I got a bit inspired by Halo 3's curved heads-up display from the multiplayer vidoc, and my mind kind of spat out this idea, just like that.
The concept is mainly affected by my year of modding the World of Warcraft interface, and I'll try to explain my thoughts and reasons.
WoW relics:When I played WoW, hardcore, for a year, I played a healer. A healer in WoW spends his or hers time looking at an interface filled with healthbars of your fellow players.
At one point, I decided I wanted to see more of the actual world, streamlining the on screen interface to just what I really needed, and an interface that would require little time actually focusing your eyes on it. Explanation of my design choices:Interface centered and bunched up at the bottom
- One place to see all information.
- Fits all screen sizes/proportions.
- The HUD will most of the time overlay a bit of ground right in front of you, so no real loss there.
- Similar to a car dashboard, familiarity.
Large flashing meters for Shield and Ammo
- You get an idea of your status without focusing on the meters.
- You get instant feedback of your status when you are hit/fire your weapon.
- Meters reduces themselves from the inside out, to increase use of your pheriphial vision, change begins closer to your focus.
Hardly any numbers
- Grenades are so few they are visually represented instead, no need to read a number.
- Numbers for shield and total ammo are at the ends of the meters, no need to have them clutter up your peripheral vision, stealing attention.
Motion sensor in the middle
- Enables you to notice things on the motion sensor through your peripheral vision, and shortens your eye movement if you need/want to focus on it.
- Personally, I hardly ever notice or remember looking at the motion sensor when it's in a corner of the screen.
Compass integrated into motion sensor
- With the compass around the motion sensor you can directly tell in what direction you see hostiles/friendlies, much to help your communicate.
This will launch a popup. Click in the window to be able to interact with it.Style
- Naturally I've tried to make it look similar to the Halo HUDs, but I haven't spent too much time on details, I mostly wanted to communicate the basics of the idea.
- I know the Spartan Laser shouldn't have 14 rounds in a clip, able to fire that fast, etc, but I made the interface first, and the Spartan Laser is the first/only first person weapon I could find on B.net.
- The grenade, deployable and weapon icons are hastily drawn, so they aren't very exact, but it's better than nothing.
- There are no sounds, because... well, I need to get this out of my system before the Halo3 beta has finished downloading. And well, I'm not really a sound guy, and that's not the focus of this post either.
Controls
- UP: Switch grenades.
- DOWN: Reload weapon when all out.
- LEFT: Get hurt.
- RIGHT: Shoot.
- Mouse Cursor: Aim, rotates the motion sensor/compass.
//BOLL OMGWTF BETA FINISHED DOWNLOADING I R GONEZ!
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