I still feel that this game's UI obfuscates important information and, in some cases, doesn't even make it available...anywhere. The side menu's colonies tab and the govern menu's colonies tab both do not show this information. I just went through colony after colony hovering over its research information and saw nothing about this event.
How do I see what colony is affected by this event? Is it even possible to find out?
Also: why can't I clear all notifications? Why do I have to do it one by one? Why is it that when I am trying to clear them one by one the side menu goes blank and I have to click on it again to restore functionality? Why is it that when I have a ship set to rally at a shipyard, it still lists itself as idle and has to be manually clicked to enter the shipyard? I have to move the ship to another tile and then back.
Sorry for the salt, but why is the UI for this game so miserable? I stopped playing this game when I came to the conclusion that it needed some major patches to smooth out the kinks. Well, it's had some major patches but there are still so many kinks. GCII was my favorite strategy game ever. This game is constant frustration and disappointment.
Oh, and whatever happened to auto-upgrade ships in queue?
It's because apparently ergonomics is the one point that is never considered in the design or the development of the game but only if people massively complain.
I really like GalCiv and I don't know why, but somehow they always find a way to make every feature an ergonomic nightmare ... and it is even less understable if you consider that every sane person playing just one GalCiv game could spot such simple ergonomic problems. If they would just sit down and ask themself things like:
- How many clicks do I need to do X?
- How does it feel if I have to do X for more than 10 planets/ships/starbases?
- Asuming I load this game after a week of hiatus - do I know what is going on with X?
But obviously such questions are alien to the developers. It's like they only concentrate on the abstract gaming principle but never ask themselves if something can be done in a convenient way. The result is that you get nice features but a horrible UI.
Gal Civ is not written for us, it is written to be playable by the AI. Humans are considered second class citizens in the GalCiv III universe. All hail Skynet!
It's because apparently ergonomics is the one point that is never considered in the design or the development of the game but only if people massively complain.I really like GalCiv and I don't know why, but somehow they always find a way to make every feature an ergonomic nightmare ... and it is even less understable if you consider that every sane person playing just one GalCiv game could spot such simple ergonomic problems. If they would just sit down and ask themself things like:- How many clicks do I need to do X?- How does it feel if I have to do X for more than 10 planets/ships/starbases?- Asuming I load this game after a week of hiatus - do I know what is going on with X?But obviously such questions are alien to the developers. It's like they only concentrate on the abstract gaming principle but never ask themselves if something can be done in a convenient way. The result is that you get nice features but a horrible UI.
It's funny because Stardock is a UI and games company, so you'd think the UI in their games would be half-way decent.
Yes, and the sad thing is that most of the usability problems have relativ easy fixes - but it just seems that they don't pay attention to that. I remember one dev stream where Paul told the story of him discussing the "repeat building" feature in the shipyard building queue with the programmer. He had to convince the programmer that such a thing would be useful and the programmer seriously argued that it is not needed because you could just hit the constructor X number of times if you want that many constructors.
... and the result of this mindset shows again and again. From little things like missing information in the notifications to the horrible starbase building clickfest. Latest thing where I face palmed hard was after the reintroduction of the three planetary focus and the removal of the wheel ... did they think of showing the current focus of a planet in the colony list in the govern window or at the right side of the map screen ... no, of course not ... and that was a thing that was present in GalCiv 2.
So all in all, GalCiv3 my be fun to play, but by god it is not fun to use at all.
We're on the same page. I'm still looking for an answer to my question though!
Why can't there be a sidebar of buttons on the planet list, allowing me to micromanage from the galactic map, without having to enter each planet?
Why can't I tell the status of each planet in terms of focus from the galactic map, by looking at the planetary list? A simple coloured dot in the upper right corner of each planet's pic would tell you at a glance the current focus setting.
I still find myself shutting down all shipyards, and hitting turn-turn-turn as fast as I can, trying to bypass the tedium.
Love game, hate interface.
This is why I never bother to look at the notifications. Perfectly playable without seeing them.
This doesn't excuse the bad interface. What's the point of a galactic event that impacts one colony when I can't see what the colony is?
I find it hysterical the AI knows intimate details about my empire that I can't find out with the most advanced tech at my disposal.
The kind of stuff our real-world tech is capable of providing data on now.
It feels like I'm stuck in a janitor closet, cleaning a mop, getting ready to scrub the next starbase/planet/pirate nest.
Galactic Custodians III.
... because our tools are about as much fun as the mop....
No, I agree. It is bad! That is why I never look.
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