Game Design 2 (2013): Immersion Through Game UI

Game Design 2Lecture 7: Immersion through UI

http://gcugd2.com [email protected]

2013

Sunday, 3 November 13

Reading

• Anthony Stonehousehttp://bit.ly/9isY6D

• Erik Fagerhold & Magnus Lorentzon (2009)http://bit.ly/d0HfcW

• Gamasutra (Marcus Andrews @ EA:DICE)http://bit.ly/9H6xuL

• SlideShare presentation from Fagerholdhttp://slidesha.re/bjxr4I


Immersive UI

• Trend towards minimal HUD

• UI as transparent as possible to not distract player


Terminology

• Diegetic: Interface included in the game world

• Non-diegetic: Interface rendered outside game world

• Spatial: UI Elements resented in game’s 3D space but not be an actual in-game entity

• Meta: Representations can be in game but aren’t necessarily visualised spatially for player









Case Study: Far Cry 2

• Goes to great lengths to make UI diegetic

• especially hard for FPS games

• Uses in-game gadgets perform traditional HUD roles

• map

• time

• weapon condition




What works?

• Novelty factor

• diging bullets out of arm

• Ubisoft promoting UI in marketing

• Interaction with NPCs

• you can see what that character is doing

• injury rescue


What doesn’t work?

• UI seems conflicted

• there are traditional non-diegetic HUD elements such as: ammo; interaction opportunities; health etc




• The non-diegetic elements fade in and out

• Some elements of the UI don’t provide the player with enough information



What does it mean?

• The struggles of FC2 show that it is nearly hopeless for (realistic FPS) games to be playable and 100% diegetic

• If you make a late decision to compliment your diegetic components with non-diegetic, the design will suffer - best to plan


Case Study: Dead Space

• Fully diegetic interface.

• Unlike most games, they had an explicit direction that all UI elements be ‘in the game world’

• Fairly traditional HUD system with a twist

• all rendered as in-game holograms



• in addition to the holograms, Dead Space also draws interface on the actual player avatar



What works?• Sci-Fi Fiction lends itself to diegetic UI

• “typical UI, rendered atypically”

• Perspective

• Using player avatar as a canvas is a great way to promote immersion

• largely depending on setting & 3rd person camera

• Preserving Functionality

• preserves functionality but adds styleSunday, 3 November 13

What doesn’t work?

• Functionality breakdown

• the holographic 3D map failed to aid player navigation leading to the implementation of another, complimentary feature - the ‘locator’ that has a completely new diegetic spatial method



What does it mean?

• Fairly traditional interface rendered in novel fashion.

• May be unrealised potential benefit of diegetic & innovative UI

• Whilst the UI may have helped in the marketing (& sales?) its benefit to the gameplay is subjective


Case Study: TF 2

• Uses mixed methods to communicate

• very much a “whatever works” approach





What works?

• Mix of UI elements from each of the categories provides for lots of info without a cluttered HUD

• shows that UI components don’t need to have an immediately obvious theme or be immersive to work


What doesn’t work

• the mix of styles can be perceived as a bit messy

• inconsistencies can require more cognition from the player


What does it mean?

• TF2 has hardly any diegetic qualities but largely succeeds in UI design.

• Shows that players will tolerate mixing styles in an interface


Summary

• Diegetic interface elements can help to reinforce the fiction of a game and can help keep the player immersed.

• Diegetic elements are harder to design and integrate than non-diegetic elements especially in FPS games like Far Cry 2

• When there is a trade off between immersion and functionality - functionality must be given priority


Education

Game Design 2 (2013): Immersion Through Game UI