skill icons

[SlechtWeerBeer]

Re: skill icons

Again like traffic signs .. ever seen a traffic sign with a full painted scene on it .. no .. why !!! .. because people need to recognize the meaning behind the sign as quickly as possible while driving ... that's why they are abstract and make use of basic colors .... that's why making traffic signs fully detailed painting is a stupid idea.

But you don't drive past skill icons at 60km/h.

 

[Mad Mantis]

Re: skill icons

Diablo 3 colorful .. lols ... apparently you haven't seen how colorful some games can get, it can give you nightmares XD

Hyperbole used as a tool to illustrate a position.

Also .. a good advice that always works, if pure colors hurts your eyes lower the contrast a little bit.

Because what I really want is to make sure that the rest of the screen is really hard to see?

 

[Knight_Wolf]

Re: skill icons

But you don't drive past skill icons at 60km/h.

You don't drive past airport signs at 60km/h either, yet the same logic applies.

You need to be able to differentiate a large number of icons/symbols/signs quickly .... it's the same when fighting hordes of enemies and is surrounded by a Hi-lv. mob and you click your hot-bar to open your skills tab and try to pick your WW skills among +25 other skills (which all look the same when scaled down to 10X10 and have no clear color coding) all that while your HP is dropping very near to zero ... not much different from driving at 6o km/m really :crazyeyes:

Hyperbole used as a tool to illustrate a position.

same here. :crazyeyes:

Because what I really want is to make sure that the rest of the screen is really hard to see?

That's the part where you increase the brightness :scratchchin:



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Point is .. what do i get from seeing a fully detailed sword in a 15X15 skill icon .. nothing ... absolutely nothing .. there is no point in drawing the sword in full detail whatsoever .. it causes clutter and confusion ... the sword silhouette more the does the job and does it 10X times better.

 

[Mad Mantis]

Re: skill icons

the sword silhouette more the does the job and does it 10X times better.

Indeed. Now make it greyscale so it doesn't look like rainbow gremlins vomited on the bottom of the screen and we are golden.

 

[SlechtWeerBeer]

Re: skill icons

You don't drive past airport signs at 60km/h either, yet the same logic applies.

You need to be able to differentiate a large number of icons/symbols/signs quickly .... it's the same when fighting hordes of enemies and is surrounded by a Hi-lv. mob and you click your hot-bar to open your skills tab and try to pick your WW skills among +25 other skills (which all look the same when scaled down to 10X10 and have no clear color coding) all that while your HP is dropping very near to zero ... not much different from driving at 6o km/m really :crazyeyes:

<snip>

Point is .. what do i get from seeing a fully detailed sword in a 15X15 skill icon .. nothing ... absolutely nothing .. there is no point in drawing the sword in full detail whatsoever .. it causes clutter and confusion ... the sword silhouette more the does the job and does it 10X times better.

Try differentiating 2 swords when you have 20+ icons with swords and little lines next to them. On a 10*10 resolution.
I think it's easier to distinguish detailed icons from another on a small scale than 2 identical icons.

 

[Knight_Wolf]

Re: skill icons

Try differentiating 2 swords when you have 20+ icons with swords and little lines next to them. On a 10*10 resolution.
I think it's easier to distinguish detailed icons from another on a small scale than 2 identical icons.

lols, there won't be anything such as +20 icons with swords ... no need for exaggeration ... let's say we have 4 or 5 of them ... if each of them sword icons has a sword silhouette and has a different color on the background they can be differentiated in a fraction of a sec .. the details add nothing and has no benefit at all .. like i said .. clutter and distraction.

Indeed. Now make it greyscale so it doesn't look like rainbow gremlins vomited on the bottom of the screen and we are golden.

If you read my reply above you will see why it can't be made greyscale .. if you have 4 or 5 items with sword symbols and make them grayscale it will be hard to differentiate between among them (and even doing them the D2 way will be hard).

Simple solution will be to actually to artistically desaturate/darken the colors of the icons backgrounds so that they don't stand out too much ... that will make them much less distracting.

 

[Mad Mantis]

Re: skill icons

if you have 4 or 5 items with sword symbols and make them grayscale it will be hard to differentiate between among them (and even doing them the D2 way will be hard).

Even I can design five different sword symbols in a greyscale. An accomplished artist should be able to do much more. Take a look at the TF2 achievements. They are all in black/white/orange. There are almost 200 of them and none look alike.

 

[Knight_Wolf]

Re: skill icons

Even I can design five different sword symbols in a greyscale. An accomplished artist should be able to do much more. Take a look at the TF2 achievements. They are all in black/white/orange. There are almost 200 of them and none look alike.

I know there can be 5 or 6 abstract sword designs in Grey scale .. that's not the problem .. the problem is that they will still all look very similar (as seen clearly in the D2 icon designs .. using negative version of the icon .. adding some circle around .. adding spikes to the circle .. etc etc).

But fact is spotting such difference in a bunch of 10X10 icons is not easy compared to colored ones ... colors are far more accessible and memorable.

Let me give an example.

For me out of the 2nd and 1st groups the most easily recognizable group no matter what size or scale is the 2nd one ... they are very easily differentiable from each other.

But the problem is still one will have to memorize what each color means.

Not the case ... taking the good point that the grayscale group has (being illustrative) and adding it to the color coding (in the third group) makes the whole recognizing and differentiation process swift and extremely easy .. and that's why i think the WWI 08 icon are the best design choice.

Thoughts ?

 

[Krugar]

Re: skill icons

Thoughts ?

1. It's not generalizable to every person. Some might find other options easier to distinguish.

2. Any option (within reason) given to the player will most of the time just mean an increase or decrease in the time they will take to get used to it, and not their ability to eventually quickly recognize the icons. Some will take longer, others will get there quickly.

3. Functionality cannot be the sole reasoning behind such a product as a computer game. Aesthetics play an important role too. And this gives an whole new meaning to 1.

...

In the end, I care for quickly recognizing skill icons but know for a fact that this will happen regardless. So, I place an higher emphasis on aesthetics and I do enjoy the new pictorial look.

And it is precisely the fact different people like different things in different quantities, that often this type of debate can never go anywhere, knight. I however, suggest you consider 2., being that I'm confident you are fully aware of 1 and 3.

 

[Mad Mantis]

Re: skill icons

Thoughts ?

Speaking for myself, I do find the first group to be more easily readable. I get distracted by the colors on the second group and find it harder to focus. Shifting the sword icon around on the first group would make them more easily recognizable.

As Krugar said. People react differently to certain stimuli. When I look at the WoW icons on my brothers Priest I see a huge jumble of skills. He finds it easy to look at.