Main Menu

[greebo]

I'm going to tackle the main menu at the beginning of January. This is going to take a long while, I assume, as this also includes updates to the FM loading GUI.

 

I'm also planning to extend the current settings GUI, as there are far more customisable settings than we have room for in the current GUI. I'm going to assemble a list of possible settings as basis for discussions, and then we probably need a slight update of the settings GUI design to make room for more tabs and more settings.

 

Anything I should consider before I dive into GUI coding, please let me know. My primary goal is to make this menu the final, stable one, without those nasty disappearing bugs we're all observing right now.

[Springheel]

There was the list of things I made to remind myself of menu issues way back when: http://forums.thedarkmod.com/index.php?showtopic=7280

 

Some of those might be worth considering.

 

I'm going to assemble a list of possible settings as basis for discussions, and then we probably need a slight update of the settings GUI design to make room for more tabs and more settings.

 

Would it be difficult to allow a scrolling window instead? That allows for more flexibility in the future--it seems like every time we think of a new feature it spawns another possible setting.

[Fidcal]

I was about to suggest the same. I think there is already a gui scroller in the briefing or stats or somewhere.

 

The only other thing that comes to my mind at this time is, would it help at all and is it indeed possible, to block Esc from anywhere but the main menu? I have a theory that might be part of the problem(s). Ideally of course I hope it is not necessary as its nice to drop back into the game from anywhere.

 

One other thing, is can the settings for the controls default to showing one of them, any will do but I think at the moment you just see headings and a blank page and have to click say Video.

 

And slightly off-topic but relevant I've also recently realized but didn't know how to present this, is that the ambient light setting has a big [indirect] impact on both readables guis and the menus guis. I tried a slightly brighter ambient and reduced the gamma and brightness sliders in the menus. This made the game look about the same but voila! now the readables look much better and so do the menus. Before, they always looked way too bright.

[Flanders]

Maybe this has been addressed before. When you quit the game it asks if you are sure. But not when you quit your current mission without saving. I'd rather have it asked me then instead of when I quit the mod.

[greebo]

Would it be difficult to allow a scrolling window instead? That allows for more flexibility in the future--it seems like every time we think of a new feature it spawns another possible setting.

 

I was about to suggest the same. I think there is already a gui scroller in the briefing or stats or somewhere.

Yes, it would be more difficult than doing it the current way, because the GUI list stuff you're seeing in the end mission statistics is not able to contain choiceDef or bindDef blocks to bind cvars and buttons, just ordinary text. The GUI possibilities are very limited in this area, you can't mix and match things, unfortunately.

 

What I can do is to implement custom buttons with C++ code support to change the y coordinate of the choiceDef blocks to simulate a scrolling window (like the objectives screen is working when more than 5 objectives are displayed). This won't save me from defining a choiceDef for each setting we decide upon in any case, there's just no easy way through this.

 

(Personally, if I have to choose between scrolling settings and tabbed settings, I'd take the tabbed settings anytime, because how often did I only realize after the second or third look that there are more settings available by scrolling in other games. I'd rather do three or four more hover buttons than to have one large list of settings. The large number of settings needs some grouping anyway.)

 

The only other thing that comes to my mind at this time is, would it help at all and is it indeed possible, to block Esc from anywhere but the main menu? I have a theory that might be part of the problem(s). Ideally of course I hope it is not necessary as its nice to drop back into the game from anywhere.

No, I'd love to handle the ESC separately in-game, but I can only handle it when already in the main menu. This has bugged me ever since, but the ESC seems to be handled fixed in closed source when the game is running.

 

I cannot even switch to the main menu via code, which is the only reason I cannot implement the objectives display hotkey - the main menu can only be triggered by ESC and that's not handled by our code. Fuckit, I say.

 

One other thing, is can the settings for the controls default to showing one of them, any will do but I think at the moment you just see headings and a blank page and have to click say Video.

Yes, that's easily possible.

 

Maybe this has been addressed before. When you quit the game it asks if you are sure. But not when you quit your current mission without saving. I'd rather have it asked me then instead of when I quit the mod.

Good point, this should be possible.

[Fidcal]

I'm happy with more tabs rather than scrolling if it saves time and labour. Maybe try if possible to leave a few lines at the bottom of each tab to add more lines in the future if something seems critical. Hopefully won't be needed. We might consider removing those curly scroller things on the right.

 

By 'main menu' I assume you mean the very top menu not all the menu pages. If so, and even though you cannot access it via code, does that mean you can reach the other menu pages by code from it? If so, is it possible to have a dummy (not visible) main menu page which instantly switches to a new page via code. This new page is then the visible main page. And even if that worked, would that give you more control?

[greebo]

With "main menu" I refer not only to the top menu (Start Mission, Settings, etc.), but also Briefing, Load/Save, Objectives, Settings, Credits, Shop, Mission Success and Mission Statistics. This is all "main menu". It's basically everything, except mission failed and in-game readables/maps.

 

I already used a lot of trickery to get the things done you're seeing now, and I'll need to use even more trickery for the rewrite. The main menu isn't exactly fun to mess around with, as you can imagine. But we should get there, even if it requires waiting for D3 going open source.

[Springheel]

I'm happy with more tabs rather than scrolling if it saves time and labour.

 

Agreed.

 

How about the following:

 

Movement (lean, walk, creep, mantle, etc)

 

Actions (frob, rotate, parry, etc)

 

Weapons (as current)

 

Inventory (inventory hotkeys, groups, etc)

 

Other (screenshot, objects, etc)

[greebo]

Sounds ok so far, but we'll only know whether these categories are sufficient after we've agreed on the entire list of settings exposed in the menus. I'm hoping to get around to post that list soon.

[Fidcal]

You might also include somehow...

 

"_zoom" = lowers weapon , eg without discharging arrow, but does not put weapon away. THIS SHARES as shift rotate, ie, hold down while rotating carried object.

 

Don't know where you'd put that in the menu but hopefully it will get a mention somewhere. Maybe together or maybe as...

 

Lower weapon (shares with Shift Rotate)

Shift Rotate (shares with Lower Weapon)

 

There doesn't seem to be any conflict with the two uses. In fact don't think there can be.

[Springheel]

What is "shift rotate"?

[Fidcal]

Can't think of the correct term but it's the control you hold down like a shift key while moving the mouse to rotate a carried object. By default I think it's the mouse button 3, ie, the mousewheel held down.

[greebo]

I went through the list of CVARs introduced by TDM (i.e. all starting with tdm_, there are 136 of those) and these I think are worth considering:

• tdm_ambient_method (is already included)
  
• tdm_door_auto_open_on_unlock (whether doors should open after being unlocked by the player)
  
• tdm_dragged_item_highlight (whether items in the grabber are highlighted)
  
• tdm_frob_ammo_selects_weapon (whether picking up rope arrows should select the Rope Arrow Weapon, for instance)
  
• tdm_weapon_next_on_empty (whether to switch to the next available weapon when arrows run out)
  
• tdm_grabber_reverse_control (inverse the direction the grabbed item is moved away from/towards the player when using the next/prev weapon buttons)
  
• tdm_hud_opacity (up for discussion) (inventory and weapon HUD item opacity)
  
• tdm_inv_hud_pickupmessages (whether the "Acquired" message should be displayed)
  
• tdm_inv_use_on_frob (whether frobbing can be employed to "use" certain items)
  
• tdm_inv_use_visual_feedback (whether using items gives visual feedback (green/red glow))
  
• tdm_lg_weak (up for discussion) (use the weak lightgem instead of the rendershots)
  
• tdm_lp_auto_pick (on for automatic lockpicking, not yet implemented)
  
• tdm_lp_pawlow (???)
  
• tdm_melee_invert_attack (up for clarification - is this a user-definable setting?)
  
• tdm_melee_invert_parry (up for clarification - is this a user-definable setting?)
  
• tdm_music_volume (ambient sound volume control)
  

These are the settings I found additionally to the ones we already have in the settings menus.

 

A few more things to discuss:

Do we want to pre-define certain shortucts for using flashmines, flashbombs, etc. so that the user just has to bind a key to them in the menu without messing in the console? (Me votes for yes)

 

Do we want to remove any existing setting because we found them to be unnecessary?

[Tels]

A few more things to discuss:

Do we want to pre-define certain shortucts for using flashmines, flashbombs, etc. so that the user just has to bind a key to them in the menu without messing in the console? (Me votes for yes)

 

Me too

 

Do we want to remove any existing setting because we found them to be unnecessary?

 

Not that I can think of.

[Springheel]

Aren't there other ones we might want to include? For example, whether crouch is a toggle or not (also creep, run and perhaps leaning). Maybe bow zoom on/off? There may be others.

 

Do we want to pre-define certain shortucts for using flashmines, flashbombs, etc. so that the user just has to bind a key to them in the menu without messing in the console? (Me votes for yes)

 

Agreed.

 

Do we want to remove any existing setting because we found them to be unnecessary?

 

I think there are some that might be unnecessary.

 

High SFX -- we should probably have an "advanced" video menu instead

 

Free Look -- what does this do?

 

Invert Mouse -- who would ever want that?

 

Weapon Switch -- ?

 

Show HUD -- we might want to break this up into a couple different options-- no HUD, show lightgem only, show icons only when cycling (if we supported that) etc.

 

Show weapon -- how would you ever fire a bow with this off?

 

I also think that the following are hardly ever going to be used:

 

turn left/right, look up/down, center view. That's five slots taken up that have no use for people who use the mouse (which I would imagine is 99% of gamers).

 

 

 

From the other list, I think the two you listed as up for discussion should be left out (they can always be included in a tweak guide), and the following I also think we could probably do without including in the main menu:

 

tdm_weapon_next_on_empty (whether to switch to the next available weapon when arrows run out)

 

I suspect almost no one will want this set--it could be included in a tweak guide for those who do.

[Ishtvan]

[*]tdm_melee_invert_attack (up for clarification - is this a user-definable setting?)

[*]tdm_melee_invert_parry (up for clarification - is this a user-definable setting?)

Yeah, these should be user-definable. Also, there will be one more that's not yet implemented for automatic vs. manual parry. I don't think we were going to have automatic attacks, last I recall.

[Ishtvan]

Can't think of the correct term but it's the control you hold down like a shift key while moving the mouse to rotate a carried object. By default I think it's the mouse button 3, ie, the mousewheel held down.

That's shared with the "run" key if I'm understanding you right.

[New Horizon]

[*]tdm_ambient_method (is already included)

 

Related to this setting, we also need to find a way to set which interaction.vfp to use. Rebb's for quality, or the original D3's for performance.

 

[*]tdm_lg_weak (up for discussion) (use the weak lightgem instead of the rendershots)

 

I can see two reasons for not needing this.

1. The weak lightgem doesn't as accurately, nor does it function with all lights. This would render gameplay broken in a lot of cases.

2. The ambient method optimization, and swapping between custom and original d3 vfp's squeezes great performance on my humble system.

 

[*]tdm_lp_pawlow (???)

Probably won't be relevant when the lockpicking system is finally finished.

[greebo]

Aren't there other ones we might want to include? For example, whether crouch is a toggle or not (also creep, run and perhaps leaning). Maybe bow zoom on/off? There may be others.

Yes, there might be others. I only traversed the tdm_* settings, not the ones that were already there in D3. Toggle crouch is definitely a must-have.

 

High SFX -- we should probably have an "advanced" video menu instead

Yes, this one is unnecessary nowadays, I assume. We hardly use the FX system in the first place.

 

Free Look -- what does this do?

Invert Mouse -- who would ever want that?

Weapon Switch -- ?

These are quite strange, yes. Fidcal might want to comment on "Free Look" as he's a keyboard-only user.

 

Show HUD -- we might want to break this up into a couple different options-- no HUD, show lightgem only, show icons only when cycling (if we supported that) etc.

No HUD? How the heck are people supposed to play like this? And how are people going to tell which key they are using when the inventory HUD is switched off?

 

Show weapon -- how would you ever fire a bow with this off?

This one is definitely unnecessary.

 

turn left/right, look up/down, center view. That's five slots taken up that have no use for people who use the mouse (which I would imagine is 99% of gamers).

The 1% is probably filled out by Fidcal and BrokenArts, iirc. I don't know how useful these controls are to keyboard-only users, and whether they have reassigned these keys.

[greebo]

Related to this setting, we also need to find a way to set which interaction.vfp to use. Rebb's for quality, or the original D3's for performance.

This is r_testARBProgram, which is not saved to DoomConfig.cfg, but I guess it can be hacked some way at startup via a proxy CVAR, as rebb suggested.

[New Horizon]

This is r_testARBProgram, which is not saved to DoomConfig.cfg, but I guess it can be hacked some way at startup via a proxy CVAR, as rebb suggested.

 

Yeah, I remember that being a problem sadly, but hopefully smething can be worked out.

[Fidcal]

I think that tdm_weapon_next_on_empty could be left out. Not even sure if it is appropriate in TDM. The only real weapons are the sword and broadhead and used in different situations. The sword never gets empty. Switching from broadhead to water > rope > moss > etc. when one runs out makes no real sense to me and even counter -productive if you waste a moss arrow after shooting your last broadhead. What do others think of that? But I can't really say I object if others favour it since it's an option.

 

The pawlaw or 'pavlov' is the simpler lockpick where you wait till you hear a certain click then hit the key (like pavlov's dog.) At what stage is lockpick testing? I put a vault door in my map yesterday with lockpick and it worked but not sure if it is perfected and the yippee! success sound MUST go before release. If that pawlaw setting still works then no harm in having the option in the menu. It's the nearest to auto without actually being auto. So yes, probably put it in the menu maybe as lockpick sweet sound or sweet click. And if auto is ever implemented then yes to put it in the menu.

 

Predefine shortcuts for lantern, compass, spyglass, and most important, clear inventory. I have no objection to any others.

 

Yes, and those others Springheel mentions, crouch, run, etc.

 

I doubt few would use invert mouse so it can remain as a cvar for those few.

 

I would need to check but I think free look blocks up and down so mouse only turns. Not very sure of that.

 

turn left/right, look up/down, center view. - I can't support them if few use keyboard only. I mean, I'm all set up so the menu settings are only for beginners. But I would recommend them if there is room because they are essential to the key-user. Maybe in a separate tab for key movement only to make it clear mousers can ignore them. If you do support key users then there are a couple more that affect the turn speed. This is crucial to get the best speed to turn without compromising bow aiming. This is one of two areas (the other being the grabber) where I concede the mouse would be best (if it didn't mean taking your hands off the steering wheel that is.)

[Ishtvan]

Regarding tdm_lg_weak, it is useful for debugging various graphical artifacts that come up with the lightgem. It should probably be something we tell people to do in the console, though, not an actual menu item. Otherwise people will set it and be surprised when the lightgem isn't accurate anymore.

[New Horizon]

It should probably be something we tell people to do in the console, though, not an actual menu item. Otherwise people will set it and be surprised when the lightgem isn't accurate anymore.

 

Yes, absolutely.

[Springheel]

No HUD? How the heck are people supposed to play like this? And how are people going to tell which key they are using when the inventory HUD is switched off?

 

You're probably right. I'm just remembering back to some of the cvars we had talked about waaay back at the beginning of the HUD design phase. We had talked about implementing a couple different options, like having weapon/inv icons vanish after five or ten seconds of no change, and a 'reset HUD' button that would make an otherwise invisible HUD visible for a few seconds. I don't think any of that is really worthwhile at this stage, however.

 

I do think there should be an option for hiding the lightgem, however, as it would be quite easy to do and some hard-core players have expressed interest in that.