new UI?

[Thegreatmonkey]

Hello,

I've been coming and going from 11 for a while now and each time I come back I see the same UI, seeing that it really needs an update. It is basally the same UI I used and got use to when I first play the game back in 2000ish. Is there any plans to update the UI? The UI is the main thing for me that has really got me to quit the game now a days. I re-sub for a few months but dealing with that UI is a pain sometimes.

[Sp1cyryan]

There is no new UI coming. If the UI was your main reason for quiting then goodbye, lol.

[Pixela]

https://i.imgur.com/A1s96rw.png

posted in other thread

i thought it was awful

[Pixela]

If people want to complain about the UI, be more specific.

[Sirmarki]

I think FFXI, generally has an older clientele than most other video games, I myself am in my 40s. I think some visualisation options would be a great addition seeing as the game requires a fair amount of reading and we all know eyes are not as good as they used to be when you hit later years.

[Alhanelem]

at one point someone was working on an updated UI for PC, but they left SE or otherwise stopped working on it and all development was halted. We briefly saw an early prototype on the Test Server before it was shut down.

[Alhanelem]

Y
https://i.imgur.com/A1s96rw.png

posted in other thread

i thought it was awful
You thought it was awful because it was an early prototype without art assets. It still offered many improvements, namely the ability to move everything anywhere on the screen. If it didn't get cancelled, it would have visually looked similar to what we already have, just with much more ability to customize it.

I work in game dev and I've test played maps in games that weere just a bunch of white checkerboard blocks. Anyone, including you would have said that looks awful if they've seen it. But again: that was an early development version. Obviously the final product looked like an actual game and not a bunch of cubes.

[Velner]

They addressed the UI situation during the AMA recently. They said it was something they wanted to upgrade and began working on but found that it was too difficult to do without essentially breaking everything else.

[Sp1cyryan]

https://i.imgur.com/A1s96rw.png

posted in other thread

i thought it was awful

Just what every 14 player wants. A dramatically worse UI that pops out and makes a lot of noise because they need constant stimulation.

[Alhanelem]

Just what every 14 player wants. A dramatically worse UI that pops out and makes a lot of noise because they need constant stimulation.
It really wasn't that, it functionally isn't much different from the original (aside from the extra macro bar that we really should still get). It just responded better to mouse input and allowed you to move things around on the screen where you wanted them. I probably wouldn't need any tools if I could just move the status and target windows closer to the middle of the screen during combat so its easier to see.

One of the other thing that was planned was for you to be able to use the spell icons on the macro bar instead of the very limited text labels we currently have- which is one of the reason they created a whole new library of icons for spells and abilities years ago. That was created for this new UI (but was never implemented into it). While the game does still have and use those icons, you only see them in the menus and they're so tiny that you can't really distinguish them.

The other main thing the prototype UI could do was allow you to have different windows open at the same time. You could have the gear screen and the inventory open at the same time for instance, it allowed you to do various things without having to back out of one screen to access another, since the menu was always available.

[Sp1cyryan]

Because the functionality won't change. People just want eye candy. The only way to get a meaningfully better UI is to make a new game.

[Alhanelem]

Because the functionality won't change. People just want eye candy. The only way to get a meaningfully better UI is to make a new game.
Moving things on the screen is all I've ever wanted from the UI, and they were going to make that happen. And then it all came to a stop. It doesn't need to make me breakfast in the morning or have fancy bells and whistles, it just needs to let me have the HP bars and stuff where I want them to be.

This UI could have been meaningfully better if it got the development time it needed and SE didn't cancel it. You have no idea how much I wanted this to happen.

[Dragoy]

Yeah, I'd like to be able to freely move the windows and have them open at the same time. That alone would make it... different at least.

I don't really have complaints about it when playing with a (PS2) gamepad, but I used to play with keyboard only (and a little bit of mouse here and there). Would not be opposed to an actual mouse and keyboard set-up either probably.

That said, if they have to choose between content and such and a new UI, I'll vote for new content etc. at this time.