Multiple people have responded with a variation of what you responded with, and then I responded with more specifics, and then we had a productive discussion.
I understand that it's a long thread, but I just wanted to point out that I've addressed this a number of times already.
Without making this thread, I wouldn't even know half of the things that are even happening, beyond the scope of what I know from my experience as a player.
I'd rather be wrong and learn something than ignorantly try to solve problems blindly while having no clue of where to even start on solving them. With this thread I actually have gotten a huge idea of what things people are trying to solve and what direction one would even go in on trying to solve certain issues.
Some people getting a bit angry, or some people constructively saying "Actually you're wrong", is not like a massive deal.
Uhh, I'm putting this here because it's relevant to my MU.
Anyone know any good TCG prototyping tools? Google docs is really unwieldly for the massive amount of data I'm gonna be dealing with, there has to be a better alternative for writing up potentially hundreds upon hundreds of cards and decks than stuffing it all into a single document.
@Ominous You can use economics in a Hell based setting. You should read Fiendish Codex II.
When I've repeatedly said that not every game needs to have a focus on being as accessible as possible to people who are new to the hobby, and you ignore that I've said that multiple times in the thread to instead say "The entire hobby can't be universally simplified", that is pretty hostile and also a straw argument.
Saying I'm trying to provoke hostility by pointing out something that's happened repeatedly in this thread (defensive elitism) is deflecting from the fact that people literally keep doing it, and do it pretty often even outside of this discussion.
I don't have the power to stop anyone from posting, nor did I say that anyone should stop posting because of their age.
The fact that you're intentionally creating straw arguments and twisting my words around is, to me, hostile.
You're making incredibly condescending arguments that entirely ignores the spirit of what people are talking about, and what multiple people have literally said they themselves have addressed in this very thread. Saying that something is impossible when other coders have said they've addressed it is basically saying "You know what, I'm going to be super elitist about this and explain how something is impossible because fuck all these potential noobs entering the hobby".
I can also make straw arguments.
I'm putting you on ignore for a week because you aren't being constructive. I hope that in a week's time you learn from this.
edit: Someone remind me to take Lithium off ignore next Sunday.
You're never going to get everyone on board for one client to rule everything, with the exception of Facebook becoming the normie kingdom.
And there have already been projects, typically projects that stay within particular games because they're not on MSB and such, that spit out clean logs in numerous ways.
Also, I'm not suggesting that MUSHClient be updated, what I asked earlier was why you don't see many new clients, though I acknowledge the existence of Potato, and the fact that Atlantis exists which I kind of considered not existing because it's a Mac client, but I guess not acknowledging the existence of a Mac client is a bit unfair since some people do use Apple stuff for one reason or another (I have an iPhone that I fucking hate because my mother somehow acquired two of them).
Either way, I don't think it's a massive endeavour to filter out spam, unless you have to manually do it yourself which is a pain in the ass. Checkboxes are a great idea. And in making such a client, you could just update it with new channels you may have missed, that people suggest.
We're legitimately at a point where we have so many tools that can just spit out a clean log by pressing one button. MUSHClient is capable of this, but it takes a lot of fiddling around that's far outside the bounds of most newbies. So yeah, while logging literally everything on your screen is intuitive, it's intuitive in the same way that turning up the heat on a frying pan as high as possible and then trying to cook vegetables is intuitive.
The vegetables certainly get cooked, but...
@Lithium said in UX: It's time for The Talk:
I get the feeling that some people seem to want a point and click choose your own adventure.
That seems like some massive hyperbole.
I don't really understand the hostility towards wanting to simplify something. To me it suggests at least a baseline level of defensive elitism that embraces the barrier to entry for new people into the hobby.
I'll be the first to say that "paying your dues" and learning how to deal with stuff that shouldn't be dealt with in the first place is bullshit. I've said repeatedly that not every game needs to be made with people new to the hobby in mind, because that's not really the intent of every single game.
To me it's a total copout when people are constantly going "No one cares about this hobby because of MMOs" (BS), and "No one cares about text based RPing anymore" (Monstrously BS and not even in the same universe as reality), but then get up in arms and defensive when someone says "Hey, maybe we should discuss some of the barriers to entry and complications that people might not think of as complications due to being used to them".
The constant defensiveness, emotional negativity, elitism, and generally treating MU code like a sacred cow, is unconstructive and I honestly am tired of seeing it in this thread.
I'm gonna be blunt, if people don't have anything constructive to say and nothing of actual value to contribute, then don't post.
If people wanna go "Fuck all these lazy millennial newbies" and "They just have to learn the incredibly unnecessary ropes because that's what I did, and that's just how things are, so stop worrying about it", then just go to the Hog Pit where they're all about pessimism and infinite stagnation.
Plenty of people have had constructive things to say in this thread, but I'm sick of all the condescending derailing from actual discussion.
Damned near everyone in this thread is older than me, it's unacceptable.
edit: Also, my MUSHClient might be terrible because I've copied over the same install to multiple hard drives and PCs for like a decade.
If you don't have command echo on, the up/down arrow keys don't do anything.
Lords and ladies political MU set in the Nine Hells.
Tons of TS, death, reincarnation, betrayal, and the antagonists are like angels and heroes of destiny from the mortal world, and other crazy shit.
God I want this game so bad and I know no one would play it if I made it.
re: Intuitive command line.
I don't know if we count MUDs and stuff as a command line interface? but the thing is, MUDs are very intuitive once you get the basic jist of how they work.
Like, when I first started playing them, I started to realize how the commands work, because I picked up on the general pattern. Like, no tutorial actually told me to type "open door", but because of how everything else worked, it just made sense to type that, and it worked.
Not every game was that intuitive, but this is just to say, being text doesn't instantly = no intuitive design.
@Derp said in UX: It's time for The Talk:
@Thenomain, I really do think he must have you on ignore.
I don't have him on ignore, I just have never tried Potato because I didn't know it was a Windows client (I never looked into it, I probably lumped it in with something else).
@HelloProject, let's take this piece by piece I guess:
- Define 'sane tabbing'.
You know, like, tabs that you can actually use like modern GUI tabs, like literally any client with tabs lets you do. Pull one out into a separate window so that you can, GASP, look at two MUs without opening up an entirely new instance of your client. Or change the order of your tabs, just, super, super basic stuff these days.
- Potato, among others, has clickable URLs by default. I would almost bet anything Atlantis does too.
I've never used Atlantis because I've never had a Mac, and I assumed Potato wasn't for Windows for reasons I'm not entirely sure of.
- Re: Shadow Commands - what? I don't even know what that means, but ctrl+up, ctrl+down, and Ctrl+z are all things in Potato.
You have to turn "command echo" on in MUSHClient in order to enable your input history. Which means that every single thing you type creates this sort of "shadow" input right behind it. It makes no goddamned sense that you can't have input history without enabling that.
- I have no idea what you've been doing to create GUI issues like that, but Jesus, dude. I've been doing this a couple years now and have never done that. Like... I think you have to be seriously trying to mess it up like that.
I don't know either, but the random shit I've accidentally made MUSHClient do have made me wonder why the hell any of these things are features. Who needs the feature of "type words in reverse"?
- Incorporate intuitive material design -- what? You keep talking about a relic from the 90's, but you haven't so far mentioned what is relic-y about it. Talk to us. This whole system is a relic from, what, the 60's, 70's?
Just, the client look, feel, and general way that it functions, it's like using ancient 90s technology. I understand that our hobby is old as shit and predates me even knowing how to pee into a toilet, but it wouldn't hurt to modernize the look and feel of the client. This is something I'd feel fairly capable of.
Most people don't use most of the features of any client. Like... fact. They have ten million cool things they can do, but it's like... grandma types a note in MIcrosoft word, prints it, closes it. That's about the same level that most users get with their client.
The reason I don't use the features in MUSHClient is because they're really damned hard to use. I'll find something cool once and then just totally forget all the crazy ass steps it took to do it. I don't expect everyone to use every feature, but it'd be cool if some of the more useful features (like the pop out windows) had a super obvious way to access and use them.
And if you think MushClient is bad, do this on TinyFugue. I dare you.
I don't think MUSHClient is bad, just that it's, like, clearly a relic of the past.
Ugh now I sound like I'm gentrifying MUSHClient and I hate myself.
@Bobotron said in UX: It's time for The Talk:
@HelloProject
Serious question: what would you do to make the functionality more intuitive? There's very little you can do to, say, map commands to buttons because all of that is a per-MUSH basis (though you CAN do this with personalized softcode, which some games used to have tutorials on doing).
Sane tabbing, as someone noted. Actual functional goddamned URL clicking that doesn't require a MU to enable it. A command log that doesn't need shadow commands to clutter your window just so that you don't lose a command you entered. A GUI that you can't accidentally fuck up because you accidentally moved it and then things got stuck in some crazy ass way. Removing the random features like that shit where you're suddenly typing in reverse that I then have to remember how to shut off.
I'd probably also build in a more intuitive logging system. MUSHClient has very good and programmable functionality and such, but it's not easily customizable unless you like legitimately know what the hell you're doing. I'd also try to make it easier to pop out channels to new windows. MUSHClient has this functionality, or at least I know a plugin did, but it's not easy to do, I'd want to make it easy to do. That along would significantly improve logs, in my opinion. Also maybe incorporate some intuitive material design into all of this so that it's not like dealing with a relic from the 90s.
There's probably plenty more that can be done that I'm not even thinking of at the moment.
I again don't doubt many of MUSHClient's features, but they're clunky unless you go into it like "I'M GONNA MASTER USING THIS CLIENT!!!". I want to simplify a lot of shit, because MUSHClient can do a lot of shit that's just difficult to figure out how to make happen without a whole goddamned tutorial.
@Groth said in UX: It's time for The Talk:
The UX issue with MUSH starts right at step 1) when you're asked to install this really quirky client designed in the 1990's that doesn't even have proper window managers.
This actually raises a very good question: Why don't we ever see people coding alternatives to MUSHClient with more intuitive functionality?
Like, if I code such a thing will I get arrested?
@Thenomain said in UX: It's time for The Talk:
@HelloProject
<whispering>iOS is for the iPhone and iPad, not the Macs.</whispering>
Oh. Well, that's just depressing then.
This is true. Honestly a part of what inspired me to make this thread is because I've been doing a lot of research into UX stuff, as I try to prepare to do coding as a career. My bizarre fascination with marketing made me very fascinated by how UX stuff affects the way people interact with the game, how quickly they can get into playing it, and even if just looking at it keeps them from even trying it.
Also, iOS on an actual Mac confuses the shit out of me, because folders don't work the way I expect them to work >_>.
I don't consider advanced features to be bad design, I'm saying that mail, despite the fact that I find it a bit clunky, is somewhat an example of good design.
It seems to be more or less as simple as it can be, at its very basic function, but if you choose, you can go deeper into its functionality.
However, not going deeper into learning its functionality doesn't affect your enjoyment of the game or use of the tool.
This is good design.
@Tinuviel said in How Do I Headwiz?:
The main thing is distancing your emotional attachment from the project. Don't let whatever you're working on define you.
Oh yeah, definitely I mean, the art is an expression of me, I'm not an expression of the art.
@Thenomain said in How Do I Headwiz?:
@Tinuviel said in How Do I Headwiz?:
The main thing is distancing your emotional attachment from the project. Don't let whatever you're working on define you.
Yeah. You already define the project. You are the project.
On top of that, everyone notices. You may tell other staff or players what ethics are, what is expected of them, or how to play, but everyone will be watching you for the clues you give them. You cannot "do as I say, not as I do" in this hobby, everyone will attempt to do as you do, because if the Headstaff does it then it must be okay.
This is generally good life advice overall, in my opinion.
I'm gonna admit that I've never been able to figure out mail code beyond the basic function of just sending stuff to multiple people.
After that it pretty much turns into alien technology.
But I don't doubt the usefulness of the extra features. If anything, this exemplifies what I was saying earlier. I can use the basic functions without knowing how all the crazy advanced shit that's way over my head works.
@Ganymede said in UX: It's time for The Talk:
but I never bitched or complained or just left because I wasn't immediately immersed in awesome RP.
But this is inherently the mindset of a seasoned MUer, like you said. From the outside looking in, this is a confusing mess.
I started MUing in 2005, some of this shit still doesn't make any goddamned sense to me. Even now I frequently fuck up if I should add a + in front of stuff depending on what game I'm on, have to remember what games I can actually use a freaking percent sign in channel conversation on, and just a ton of minor bullshit that just gets super annoying to deal with and never really gets any better.
My intent with this thread was never to claim that MUDs are perfect, because, again, there's a reason I don't really play them anymore. But I still hold to the idea that MUDs are, in general, not a mess when it comes to quality of life shit. Like, even entirely ignoring combat stuff for a moment, there's just so many little annoyances that I don't understand the necessity for.
If someone wants to code macros because they're used to public having a + sign or whatever, fine, let them, but like, I don't see how as a hobby we can constantly go "Oh this hobby is dead because MMOs" or "because people don't text RP anymore (BIGGEST FUCKING LIE EVER TOLD)", when we have all of these fixable things that are clear barriers to entry, but we argue that it's fine because we're arguably used to it.
I get that not everyone who makes a MU is making it with the intent of pulling people in from outside of it, especially due to the unwarranted pessimistic outlook that people have on this idea that people aren't interested in joining, but like, people can't act like all of this irritating command confusion and random inconveniences don't at least have something to do with why it might be intimidating to some people who actually do manage to find a hobby that no one bothers to advertise.
I mean, this might also boil down to differences in how we perceive friendships and emotional attachment. I pretty regularly cut friendships or kick people right the hell out of my life because I either realize they don't respect me as a person, or that they're just really shitty or boring people from what I originally perceived, who don't contribute anything to my life.
So it's like, I have trouble imagining emotional attachment suddenly making me want to appease people or impress them. If people are inconveniencing the game then they just get removed, it doesn't matter if I liked them or whatever, it's not like I'm cutting off my own arm. This is honestly something I never understood about the way people run games. The apparent fear of upsetting people or losing relationships because you're enforcing rules or running the game in the way that you think it should be run.
If someone turns into a big ass baby because you're not doing what they want, why should you care, regardless of your previous relationship? This suggests that they're trying to use your relationship to get what they want, and also that they're a shitty ass person who should have even less sympathy than you may have had for them before.
Also, being overly friendly is creepy even if you aren't the headwiz, so that's a bit different. I also think there's a difference between being yourself and friendly and everything, and putting on your staff hat. I don't think you should do one or the other all the time.