ID:1393070
 

Poll: Which is received best

Huds 86% (50)
Stat Panels 1% (1)
Stat Panels+Huds 12% (7)

Login to vote.

I've seen games with all 3 types done very nicely and i was wanting to know which type would be well received and which is best for what type of games?

Please vote and tell me why you think that one is better per say over the other types?
Stat panels look ugly and I can only think of 1 legitimate reason to use them and that is displaying information quickly and easily to help with testing things.

You should never use them in a finished game. Ever.
In response to The Magic Man
That's just not true There are some of games on byond that have a nice mix of both and looks nicer them most huds
In response to The Magic Man
This guy knows what's up. Stat panels are hideous and lazy, and always end up being crammed with so much superfluous information and hundreds of verbs. The only time I use them is for debugging, but never in release.

Ask yourself this: can you name one non-BYOND game that uses something like stat panels?
I was just thinking about using them for event related text and server info ect stuff like that
I'm fairly certain the majority of people who use the forums don't like stat panels.

I'm sure there is some other place you could put things like that.
A wise man once said, "Stat panels are the devil".
In response to MegaJester
i know i could make Huds for event text but it seems more efficient to use A stat panel for things that just spam some text every hour or so telling you the event is starting and whats going on in the event.
Stat panels are the devil
In response to Rushnut
Rushnut wrote:
Stat panels are the devil

This, Is said wise man. ;( brings a tear to my eye every time.
In response to DragonDesend
DragonDesend wrote:
Rushnut wrote:
Stat panels are the devil

This, Is said wise man. ;( brings a tear to my eye every time.

i crey ever tim
mi msg is 5deep12u
In response to LordAndrew
And to add a bit of flare for you Look at Rise of the Pirates, i was considering using a event stat panel like that and chat like that.
Link: http://www.byond.com/games/PrideRavanok/ RiseOfThePirates#tab=pics

EDIT: You would have to play it for a few min to see what i mean..
In response to Void Games
Well, ultimately the heads up display vs stat panel argument is a presentation issue. There's only so many ways to present information in a stat panel, as opposed to the many neat ways you can display it on the screen.

Going from your example here, do you really need to display a whole bunch of text right away in a stat panel to show an event is starting, and what the event entails? Why not have a notification icon of some sort appear on the screen, and upon clicking it have it bring up a dialogue box on the screen with an explanation of the event.

Obviously there's a bit more work involved here to set all of this up, but in the long run it's going to look far more professional than boring stat panels vomiting the info on you.
In response to Void Games
I think you may be confusing a stat panel for what is simply an output element. It appears Rise of the Pirates is emulating a stat panel by having buttons to switch between output elements, but that's not the actual dreaded stat panel element. There's absolutely nothing wrong with using the output element for displaying information and chat messages.
In response to LordAndrew
Can you link me to any guides explaining this?
BOOOOOOO! STATPANELS! BOOOOO HUDS! BYOND is capable of so much more than statpanels OR HUDs. HUDs need to be used WITH the interface tools, and people need to do more with their window than just make it a solid color, stick in a donate button, and some tabs/statpanels, and a healthbar on the screen. The interface should be non-intrusive the game, should fit the theme, and should be hard to tell apart from the map element. If I can tell what is interface, and what is map in your game, you very possibly have a very crappy interface.

This is something along the lines of what I do. Note that this demo is incomplete and a number of things don't work, or are simply broken because the person I made this for never paid the second payment.

I haven't bothered to go back and polish it, because honestly, while the graphics are solid, I have no real want to make an RPG.

Don't use the graphics, BTW. They belong to me.

http://www.byond.com/developer/Ter13/Interfacedemo

The above demo uses a couple of browsers (A few things really need work, graphically, but the basic idea is there), HUD elements, and some very serious interface elements.

Note the lack of solid-color verb panels, tab panes to navigate through, and how there are NO statpanels or verbs.

All stats should be represented either in unfoldable subwindows, or on-screen. One of the browsers is a tooltip that I've set up with javascript to communicate back and forward with the server. It keeps track of the mouse and if the mouse exits the tooltip, it tells the server to hide the browser. It was intended to be used when you right clicked on an object in the inventory menu, or when you hovered your mouse over it for about 3 seconds.

The output panel isn't an output at all. It's a custom-written HTML page with javascript in it, which is available in my demos as "ImageScrollbar".

Most of the rest of it is pure HUD. Including the paperdoll, which is a map element, and the inventory bags are map elements with item slots, rather than grids, seeing as grids have a horrible tendency to... Well... Suck.


If you want a closer look at what is what in my demo:

Everything in green is using skin/interface elements.
Everything in purple is using browsers
Everything in red is using HUD objects.

The inventory windows are all separate windows, with a map element in them, so they don't have to clutter the screen, but they can overlap if the client wants them to.

The spellbook uses a map embedded in the pages to allow you to add hud elements and text, but you could easily swap that for a browser.

The paperdoll uses a map as well as a lot of labels for stats.

Honestly, I'd probably want to switch it to HTML as well, with javascript that way I could just sent it updates periodically using simple DM to send function calls to it to update it.



Right click the image and click view image to see the full size screencap.
And if you really didn't know this is what a stat panel looks like, Void.

http://files.byondhome.com/MegaJester/statpanel.png
In response to Ter13
I would never use it without consent of the owners, and or person it was made for, i'm not like most on here.
In response to MegaJester
I thought you could do something Like Rotps is doing i did not know it was a entire different thing.
In response to Ter13
Could i coax you into finishing it? Its a nice demo but i don't have any money to spare, you should not keep something that has so much potential unfinished.
Page: 1 2 3