Option for old-style skillbars

[Proxima]

Something I keep thinking of when I watch a NeoLemmix stream, and then forgetting to post about It would be really nice if, when playing/making a pack that only uses the traditional 8 skills, we have the option to keep the skills in their usual places rather than bunch left.

[Colorful Arty]

Also, an option, option, OPTION to have leading 0's for skills/release rate which are single digit. They were removed for some unknown reason, and myself and Flopsy would like them back. Having the OPTION to make them like that hurts NO ONE and benefits EVERYONE.

[Simon]

I too like the L1 order in the skillbar. Maybe that works even without option, showing the L1 skillbar whenever all available skills are from L1? Then, make the option only when somebody complains.


Exciting case with the leading zero.

1-2 years ago, I advised against leading zeroes even as an option, to de-clutter the interface. I thought the cleaner interface would grow on everyone within days. Surprised that you want them back even after a year. If you feel this strongly about them, I won't mind an NL option to have them back anymore.

Old NL had more options of this kind: Empty skill is 00, or black gap, or white square. Any preference for that, so Nepster can attack it all in one go?

-- Simon

[Colorful Arty]

Basically, I just want it to look the way it does in the DOS Lemmings: leading 0's for single digits and that distinct white square when you're out of that skill. Thanks for being accommodating - I know it will make the settings GUI a bit more crowded, but it shouldn't be a big deal.

[Nepster]

Coding the changes should not be too much work. My only issue with this is that it will clutter the option menu even more. The problem with cluttering it with a lot of options, is that players might feel overwhelmed by the possible choices and might not find the options, that would be really useful for them.

1) Display all 8 traditional skills, if no others are used.
Is there anyone who prefers that only the actually used skills are displayed? If not, then I will make this change and not add an option. Otherwise we may need further discussions, in order to avoid too many options regarding the layout of the skill panel.

2) Leading zeroes
As I said above, I want to avoid too many options regarding the layout of the skill panel. I just feel that such issues are far too minor to warrant three or four options. So currently we are considering:
- Black-out number or display a zero if out of skills. This already exists and "display zeroes" is only used by Apjjm and möbius, as far as I know. Depending how strongly they feel about this option, we might even remove it to free some space in the option menu.
- The full traditional skill panel suggested by Proxima.
- The leading zeroes suggested by Colorful Arty.
Upshot is: I don't care what the skill panel options do exactly, but I want to avoid having three of them. Even two are borderline.

PS: I find it very interesting, that you (Arty) want an additional zero displayed, while you have skills, but then actively avoid it when you run out of skills.

3) White squares when you are out of skills.
That's easy, because it doesn't require anything new. Just wait for the new-formats version, then remind me of this issue, and I will tell you how to fix this yourself. Assuming nothing changes, you would just have to replace "skill_count_erase.png" in "styles/default/panel" with another image that displays the white box instead of the black one.
However I will not add this as an official option. Whether to have a black square or a white square in that situation is far too minor to warrant an extra option, in my opinion.

[IchoTolot]

I would prefer that only the actual used skills are being shown. Skill boxes empty from the begining with no pick-ups in the level regarding that skill are only cluttering the skillbar. Even only with the original skills, having only 2 skills in the bar when only the 2 skills are being used is way tidyer.

[Nepster]

Ok, then here is what it is going to be like: There will be one option slot available for graphics of the skill bar. Please discuss what it should look like, and when you reached a decision that you are all happy with, I will implement it. And if you cannot reach an agreement, I will simplify the code by removing the exiting option.

I had a brief look how much code would be required for the various changes, and implementing both Proxima's and Colorful Arty's suggestions would introduce too many new if-clauses that complicate the code. So nevermind potential usability issues, there won't be even two options, which I still mentioned as a possibility in my previous post.

[Proxima]

I can see this debate getting ugly   However, at least Arty and I are in agreement about blackout/whiteout when the skill count is zero, so is there anyone who desperately wants it to display "0"? If not, we could remove that option.

Even only with the original skills, having only 2 skills in the bar when only the 2 skills are being used is way tidier.

When there are two skills, yes. It's when there are six or seven -- and that's a far more common situation -- that it's most irksome that skills don't stay in place and I have to look over the skillbar to find where they've gone in each level.

I sympathise with Nepster's desire to cut down the number of options, since NL already has a lot, and that is giving him more work to do. Still, I think that since my option would improve usability (for traditional-skills packs), whereas Arty's leading zeroes is purely aesthetic / nostalgic, if we can only have one then mine is the more important to implement

[namida]

There is currently no options, except for compact (ie: displays RR, 8 skill slots, pause, nuke, fast forward and minimap) vs full-size (ie: displays all of those plus a few extra functions like restart, frameskip, etc) skill panel. All options relating to whiteout, leading zeros, etc have been long since culled.

[ccexplore]

Having the OPTION to make them like that hurts NO ONE

As Nepster alluded to in some of his replies, this is just flat out wrong for the people maintaining the game's programming code, because in many cases an option means you have to keep two or more sets of code, plus additional code to check the setting and branch into the right code.  It is from coding perspective the most complex.  One or two options may not be much, but apply this same line of reasoning over and over (and you know there will be many such potential cases because people have such diverse preferences) and it soon adds up.

Then there's of course the number of options being presented to the user in the UI.  There are ways to manage it like relegating some into a separate "advanced" section or similar (although that too would be more work as well), but again, it ultimately puts a practical limit to how much you can apply the reasoning of "eh, let's just make that yet another option".

Anyway, my point is not specifically targeting the current discussion on skills display; just be understanding in general that it is not practical to make everything little thing into yet another option.

[Flopsy]

1-2 years ago, I advised against leading zeroes even as an option, to de-clutter the interface. I thought the cleaner interface would grow on everyone within days. Surprised that you want them back even after a year. If you feel this strongly about them, I won't mind an NL option to have them back anymore.
-- Simon

I too have missed them since they were gone, 01 is much better than a centred 1 in my opinion. Just something which is nostalgic from playing Lemmings years ago, can't really explain why.
Maybe it's because I have a strange obsession with Mayhem 3 "It's Hero Time" and all the skills saying 01

leading 0's for single digits and that distinct white square when you're out of that skill

I miss the white out skill as well, a black background doesn't seem the same.

[Nepster]

I moved Simon's post and ccexplore's answer to a separate thread, because discussing possible old-style skillbars has only little to do with the timer blink option, even though Simon's question regarding the timer blink option was a reasonable one to pose.

I can see this debate getting ugly...

Sorry, but I simply don't want to spend too much time coming up with solutions that everyone can live with, if it will only affect two or three players. So expect this response a bit more often in the future.
While I naturally prefer the old-style skill bar to be as close to the standard one, I would like to point out that your and Colorful Arty's suggestions are not mutually exclusive. So if everyone will be happy with it, I can implement both changes, but combine them into one option. As I said, this would need only barely less code than having two separate options, but at least I don't have to deal with multiple option flags flying around in the skill panel code.

There is currently no options, except for compact (ie: displays RR, 8 skill slots, pause, nuke, fast forward and minimap) vs full-size (ie: displays all of those plus a few extra functions like restart, frameskip, etc) skill panel. All options relating to whiteout, leading zeros, etc have been long since culled.

Sorry, but that's only partially correct. My NeoLemmix versions still have the option "Black-Out Zero Skill Count", which toggles between displaying nothing or a zero, in one has run out of skills.

[Proxima]

While I naturally prefer the old-style skill bar to be as close to the standard one, I would like to point out that your and Colorful Arty's suggestions are not mutually exclusive. So if everyone will be happy with it, I can implement both changes, but combine them into one option.

How would that work? I can only have skills in constant positions if I accept leading zeroes, and Arty can only have leading zeroes if he accepts skills in constant positions? Sounds like a "worst of both worlds" solution

[Nepster]

Yeah, sorry. This would only work if having leading zeroes wouldn't matter to you and the same applies to Arty the other way around. Seems not to be a valid option, then.

[mobius]

lol, I know this forum is full of nerds when we're debating the ever important issue of "leading zeroes"

First; I must agree with Nepster and Icho that too many options can be a very bad thing. Especially when it's for something rather trivial like this. I put below my personal preferences but for these reasons I really don't care at all if they're listened to. I greatly appreciated when namida adding options to address issues like the rewind causing me to rage but we can't really add an option for every single little detail, it's just too much work on both sides.

2) Leading zeroes
As I said above, I want to avoid too many options regarding the layout of the skill panel. I just feel that such issues are far too minor to warrant three or four options. So currently we are considering:
- Black-out number or display a zero if out of skills. This already exists and "display zeroes" is only used by Apjjm and möbius, as far as I know. Depending how strongly they feel about this option, we might even remove it to free some space in the option menu.
- The full traditional skill panel suggested by Proxima.
- The leading zeroes suggested by Colorful Arty.
Upshot is: I don't care what the skill panel options do exactly, but I want to avoid having three of them. Even two are borderline.

wait what? Where did I say that? I don't remember saying so if I did. In any case; I really don't care either way; if I had the option I'd prefer no leading zero. By Leading zero you mean; 03, I'd prefer not.

-no leading zeros; no double zeros
-I like the white out or black out, makes it a little easier to see it's empty.
-I don't care about classic skill panel or not. "Empty panels" doesn't bother me.
-Having skills present that you can't use or are empty doesn't bother me. (like having bombers in a 100% level).

If I had my way, I'd ask for a complete redesign of the skill panel. One that's easier to see, with some shadows or something to stand out a little better, at the very least get rid of the puke green.
I'm aware that some people have made their own skill panel mods and I'm sorry to say honestly I don't find most of those to be any better.
I should say I just don't care for them too much; I don't mean to say there overall "bad".


after saying all that, I feel like I should point out, conversely that my favorite programs are the ones that have the most options, and are the most customizable. One reason I love using Adobe Audition even though it's an incredibly out-dated audio program is just that; the options menu and short cut hotkey menus are huge, but effective in setting the program up to run as personally efficiently as possible.

[Colorful Arty]

Some good points brought up by Nepster and ccexplore; I did NOT think about how implementing leading 0's and white-out boxes as options would complicate the code, and I'm sorry if I came across as rude.

I am curious as to HOW that would over-complicate the code though; shouldn't it only affect the code regarding the skillbar display? I can't see how those display settings would affect the rest of the game's code.

[Nepster]

I am curious as to HOW that would over-complicate the code though; shouldn't it only affect the code regarding the skillbar display? I can't see how those display settings would affect the rest of the game's code.

Code changes would be required in the following parts:
- The option menu code, to allow you to select this option.
- The new flag has to added to the GameParams code to be able to access the option setting. This only a very minor change.
- The skill bar code. If I am lucky, I only need to adapt the base class for the skill panels. Otherwise I will have to change code in the (currently) two actual implementations for skill panels.

The main problem is, that the current skill panel code is extremely modular wrt. what buttons are displayed and where they are displayed, but unfortunately not how they look. The idea behind this was, that how they look is mostly governed by the button sprites, which can easily be changed, which should have made adaptability on the code-side redundant. So much for that hope...

- Black-out number or display a zero if out of skills. This already exists and "display zeroes" is only used by Apjjm and möbius, as far as I know. Depending how strongly they feel about this option, we might even remove it to free some space in the option menu.

wait what? Where did I say that? I don't remember saying so if I did. In any case; I really don't care either way; if I had the option I'd prefer no leading zero. By Leading zero you mean; 03, I'd prefer not.

This comes from the poll about the option usage, that I did some time ago. But good to know that you are no longer a fan of this option, so that we can replace it with something else.

If I had my way, I'd ask for a complete redesign of the skill panel. One that's easier to see, with some shadows or something to stand out a little better, at the very least get rid of the puke green

In the new-formats you will have access to the skill panel images and can change the puke-green background. Perhaps you prefer the Genesis-style panel by altiereslima?