapped around after slot 1 and selected slot 0.

 

The 'next weapon' key appears to be completely broken; no matter what slot I start on or what weapon I have, 'next weapon' simply switches to no weapon selected, and cannot leave that state.

 

I'm guessing 5 and 6 are mapping errors, and apparently 7, 8, and 9 are already known. Thanks for addressing each of these issues.

 

I thought of another one, which I didn't find in the bugtracker:

 

10) Setting antialiasing or anisotropy to higher than 8x makes the menus all blurry and odd-looking. When I restart TDM after changing the settings, antialiasing has been set to OFF. I'm guessing 16x is not actually supported. If the same thing happens for everyone, you should probably just not have the option of selecting 16x.

[LEGION]

My AA and AF work fine.

 

I agree that the "next weapon" button should skip empty slots and also work from "the go". However, I think having a hole in the slots can be covered by pressing "next" twice? I usually use the mouse to scroll through weapons, and I can't remember havng problems switching arrows when I have f.i. no gas arrow.

 

How could you forget, Tels? That´s the infamous 'Mousewheel'-bug!! That bug no one is willing to provide a patch until mod-update-release...

 

The problem with the leaning seemed to be that the arrow is shot from its showed position, so sometimes it just hits the corner, leaning a little bid 'wider' is the habit to learn. But I´m still not sure if it is a bug or not. Ideally the AlterEgo will hold the bow more to the left/right while leaning.

Hmm, could it be as simple as just adjust some Offset-values for bow-leaning or sth like that?

[New Horizon]

How could you forget, Tels? That´s the infamous 'Mousewheel'-bug!! That bug no one is willing to provide a patch until mod-update-release...

 

Trust me, it's better to wait than to rush something out. Our update delivery system is being worked on to see if we can create smaller updates..thus delivering future updates and patches faster.

[LEGION]

Hmm, okay. Once more you earned my confidence, this time...

[Aprilsister]

Our update delivery system is being worked on to see if we can create smaller updates..thus delivering future updates and patches faster.

 

 

 

SWEET!

[New Horizon]

No promises at this point though, but it is being worked on.

[Aprilsister]

Well, sitting out here you know it automatically seems the best thing you could be working on. And not just because we want things (:ph34r:1.03:ph34r:) yesterday.

 

Yes yes that's all true.

 

But also I think getting a sleeker tdmupdate is honestly the best thing you can do. It'll foster a good feedback loop for the coders and it'll also give those who do modeling and textures and other asset creating and tweaking a more immediate feeling of "ah there I did that, and there it is in action!" accomplishment.