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Looking at the recent post in the locked thread, one thing really stood out... transparency (or at least the lack of shading around the bars and stuff) all over the place in the UI. That may look cool for a demo, but I suggest everybody go into their config menu and try changing their FFXI skin to a high-transparency skin and try playing for an hour or so.
All done? (Okay, I cheated and didn't actually do it, but I'm pretty sure you can.) Doesn't it suck when you can't see shit half the time because it's camoflauged in the background? I'm not even talking about the text as much as the bars. Just try to read them in those pictures in the post I linked. Even FFXi has some problems (looking at pet HP bars can be a pain depending on the background), but not too many if you use the default skin.
One word: contrast. It's something that Anime fansubbers learned long long ago, but when the first anime DVDs came out, subtitles were hard to read because the people who made the first DVD authoring software didn't understand that you need more than a one pixel outline, especially with NTSC video. FFXI keeps most bars inside of shaded boxes that keep the contrast relatively consistent, with only a little transparency. Just try reading some of the text in those screen shots. No, not the chat log (though it is still hard to read in places even with shading), I mean the quest name, monster name, weapon skill (?), etc.
And there's one thing that's the exact opposite. I noticed in some of the videos there is an opaque blue message box right smack in the middle of the screen, blocking whatever it was you were looking at. With FFXI, it's only the status icons that really get in my way when looking at stuff (can I plz has moving my mans downward in the screen?), but I'm using PS2, and with a full alliance going, half the screen is taken up with panels and menus most of the time, so it's going to suck for me no matter what.
It's nice to have an artist designing parts of the UI. But artists don't generally understand usability. (They still should understand contrast.) And companies tend to skimp on testing for usability. (The notable exception was Apple back in the early '80s when they were designing the Lisa and Macintosh.) At least being able to move parts around is an improvement over FFXI. Now if they could keep everything else from being a regression in terms of usability, maybe we would have something.
(And I still see no indication as to whether or not you can see another player's current buff/debuff status.)
All done? (Okay, I cheated and didn't actually do it, but I'm pretty sure you can.) Doesn't it suck when you can't see shit half the time because it's camoflauged in the background? I'm not even talking about the text as much as the bars. Just try to read them in those pictures in the post I linked. Even FFXi has some problems (looking at pet HP bars can be a pain depending on the background), but not too many if you use the default skin.
One word: contrast. It's something that Anime fansubbers learned long long ago, but when the first anime DVDs came out, subtitles were hard to read because the people who made the first DVD authoring software didn't understand that you need more than a one pixel outline, especially with NTSC video. FFXI keeps most bars inside of shaded boxes that keep the contrast relatively consistent, with only a little transparency. Just try reading some of the text in those screen shots. No, not the chat log (though it is still hard to read in places even with shading), I mean the quest name, monster name, weapon skill (?), etc.
And there's one thing that's the exact opposite. I noticed in some of the videos there is an opaque blue message box right smack in the middle of the screen, blocking whatever it was you were looking at. With FFXI, it's only the status icons that really get in my way when looking at stuff (can I plz has moving my mans downward in the screen?), but I'm using PS2, and with a full alliance going, half the screen is taken up with panels and menus most of the time, so it's going to suck for me no matter what.
It's nice to have an artist designing parts of the UI. But artists don't generally understand usability. (They still should understand contrast.) And companies tend to skimp on testing for usability. (The notable exception was Apple back in the early '80s when they were designing the Lisa and Macintosh.) At least being able to move parts around is an improvement over FFXI. Now if they could keep everything else from being a regression in terms of usability, maybe we would have something.
(And I still see no indication as to whether or not you can see another player's current buff/debuff status.)
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