Topic: [GUI] - GUI retouch

Can we make the windowborder a little bit bigger? I mean ~4pix broader.

why? for a small shadow. look here: http://www.abload.de/img/image2qklv.png

yes, I haven't the new really cool graphics of fraang. I like his ideas and work!

and yes, its just eyecandy but I think the "look" makes the game 'more friendly'. I think the "look&feel" of a game UI are a very importent thing. As player (not developer!) you have to look for some hours on the screen and you want 'feel' the game.

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I like the shadow, too. But it's not my priority ;) Maybe, it could be achieved in a way that the shadow doesn't belong to the window's border, although lying behind the window. That wouldn't increase the thickness of the border and you can still move the window to the corners of the game screen. But maybe, this would make a kind of window snapping function look a bit strange... However, this is a task for programmers. I currently cannot estimate how difficult the implementation of this feature will be.

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After some time of thinking of the GUI I have come to the conclusion that we should think and sketch a few things and finally have a real imagination of what we want to achieve and how instead of putting to much efforts into hard work which will be thrown out because of design faults. Ok now after sayd this and hopping I have not demoralized you by this I want to share with you some ideas I had in mind the last few days. Ideas are more than welcome. The more input I can get the better the finished work will be. So please share your thoughts regardless how ridiculous the might sound.

1) There should differentiated between GUI elements which are shown all the time, most of the time and rarely. Elements which are shown all the time should be included in the default GUI layout (visibility and position), things wich are most of the time should fit well with the elements always shown and things rarely used/shown should get also a place but are not as prioritized as elements which are more often visible. It may look like this: Elements which are shown the whole time (main bar, map, ...) should be borderless windows which can be moved over the screen if wished but are no "real" windows. Elements which are shown most of the time should be "real" windows and can be moved. They have the typical look and feel of windows on the desktop. Elements which are shown rarely should be like popups or dialogs. Small and designed for a single task (manage the stock limits (I hope this not confusing), ...).

2) There should be windows - described as above - which can be closed (map) and one which can't (main bar).

3) Concerning the window border I would favourite a border of 4-6 pixels. This should not wast to much screen space. Shadow "have to be not part of the window" because it would wast to much screen space.

4) For the button I would favourite icons instead of text because the can be smaller without text. But good icons are hard to do because the should be intuitive and let the player know what this button do. Maybe a tooltip with a "name" and a description would help confused players.

Ok this was it for now. Feedback is appreciated.

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I have tried to bring the ideas above into a visual concept. I hope this make it easier to understand and imagine what it looks like. This is only a layout (position, size, ...) with no particular style which defines the appearance!

What do you think is the (window) border just right or do you prefer a broader one?

PS: Are the GUI element attributes hardcoded? Maybe we should introduce some kind of meta language for the GUI layout and style. XML is used very often for this. Let me know what think of this.

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Is there a (fast) way for experimenting with the layout? We can use placeholder graphics for the moment. Maybe we should write a wiki page once we have finished the layout?

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