DESIGN: City Manager Screen

[OnePresent]

Here's the concept so far. Two screendumps showing both tabs selected. All items are shown in their proper place, although no real design has been done at this point. That is, design to the backgrounds, tabbing, colors is still to come. This is an 800 x 600 screen. It takes into account most of the things we spoke about in the Call To Artist thread.

Feedback welcome of course.

[OnePresent]

With build tab selected...

[Maquiladora]

I like it, it cuts down on alot of clicks and thats the main thing. Im not fanatical about wanting a new all-in-one city manager, but i could live with that.

[Flinx]

Best concept we have had to date.

[_X_]

Awesome!
looks better than those posted in the Call to Artist thread, no offense

[The Big Mc]

I can see myself using this.

[J Bytheway]

Looks good . I can also see myself using this without getting frustrated. Have you any plans for how to generalize it to higher resolutions - does it scale in some way, or would it be better to simply design something totally different.

[child of Thor]

I'd find it hard to imagine a better way to do it in 800x600 great work OnePresent, better than the origonal

and for Jbytheway's comments on higher resolution, i sort of have the feeling the design should stay the same, no matter the screen resolution - just so it remains consistant for the player.

Not that it would bother me to have a slightly differnet layout, but new comers could find it off putting? (there is a common complaint about confusing UI from the CTP2 nay sayers).

[OnePresent]

One thing I'd like to get confirmation on from a programmer before doing any more work... Is the map view possible? All other elements are just rearranged versions of existing art. The map view is new. Is it possible for someone to do a "programming sketch" and see if this is valid? Or it may be such a simple concept there's really no need to spend any time testing it.

I'll wait for feedback before moving on with this.

Originally posted by J Bytheway
Have you any plans for how to generalize it to higher resolutions - does it scale in some way, or would it be better to simply design something totally different.

COT is thinking the same as I am. The window size would remain consistant at 800 x600 across all resolutions. Just as the current City Manager stays the same size .

[Flinx]

Originally posted by J Bytheway
Have you any plans for how to generalize it to higher resolutions - does it scale in some way, or would it be better to simply design something totally different.

I thought the windows stayed the same pixel size in all the screen resolutions.

[J Bytheway]

Originally posted by OnePresent
One thing I'd like to get confirmation on from a programmer before doing any more work... Is the map view possible? All other elements are just rearranged versions of existing art. The map view is new. Is it possible for someone to do a "programming sketch" and see if this is valid? Or it may be such a simple concept there's really no need to spend any time testing it.

Good point... I was assuming it would just be a 'hole' through which the main map view was visible, but I don't know how easy that would be to implement. Replicating the main map view to put it onto a city screen would probably be very hard, though.

[Flinx]

Since ‘Build’ is the only tab, why not just open the build manager window as is done now?

The current city manager does not have a build tab it has a production tab where all you can do is see the build queue (that is true, right? )

The build manager is accessible from the main UI so we have to keep it around... ...well I guess you could just open the city manager to the build tab...

There is also the window that pops up when you create a queue or add items to the build queues of several cities simultaneously which is similar to the current build manager; do we care about consistency?

[Martin Gühmann]

We already have some kind of mini map in the city manager, unfortunatly I don't know if it can be extended easily so that it looks like this. I would love to see the map implemented like this. If it is very difficuilt we can fill the gap with something else, one problem I see is the place for the advice, where do you see it when it is enabled.

One thing that should be changed is that the garrison should be put into a list box so that we can have more flexible army sizes later.

-Martin

[hexagonian]

Works for me...
Great job!!!

[OnePresent]

Originally posted by Flinx
I thought the windows stayed the same pixel size in all the screen resolutions.

I believe J Bytheway was referring to something similar to when a web page graphics expand to fill a wider image. Usually an area is designated as the area to be "stretched."

Originally posted by Flinx
Since ‘Build’ is the only tab, why not just open the build manager window as is done now?

We certainly could do that and just use the first sketch shown above. My problem with the separate window is having to juggle it with the City Manager and try to look at the map underneath them both. Just too much work. The screens shown tackle most of those issues though the downside is having one tabbed item. I feel it's still cleaner than the original game.

Originally posted by Flinx
There is also the window that pops up when you create a queue or add items to the build queues of several cities simultaneously which is similar to the current build manager; do we care about consistency?

Good point. I'll have to give that some thought. I care very much about consistency.

Originally posted by J Bytheway
Good point... I was assuming it would just be a 'hole' through which the main map view was visible, but I don't know how easy that would be to implement. Replicating the main map view to put it onto a city screen would probably be very hard, though.

If worse comes to worse the map can be deleted and all the information could be crammed on one screen sans tabs. The center city on map eyeball button would still make this concept superior to the City Manager as it currently stands.

With this no map scenerio my dream would be to move the "City" selector into the title bar, put the center city eyeball button in the title bar also, then beg a programmer to implement the "windowshade" feature I've mentioned on previous threads. Whenever a look-see at the map is needed the City Manager would just "roll up" into its title bar. I think this concept has lots of merit and I would rank it about equal to the concept presented at the beginning of this thread.

Originally posted by Martin Gühmann
We already have some kind of mini map in the city manager, unfortunatly I don't know if it can be extended easily so that it looks like this. I would love to see the map implemented like this.

In another thread the consensus of the current mini view of the city was crap. I'd like to not expand on this piece of crap. To be clear on what is shown with these sketches, it is the normal map zoomed out to the max level. I'm open to other ideas though.

Originally posted by Martin Gühmann
...one problem I see is the place for the advice, where do you see it when it is enabled.

A wee bit complicated. On resolutions over 800 x 600 it could still attach itself to the side. It is 224 pixels wide. On 800 x 600 res I see it as a separate window floating, with its own close box. Or it could even just overlay the City Manager screen, needing to be closed before doing anything else in the City Manager screen. The multi-options for different resolutions may be more complicated than it's worth. A simple separate window may be easiest. I don't believe folks really use this feature much anyway.

Originally posted by Martin Gühmann
One thing that should be changed is that the garrison should be put into a list box so that we can have more flexible army sizes later.

The current setup can be expanded to an army of 18 by moving the activate/disband buttons to the same line as the type "Garrisoned." A list box if more is needed. Though I would not be happy with the list box not being able to see all my units in one view. When talk has come up about increasing army size I've wondered how this will be handled on the battle screens. That IMO is a biggie.

Thanks for all the feedback, now back to my real job...