Normally this is something that I wouldn’t do, but have decided it was about time. The Devs have proposed a new Guild Menu UI with the Task screen as follows:
Many of my guildies, friends in other guilds, and I thought it to be less than appealing. I even took it as far as asking friends who have not ever played nor heard of GoW. They thought it looked horrible. I decided to do a mash-up mock-up of the old and new and still try to keep it with the “scheme” they, the Devs, seem to be going for. I present to you my work, though no where near perfect, I believe it gets my point across and is a decent representation of what I feel it should look like. (The Brown Task reward is Diamonds)
Your alternative is certainly better. But if you don’t mind a small tweak i believe we could have the “Enjoy your Temporary Bonus!” right below “Complete!” and this would leave extra space for a bigger icon of said bonus like this:
I personally don’t want to see the current donation bars replaced with a % completed that doesn’t show 75,000/120,000 or a bar that doesn’t show the numbers. I don’t want to have to calculate how much needs to be donated to complete a task or take the extra steps to open the donation, hit complete then exit out of it. It should clearly show xx of yy has been donated to the current task level at all times until completed.
In addition, though I don’t know how feasible it is: I would really like a different background picture than the one presented. This whole new UI is so gothic-dark and I just compared the mockups to what we have right now. Currently, our guild is a light, happy place. The new UI brings already black for the boxes and a slight black title background.
So why can’t we at least have a background picture that doesn’t get depressingly dark around the edges and seems to look more like an abandoned town than anything? Give us some bright landscape or guild hall or something, devs! I am so tired of depressing black being the main theme of the UI. This is supposed to be a colorful and happy game and not some funeral.
The black gradient is to help people read the text the devs like to put on top of artwork which sometimes make the text nearly unreadable. It’s either more boxes for the text as well or that gloomy feel.
Oh, no, sorry, you misunderstood me! I fully understand that the black gradient is needed! But because I know it is, I would like a brighter background picture! If I look at it, with the grey and brown houses at the sides and these super-dark objects in the bottom corners, I just find it too dark and depressing.
Just take the Shetang background (yes, I know it will be revised) that you can see behind the Winged Elf on the loading screen when starting the game. That’s a background with bright colors - a lot of sky, a lot of pink plants, a building of light colors. I feel like a background with similiar colors would make the guild screen a much friendlier place, especially if there needs to be a black gradient because of the text.
Honestly, looking at it right now, with what I can make out of it, it looks like an abandoned or ruined town instead of a place a guild would stay…
If, and i mean a big IF, it wouldn’t demand too much work they could add a options of backgrounds based on the kingdoms for the players to chose what they like the most. It’s entirely possible to make such “architeture” in a way that each new kingdom you unlock also add a new background for your collection just like the armor we have to “pimp” our avatars.
I really like that idea! Though honestly, I feel like even making it the home kingdom would be an improvement. Some of the background might be pretty dark there, too, and of course choosing by tribute is important, but I feel like most are better suited in color than the one shown and definitely themed better. I’d rather have a dark Maugrim Woods background if I like Maugrim Woods enough to make it my home than have a no-name abandoned town background. Simply because I feel that the fact that it’s something we have no association with; no kingdom, no troops, no characters, no story, makes it even more unattractive.
If there would be some lore behind that background like we have the kingdom-lores; something about guilds trying to rebuild the place by strengthening magic statues or whatever, there would be a reason for it. But like that? It’s like ‘depressing town out of nowhere, located in wherever-land’. That’s just sad.
And honestly. I can’t understand why devs are going this modern and dull way for the new interface. What was wrong with the previous? I loved it! And now we have some slop, not inviting to play at all. I don’t want it!
The first layout could work better if the columns “filled up” with color as they were completed, like a bar graph. The % complete / fill meter / gold donated is totally lost at the bottom.
Seems everything with the new UI is not task-oriented. The most important information is hard to read.
I’m no expert on design, and because I usually donate all my gold after reset I don’t spend much time looking at the task screen. I want the community at large to be happy, so if something like Solar’s design would serve that purpose, I’m in favor of keeping her, and other important members of our community, happy. I hope that something that is both appealing and functional is introduced, and I appreciate the time and effort taken to try to combine the two styles for the betterment of the game.
