As
humans, we have a highly developed verbal and grammatical system. Still,
language may not always be the perfect solution for some communication
needs. For example, take the following list of words:
- boca
- mouth
- bouche
- kuchi
- oris
- mund
All six
words mean the same thing ("mouth" in Spanish, English, French,
Japanese, Latin and German, respectively). Still, the symbolic representation
used by the different languages is very different. No one would say
that all six words express the exact same meaning. Most modern languages
separate representation from meaning, and this may be unsuitable for
interface design: the interface must be adapted to whichever language
a player uses. On the other hand, take the image in Figure 4.
OK, so
it's a picture of a mouth. Here, representation (the picture) and meaning
(the concept of mouth) are closely tied. Most ancient languages where
built around this idea. For example, see the Egyptian hieroglyph for
mouth," and the Japanese khanji symbol for the same concept, in
Figures 5 and 6.
Both resemble
the shape of a mouth. Early languages were pictorial because the human
brain works much better with images than it does with words. Decoding
written text required much more effort than just seeing and identifying
shapes in a pictogram, and that's the reason why cavemen began by drawing
animal shapes onto the walls, instead of writing their names.
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Figures
5 & 6. Both Egyptian hieroglyphs and Japanese khanji symbols
are pictographic representations.
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Maybe
we should apply this same methodology to interface design. We could
try to express as much information as we can in a graphical way, so
that it becomes:
- user
language independent
- easier
to interpret by the brain
This trend
towards pictographic interfaces is not new, and many games have made
great use of this paradigm. If you decide to use this strategy, you
should keep in mind the following:
- Try
to choose images and symbols that are universal, culture-independent.
- Simple
drawings are easier to decode than complex ones.
- Use
color only when needed.
- Use
easily recognizable shapes.
To sum
up: use graphical metaphors. Thus, the quest for pictographic interfaces
finally meets the analogy learning trend. As a result, you get a symbolic
representation (a drawing) of something the user already knows how to
use (because it is a metaphor). Tests show that this provides much beter
usability and user perfomance.
There
is yet another practical reason to use pictograms. Today's titles sell
millions, and are sold worldwide. As a consequence, they need to be
translated. All on-screen messages, manuals, etc. have to be converted
for every languages the game will be sold in. Pictographic interfaces,
when designed cleverly, require little or no translation at all, because
the symbols they use are universal. So, as a side effect, this strategy
can reduce the needs of localization.
Screen
Layout Techniques
Sometimes
games contain relatively large sets of actions that a user may take
at any time. For example, the Baldur's Gate screen in Figure 7 has (counting
menus and buttons only) more than 25 clickable targets on-screen simultaneously.
If we do not apply some clever layout technique, the result may only
be a screen cluttered with unrelated info.
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Figure
7. The main game screen in Baldur's Gate has over 25 clickable
on-screen targets -- and that's not even counting the main game
window.
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To maximize
user performance in these situations, we must follow some basic laws.
The first
one is called Fitt's Law, and states that:
"The
time required to acquire a target is a function of distance to the target
and its size."
This law
has some interesting extensions and corollaries. For example, targets
located along the edges of the screen are easier to reach than those
located in the middle. Even more, the four corners are the least-effort
area of the screen, in terms of ease of access. So games should keep
the most important buttons and controllers in these areas.
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Figure
8. Infogames' Silver featured a floating menu, activated by a
right mouse click.
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Another
interesting conclusion arises from the fact that user speed decreases
with distance to the clickable area, which is quite obvious. Still,
most games put menus and buttons in predetermined areas of the screen,
such that the user must go there to click them. Efficiency would improve
if we could ensure that the buttons were always close to the current
mouse position.The only way to achieve this effect is by using floating
menus, so that the menu opens right around the cursor position with
a click. Although Windows has been using this paradigm for some years
now, I can only remember one game using this concept: Silver,
a newer RPG by Infogames. As you can see in Figure 8, whenever the user
clicks the right mouse button, a floating menu opens and you just select
the right button. It takes some time to get used to it but, as time
goes by, the system proves very agile and efficient.
A second
law is to organize the screen in a coherent way. Menus, buttons and
commands should be laid out in thematic groups, to improve access speed.
For example, in Baldur's Gate you have game commands on the left-hand
side of the screen, immediate actions (move, attack, etc.) on the bottom,
and characters to the right. Grouping related items in such a way reduces
the time required to click on the different areas, especially for novice
users.
The third
(and last) layout strategy is to keep relevant information (but nothing
else) visible. All the actions a user may take at a certain point of
the game should be directly visible, without a need to dwell into nested
menu systems. Many users ignore all commands that are not directly available
to them. On the other hand, all information irrelevant to a the current
game context should disappear, or at least become unusable. This way
we can prevent user errors. In a RPG, for example, selecting a character
should show on-screen all the actions he can perform, and de-activate
all the remaining actions.
The spatial
layout techniques I have just outlined, when used together, greatly
improve interaction, by make games more intuitive. This is a very important
feature, especially in the first minutes of gameplay, which decide whether
the player will stick to the game or get bored and stop playing.