Timeless Menace Interface and HUD

[AncientWisp]

Playing on an Xbox One with old, dim eyes…

 

Love the game, found the interface to be workable, but Timeless Menace really takes the interface in the wrong direction for me.

 

Showing the status on the game screen:

• Due to the reduced size I’ve lost the detail I had.  It was nice to know if you are ½ way through your “water”, etc.  If your goal was to make it vaguer you’ve accomplished that.

• Showing the status also clobbers my ability to see anything other than status when working in low light (inside houses, night time).  Maybe this isn’t a problem for younger players, but for me, and it’s a significant issue.

• Lost control of how long I can see it.

   

  I know this was a feature folks were asking for, but if they’re like me, the only thing I’m really interested in seeing is how I’m doing for “cold”, not the other stuff.

   

  Radial Menu:  If you have to use two keys at the same time it’s not great, but workable.  Your menu requires three.  This may be an age issue, but I do find it really nasty.

[Patrick Carlson]

1 hour ago, AncientWisp said:

Playing on an Xbox One with old, dim eyes…

 

Love the game, found the interface to be workable, but Timeless Menace really takes the interface in the wrong direction for me.

 

Showing the status on the game screen:

• Due to the reduced size I’ve lost the detail I had.  It was nice to know if you are ½ way through your “water”, etc.  If your goal was to make it vaguer you’ve accomplished that.

• Showing the status also clobbers my ability to see anything other than status when working in low light (inside houses, night time).  Maybe this isn’t a problem for younger players, but for me, and it’s a significant issue.

• Lost control of how long I can see it.

   

  I know this was a feature folks were asking for, but if they’re like me, the only thing I’m really interested in seeing is how I’m doing for “cold”, not the other stuff.

   

  Radial Menu:  If you have to use two keys at the same time it’s not great, but workable.  Your menu requires three.  This may be an age issue, but I do find it really nasty.

Thanks for your feedback. Even if you are feeling out of place right now, we hope you give these changes a chance. We've worked really hard on them.

One note in terms of your Status--on the Xbox One controller you can hold start and look at the Status info for as long as you need to. I hope it helps a bit to know that. 

[pecypc]

14 hours ago, AncientWisp said:

Playing on an Xbox One with old, dim eyes…

 

Love the game, found the interface to be workable, but Timeless Menace really takes the interface in the wrong direction for me.

 

Showing the status on the game screen:

• Due to the reduced size I’ve lost the detail I had.  It was nice to know if you are ½ way through your “water”, etc.  If your goal was to make it vaguer you’ve accomplished that.

• Showing the status also clobbers my ability to see anything other than status when working in low light (inside houses, night time).  Maybe this isn’t a problem for younger players, but for me, and it’s a significant issue.

• Lost control of how long I can see it.

   

  I know this was a feature folks were asking for, but if they’re like me, the only thing I’m really interested in seeing is how I’m doing for “cold”, not the other stuff.

   

  Radial Menu:  If you have to use two keys at the same time it’s not great, but workable.  Your menu requires three.  This may be an age issue, but I do find it really nasty.

They scoff, saying on inside of window menus and status as deeply immersed in the game. This adds arcade, compared with the previous division of the game world and the menu.

[random calliope]

AncientWisp, you're not alone.  Of the changes of Timeless Menace that I've experienced so far (most thrilling and wonderful) the interface is a real step backwards.  

My character is now forever sick because after first loading the update I ate two pieces of wolf meat.  To find the path into my inventory to eat it was another story, complete with mapping the keys for the new interface.

With my character now at 2% risk for parasites (because of the wolf meat), a 6% chance for hypothermia, AND cabin fever because I'm trying to figure out the menuing system before going out in my stalker game, one would think with all those alerts that I got mauled by a bear and was about to die.  Actually there's no danger, just a ton of alerts.  The red cross appears to be permanently displayed because of the wolf meat.

Now try to find the health screen.  You have to deal with the radial menu for this one.  It now takes multiple clicks to find the health screen - combo keyboard then mouse on the PC.  It used to just be one key for a quick look, then one to close it.

How much cold, tired, fed, or hydrated the player is cannot be distinguished with the current bars because there is no (visible to me) "full" marker to the right of the bar.  A bar graph is fine when it shows its upper limit.  These have no such identifying markers. (This is AncientWisp's first bullet)

What does a snare have in common with a fire and a bedroll?  Is the assumption that players set snares before bedding down so they have breakfast in the morning?

 

13 hours ago, Patrick Carlson said:

Thanks for your feedback. Even if you are feeling out of place right now, we hope you give these changes a chance. We've worked really hard on them.

I'm not being negative here, but giving something a chance isn't an option when you're talking about eyesight...  And I"m trying.  i'm really trying.  Even if I successfully change my habits of how I call up info I can't see what simply isn't there - like the max on the stats bars, or an actual health alert.  These things simply cannot be assessed without digging into menus now to get actual numbers instead of using the indicators because the indicators can't be trusted.

[AncientWisp]

Feeling out of place???    Guess I stepped on someone’s pet dog here.  Could I use it?  Yep, but that doesn’t make it better FOR ME.  If your gamer audience likes it it’s a winner, if they don’t then it sucks, and without feedback I’m not sure how you know the difference.

 

I offer the following in the same spirit, namely keeping a really great game great:  Prior to this release you offered a nice open world where I could play the game anyway I wanted to.  I could spend my time exploring, or I could find a resource rich spot and hunker down for the long haul, or some variant in between.   

 

Now you’ve introduced changes to force folks to get out and do something other than just sleep.   For the life of me I can’t figure out why a gamer would do that, and even less why it should bother Hinderland if they do.   When you waste resources (as in time and money) to force folks to play a single player, noncompetitive  sandbox game the way you want them to, you may want to question the direction you are heading in.

 

[Patrick Carlson]

12 minutes ago, AncientWisp said:

Feeling out of place???    Guess I stepped on someone’s pet dog here.  Could I use it?  Yep, but that doesn’t make it better FOR ME.  If your gamer audience likes it it’s a winner, if they don’t then it sucks, and without feedback I’m not sure how you know the difference.

 

I offer the following in the same spirit, namely keeping a really great game great:  Prior to this release you offered a nice open world where I could play the game anyway I wanted to.  I could spend my time exploring, or I could find a resource rich spot and hunker down for the long haul, or some variant in between.   

 

Now you’ve introduced changes to force folks to get out and do something other than just sleep.   For the life of me I can’t figure out why a gamer would do that, and even less why it should bother Hinderland if they do.   When you waste resources (as in time and money) to force folks to play a single player, noncompetitive  sandbox game the way you want them to, you may want to question the direction you are heading in.

 

Nope, no pet dogs were stepped on.

I only meant "out of place" in the spirit of your feedback, that you seemed uncomfortable with the changes to the game, which is fine to express. That's why we always want to hear what players think of the update. Your feedback on the Xbox One controls is noted. 

I will also say though, and this has always been the case for The Long Dark's development, that the team has a clear vision of what they are building. At the same time we work in parallel to get great feedback from the community. We think these two approaches can coexist, and have so far, even as the game has changed and evolved.