Nitrium
Chieftain
Well, to be fair I don't think it's THAT bad... I had that issue with Europa Universalis IV (I'm playing at 2560x1440), where I had to squint to read the text.
But yeah, YMMV.
How you you like the UI?
- Thread starter Nitrium
- Start date
Well, to be fair I don't think it's THAT bad... I had that issue with Europa Universalis IV (I'm playing at 2560x1440), where I had to squint to read the text.
But yeah, YMMV.
VirtuallyJesse
Chieftain
- Joined
- Aug 6, 2012
- Messages
- 58
The city menu is the biggest problem I have with the UI. And the fact that all the icons look the same, I know thats the style they were going for but it all just looks like placeholder art.
Im really enjoying the game but there are a few things that drive me mad about the UI
1. The blur effect when you have things like the Virtue screen open. You are about to make a choice on something that will impact the output on some level but you cant look at the top bar and access the impact without exiting out of the screen.
2. The City screen is a MESS. Do we really need to see all the possible yeilds are far as the eye can see. DO we really need to have such HUGE tiles-work circles, and worse do we really need such huge buy-tile tags? This was all bad enough in CiV but because of the use of black in the UI it is so heavy.
3.I personally find the monotone of the city name bar on the main screen a bit dull, more use of colour to show things would be better
4. The tech web. I love it but once again the monotone approach means that instead of using colours etc to denote certain things everything just blends together. I found it extremely hard to even see where Wonders are on it.
5. The lack of 'design' on pop up windows. The UI for the most part is lovely but the small rectangular pop up windows dont look minilaistic they look like placeholders for a future UI that they quite got around to making.
PS No clock or regenerate map button
1. The blur effect when you have things like the Virtue screen open. You are about to make a choice on something that will impact the output on some level but you cant look at the top bar and access the impact without exiting out of the screen.
2. The City screen is a MESS. Do we really need to see all the possible yeilds are far as the eye can see. DO we really need to have such HUGE tiles-work circles, and worse do we really need such huge buy-tile tags? This was all bad enough in CiV but because of the use of black in the UI it is so heavy.
3.I personally find the monotone of the city name bar on the main screen a bit dull, more use of colour to show things would be better
4. The tech web. I love it but once again the monotone approach means that instead of using colours etc to denote certain things everything just blends together. I found it extremely hard to even see where Wonders are on it.
5. The lack of 'design' on pop up windows. The UI for the most part is lovely but the small rectangular pop up windows dont look minilaistic they look like placeholders for a future UI that they quite got around to making.
PS No clock or regenerate map button
Acken
Deity
The UI is bad. It's worse than Civ5 for absolutely no reason (additional clicking required, some broken functionality with queues).
And with something like bc1 EUI available for Civ5 where they could shamelessly copy ideas I just cannot comprehend how you can be so incompetent and make something worse than the previous product.
Simple examples.
Why are the "growth" and "production" progress in the two corners in a very tiny ugly color ?
If you select Research as a production you cannot queue up things you have to switch mode, remove the research and then go back to queue mode.
Why is there no sort function by gold or science for trade routes ? It was in BNW
Huge building icons
No demographics
The list goes on.
No excuse sorry, the UI is a shame. Going from bc1 EUI to this is like ditching a good steel sword to play with a stone hatchet.
And with something like bc1 EUI available for Civ5 where they could shamelessly copy ideas I just cannot comprehend how you can be so incompetent and make something worse than the previous product.
Simple examples.
Why are the "growth" and "production" progress in the two corners in a very tiny ugly color ?
If you select Research as a production you cannot queue up things you have to switch mode, remove the research and then go back to queue mode.
Why is there no sort function by gold or science for trade routes ? It was in BNW
Huge building icons
No demographics
The list goes on.
No excuse sorry, the UI is a shame. Going from bc1 EUI to this is like ditching a good steel sword to play with a stone hatchet.
- Joined
- Mar 3, 2011
- Messages
- 1,128
I love the atmosphere ,I don't mind the monochromique thing and even like but they are a lot of missing things , functionnaly spreaking.
I m not sure that there is a button for every Fx key screen. For instance , I didn't find the trade routes managing screen so I pressed the Fx keys until I got the right one (it's F10 if you are curious btw).
SO some things are either absent or well hidden
I m not sure that there is a button for every Fx key screen. For instance , I didn't find the trade routes managing screen so I pressed the Fx keys until I got the right one (it's F10 if you are curious btw).
SO some things are either absent or well hidden
Acken
Deity
I love the atmosphere ,I don't mind the monochromique thing and even like but they are a lot of missing things , functionnaly spreaking.
I m not sure that there is a button for every Fx key screen. For instance , I didn't find the trade routes managing screen so I pressed the Fx keys until I got the right one (it's F10 if you are curious btw).
SO some things are either absent or well hidden
For trade routes you can click the "+" just left of the bottom right buttons
Anarchist
Warlord
Some things are sort of OK, some are amazingly irritating.
The tech tree (as has been mentioned) is a nightmare. You can't zoom out, or if you do its useless. To see what everything does is painful. Initially I spent most of my time trying to figure out what to research.
The city screen took me ages to fathom. It is sort of OK when you are used to it. Why doesn't Esc get me out of it, though? The building list is too expanded and you are forced to scroll a lot, which is a pain.
The alert icons are a mess. Some are coloured, some are not. What is that about? I hate the 'there is an enemy near your city' alert that is small and monochrome. I miss that all the time. Also, some fade in and out of colour, but there is no rhyme or reason to which that I can see.
Still with the damned irritating "let's declare war on ..." dialog that refuses to allow me to see any details of the players. How the hell do I know who is who? Maybe I'll get used to the names, but for newbies (to BE) it is useless.
Unit upgrades and names. I am almost completely lost. All those fancy upgrades (and I like the way it works, just not the damned UI, which is this thread) are converted into meaningless (to BE newbies) names. I have to look at the whole upgrade list to figure out that unit I allowed an extra tile range if it has not moved. The name is meaningless. Which brings me to ...
The Civilopaedia and the upgrade dialogs don't keep their place! If I go back to the game to check what I was doing before opening it, and go back, the dialog is back to the start. That is as annoying as my mother-in-law.
As has been mentioned elsewhere, the trade route selection, as well as being constant, is annoying (also a bit like the mother-in-law, really). The 'previous route' mention is almost impossible to see easily. It should be at the top or in a different colour. The list also cannot be sorted as you can in Civ 5.
How hard is it to see what the turns to finish a build is? I have no idea why that is not better. Actually. I'm not a fan of the transparent city title at all.
Victory ranking is much, much better! I can now see clearly where I stand, and how close others are to winning (ie who needs a kick in the wossnames right sharpish).
Quests dialog is a bit odd. Also, the 'show failed quests' checkbox does the opposite.
Right-click on unit pics (bottom-right of the screen when selected) does not take to the Civilopaedia entry like Civ 5 does.
Esc does not always dismiss things, making me hunt for the randomly-placed close button/word. That was true in Civ 5 too, but seems worse in this one.
Overall, not very impressed, and most of this could/would/should have been picked up in User Acceptance Testing in my world. It looks like that is what we are doing now, just like with Microsoft products.
The tech tree (as has been mentioned) is a nightmare. You can't zoom out, or if you do its useless. To see what everything does is painful. Initially I spent most of my time trying to figure out what to research.
The city screen took me ages to fathom. It is sort of OK when you are used to it. Why doesn't Esc get me out of it, though? The building list is too expanded and you are forced to scroll a lot, which is a pain.
The alert icons are a mess. Some are coloured, some are not. What is that about? I hate the 'there is an enemy near your city' alert that is small and monochrome. I miss that all the time. Also, some fade in and out of colour, but there is no rhyme or reason to which that I can see.
Still with the damned irritating "let's declare war on ..." dialog that refuses to allow me to see any details of the players. How the hell do I know who is who? Maybe I'll get used to the names, but for newbies (to BE) it is useless.
Unit upgrades and names. I am almost completely lost. All those fancy upgrades (and I like the way it works, just not the damned UI, which is this thread) are converted into meaningless (to BE newbies) names. I have to look at the whole upgrade list to figure out that unit I allowed an extra tile range if it has not moved. The name is meaningless. Which brings me to ...
The Civilopaedia and the upgrade dialogs don't keep their place! If I go back to the game to check what I was doing before opening it, and go back, the dialog is back to the start. That is as annoying as my mother-in-law.
As has been mentioned elsewhere, the trade route selection, as well as being constant, is annoying (also a bit like the mother-in-law, really). The 'previous route' mention is almost impossible to see easily. It should be at the top or in a different colour. The list also cannot be sorted as you can in Civ 5.
How hard is it to see what the turns to finish a build is? I have no idea why that is not better. Actually. I'm not a fan of the transparent city title at all.
Victory ranking is much, much better! I can now see clearly where I stand, and how close others are to winning (ie who needs a kick in the wossnames right sharpish).
Quests dialog is a bit odd. Also, the 'show failed quests' checkbox does the opposite.
Right-click on unit pics (bottom-right of the screen when selected) does not take to the Civilopaedia entry like Civ 5 does.
Esc does not always dismiss things, making me hunt for the randomly-placed close button/word. That was true in Civ 5 too, but seems worse in this one.
Overall, not very impressed, and most of this could/would/should have been picked up in User Acceptance Testing in my world. It looks like that is what we are doing now, just like with Microsoft products.
isau
Deity
- Joined
- Jan 15, 2007
- Messages
- 3,071
I find the UI very difficult to use. Which shocked me because Civ V (and even 4) mostly got this part right.
One thing I haaaaaaaate is that the terrain indicator window is in the top right corner of the screen, instead of the bottom right. Not to mention the fact that I seriously cannot tell a desert from grassland from plains. I have no idea what anything is and have to roll over it, and the indicator is tiny and in a not view-friendly place, so I have to keep glancing back and forth.
Overall its just way, way too hard to tell what anything is on the map.
One thing I haaaaaaaate is that the terrain indicator window is in the top right corner of the screen, instead of the bottom right. Not to mention the fact that I seriously cannot tell a desert from grassland from plains. I have no idea what anything is and have to roll over it, and the indicator is tiny and in a not view-friendly place, so I have to keep glancing back and forth.
Overall its just way, way too hard to tell what anything is on the map.
mnf
King
- Joined
- Jan 31, 2006
- Messages
- 659
The terrain info box is basically a repetition of your mouseover tooltip. I stopped looking at it after I modded the tooltip offset to leave space for the mouse cursor. I also got fed up with the city banner covering up stuff, so I shifted them down.
The monotone style I think is all about the tablet platform. That minimalist Android feel that's so "fashionable" these days. While it does somehow fit in with the whole technological gadgets feel, it doesn't fit in with the futuristic feel that's supposed to be Beyond Earth.
I wish developers would stop trying to make one-size-fits-all UIs already. A game will feel different when it's played on a 27" screen to when it's played on a 17" screen.
The monotone style I think is all about the tablet platform. That minimalist Android feel that's so "fashionable" these days. While it does somehow fit in with the whole technological gadgets feel, it doesn't fit in with the futuristic feel that's supposed to be Beyond Earth.
I wish developers would stop trying to make one-size-fits-all UIs already. A game will feel different when it's played on a 27" screen to when it's played on a 17" screen.
Magma_Dragoon
Reploid
- Joined
- May 10, 2008
- Messages
- 2,354
absolutely hate the main menu button fade in
Way too small, especially text, on a 4k monitor. I was able, with some work, to mostly fix this in Civ5, but so far in BE the best I've done is to move the icon positions, but not make the text bigger. I've started poking around some of the .lua and xml files (besides the font files) but so far haven't seen anything obvious...but I'm not a modder so maybe I'm overlooking something.
CaptainPatch
Lifelong gamer
In a word, it sucks. Pretty colors, but that's about it for the pros column. Non-intuitive. way too small font. Hazy tooltip descriptions. Missing info data links. (Where's the _quick_ tech web link? It's click on the research beaker -- but it doesn't tell you that in the tooltip.) Where's the active unit list? I still haven't found that. You can't see units sleeping in a city just by looking at the map or city screen.
In my opinion, the whole thing needs to have a serious overhaul.
In my opinion, the whole thing needs to have a serious overhaul.
Arklight
Chieftain
- Joined
- Oct 25, 2014
- Messages
- 5
Reading through the thread it seems all my minor gripes have been experienced by others;
Tech Tree - monochrome icons, cant tell the difference easily between wonders, buildings and troops and a quick glance. having to tooltip everything is a bit of a pain.
I also have just found it not as intuitive, and why is everything so BIG. Its like someone saw the metro interface and said, "Yes, that was a brilliant idea" (and like that the mechanics are sound its its just a pain to use)
D
Tech Tree - monochrome icons, cant tell the difference easily between wonders, buildings and troops and a quick glance. having to tooltip everything is a bit of a pain.
I also have just found it not as intuitive, and why is everything so BIG. Its like someone saw the metro interface and said, "Yes, that was a brilliant idea" (and like that the mechanics are sound its its just a pain to use)
D
The lack of a strategic view is a killer. It wouldn't if the map was readable. Right now I have to look every hex description to see what it is and whether there's miasma on it or not. The map just doesn't do its job of conveying information to the player.
City screen sucks. Queuing orders should be easy, it is not.
Icons for your citizens hide the yield icons behind them, so you can't decide where to put your citizen, as the choice icons hides the information you need to take the decision.
Basically, all decision making requires you to take extra steps to find the info you need instead of presenting it to you.
City screen sucks. Queuing orders should be easy, it is not.
Icons for your citizens hide the yield icons behind them, so you can't decide where to put your citizen, as the choice icons hides the information you need to take the decision.
Basically, all decision making requires you to take extra steps to find the info you need instead of presenting it to you.
Lord Tirian
Erratic Poster
It's really weird, the scaling seems to be all over the place. The tech tree screen seems fine, the main map suffers from a tiny mini-map, the city screen has enormous icons for existing buildings but a okay-ish size for the queue/build list.
It just feels a bit inconsistent which surprises me, after Civ5 was not only fairly consistent but also scaled fairly well to different screen-sizes. Icons have the same problem, some work really well at their size, some... are way to reliant on small detail to work scaled down.
My pet peeve, though is, selecting units. In Civ 5, unit icons moved/were offset a bit to avoid city labels and to distinguish between civilian and military units. In Civ:BE, activating a garrisoned unit stacked with a civilian is surprisingly fiddly.
I like the overall aesthetic, but really think it could do with another pass of polish to tie it all together a bit more.
Teproc
King
I will agree with the fact that strategic viex missing is really a problem here. I don't need it on my computer, but I would definitely use it every once in a while to see things more clearly (I sometimes do that even in CiV), and it's not an option here.
Greasy Dave
Prince
- Joined
- Oct 30, 2010
- Messages
- 376
The tech tree is just AWFUL. I mean AWFUL!
It's like it didn't occur to anybody that introducing a free form, unstructured system, they might have to help the user by providing some graphical strucutre!
You can't filter for wonders????
You can't filter search for military units???
Why? Didn't that occur to them?
They could have colour-coded the techs that have a similar theme - health, science etc
They could have colour coded the techs as they increase in beakers needed.
They SHOULD have HIGHLIGHTED wonders with great big BEACONS of SHINING NEON so people can find them at a glance
Absolutely awful design.
I would like to enjoy the game. I'd like to explore the tech tree and enjoy the exploration - but the UI is killing me.
Can't remember the name of the Civ V UI overhaul mod - most downloads on steam - didn't they look at that and learn anythign?
It's like it didn't occur to anybody that introducing a free form, unstructured system, they might have to help the user by providing some graphical strucutre!
You can't filter for wonders????
You can't filter search for military units???
Why? Didn't that occur to them?
They could have colour-coded the techs that have a similar theme - health, science etc
They could have colour coded the techs as they increase in beakers needed.
They SHOULD have HIGHLIGHTED wonders with great big BEACONS of SHINING NEON so people can find them at a glance
Absolutely awful design.
I would like to enjoy the game. I'd like to explore the tech tree and enjoy the exploration - but the UI is killing me.
Can't remember the name of the Civ V UI overhaul mod - most downloads on steam - didn't they look at that and learn anythign?
Deon
Lt. of Mordor
Maybe I am missing something, but did they really remove a way to see what the city has just built? It appears to be a major issue in my games.
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