Off With Their HUDS!

Gamasutra has a piece looking at the move to unite player and gameworld by removing the HUD from the gameplay space. From the article: "Many elements found on a typical HUD are there not out of necessity, but out of convention; they represent a sort of 'info overkill' that, for the vast majority of players, has no impact on gameplay at all. For every piece of information you offer the player, ask, 'Is this information essential to the game experience?' In doing so, you might find that you don't need to bombard the player with quite as much data as you once thought you did."

Comments

HL Series

[rwven]

I think the Half-Life series very well understands this...
-You get a weapons menu when you try to scroll through weapons but otherwise it's not there
-You get the flashlight in the top right
-You get health, armor and ammo

Then you have games like Deus Ex: Invisible War.
-Half the stinkin screen is HUD. To make matters worse, the HUD is elyptical so it creates this circle in the center of your screen that is the only useful part of your video display...

Nuff said.

Re:HL Series

[IgLou]

But didn't you find when you played after a while you forgot about the HUD? I did. In fact I had a bad habit of running out of ammo because I wasn't actively thinking about it until I was in a non-action sequence. :D

Although what I think would be really cool for that type of experience would be when you're in the thick of a combat the hud should fade out so you can't really gauge how much ammo and health you have. But that's just my sickness.

Re:HL Series

[Gord]

> Health and armor make more sense, although a visual picture (blood, debris, etc) would probably be better than either a bar or a number.

Perhaps ID had it right all along with the original Wolfenstein 3D. A picutre of the characters head would get progressivly more bloody as their health went down, tho it did have a % score as well. A quick glance at the state of the picture was always a quicker way to get a feel for your health than distracting yourself by reading and interpreting percentage.

Re:HL Series

[MjrTom]

Agreed. For a 'realistic' game, the unpleasent click that you get from an empty magazine is the best indicator that you're out of ammo. It's hard enough to count your shots with a semi-auto. In my very limited full-auto experience it's impossible. I don't know about health, but I think that maybe the blood and debris might work, or maybe a visual sagging of the player, or some kind of visual effect to indicate the dizziness/fatuige/general unease that comes (at least to me) after a grave injury.

Re:HL Series

[usrusr]

agreeing a little more, i would even like to see an fps without a health level indicator at all. doom3 made me realize this, i was more trying not to get hit because of the random rotation and visual blur penalty than because of some abstract numerical value decreasing. of course you would probably want to lower the overall level of difficulty then, but i'm sure that games that focus less on challenge but more on atmosphere (doom3 did that for example) would benefit from that change. the challenge-aspect is in decline in single player shooters anyways, since nobody in their right mind would choose an "spfps" to put his aiming to the test if mpfps is always available.

speaking of the ammo-counter, it's definitely useless in an intense fight, you either roughly guess (or even count) bullets used and therefore have an idea when you have to reload or you just don't care and then no ammo display in the world could change that. an exception are some of the hl2 guns that have an audible warning for "low ammo" which is very intuitive (took a very long while until i consciously realized what it was, before that i just knew when ammo was low, had no idea why).

one last idea to throw in the pool: in reality being able to count bullets while being under fire is one of those important differences between a skilled veteran and a greenhorn, so giving the player hud displays (or a crosshair) could be the list of goodies you get for experience points in games with a skill system like enemy territory.

Re:HL Series

[Golias]

Removing the cross-hair would probably be a bad idea.

In most FPS games, the cross-hair is a stationary object, because the player is always facing exactly where they are aiming. This means that PvP gamers could "cheat" to get an edge on their opponent by adding a cross-hair to their monitor with a small transparent vinyl sticker, or even hanging a weighted string down the center, and taping another string across the horizontal axis.

Too much to ask?

[Azreal]

Would it be too much to ask to make HUDS in games customizeable. Make it scriptable and also include a graphical means to create the HUD setup you like akin to the idea of customizeable home pages where you can add and remove "boxes", drag them around, and even choose what information is shown in each box.

Re:Too much to ask?

[Masami Eiri]

More like Guild Wars's. WoW's requires external addons, while GW's has full internal customization. You can resize, move, remove, or add elements to your hud almost totally as you wish. Some stuff, like the skill bar have to stay on screen (but can be moved, resized, and I think even rotated), but most other stuff can be tweaked alot.

The Riddick game...

[PatrickThomson]

The riddick game actually does this quite well. Without combat, there's no hud, in hand-to-hand there's an abstract health meter only, and when reloading a weapon it shows a count of remaining clips. Ammo readout is on the gun itself, there's no other hud.

it all depends....

[globaljustin]

undergarmets!

Really, the question of whether HUD is more/less realistic depends on what the game is designed to do.

from TFA:

However, nothing screams "this is just a game" louder than an old-fashioned HUD.

Not so! If the game is a FPS, then having a HUD might greatly increase the 'immersion factor' (a factor which I don't necessarily think is part of good gaming...that's another post). A soldier of the future might very well have a helmet w/ an HUD.

another thing, HUD doesn't have to be intrusive. It could be modified to take up mere millimeters of space around the edge of the screen. Most games have options like this. (i'd give examples but I haven't played much recently...i still know a good game when i see it tho)

"Rise" of the casual gamer?

[Anakron]

I find it interesting that they refer to the rise of the casual gamer as a reason to go hud-less. From what I've seen, game companies try very very hard to create immersive games that don't have much to offer the casual gamer.

Not sure

[Anonymous Coward]

I know I've always liked an interface where everything is visible, even if not strictly needed to play the game.

This one isn't hard

[TubeSteak]

Allow users to select what & how much information (if any) the HUD shows.

This one is a no-brainer.

The article isn't just talking about removing HUDs, they want alternative methods of conveying the same information.

Anywho, reading the conclusion gives you a good idea of what the rest of TFA is about

The games mentioned above offer numerous examples to show how player status information can be presented in ways that are immersive and innovative. There are countless other solutions; in fact, the more specific a solution is to a particular game, the greater the odds that the developer is offering the player a one-of-a-kind gaming experience. As developers continue to challenge themselves to achieve more sophisticated levels of immersion and intuitive gameplay in their creations, they will no doubt devise equally sophisticated and unique ways to communicate critical information to the player.

Re:This one isn't hard

[bckrispi]

Agreed. The X-Wing series nailed this one early on. The ships HUD displays took up a lot of screen real estate. But with the press of a button, all non-essential information disappeared so you could get a much fuller view of the battlefield.

Information clutter

[the_demiurge]

I agree. Now we just have to explain it to CNN Headline News and MTV.

Red Orchestra!

[vertinox]

How many times do I see articles that might as well be talking about Red Orchestra. They basically have removed all crosshairs, ammo counts, and health stastics.

All information is through visual, sound, or textual cues.

Example1: If you are low on stamina, your guy breathes heavy.
Example2: To find out how much ammo you have, reload and you'll get a message that says, your clip is heavy etc.
Example3: You don't get cross hairs. If you want to aim, you hit ironsites and it brings you guy up to your eyelevel and you use the 3d model to aim.

Very fun... Very realistic... Prolly the best WWII sim out there and these guys are an indie company.

Re:Red Orchestra!

[corbettw]

How about a damage system that actually impairs your avatar? Got shot in the leg? Ok, now you limp everywhere. Boot to the head? Ok, everything is fuzzy and you have tunnel vision. Stabbed in the back? Now you can't raise your weapon up to eye level and have to shoot from the hip.

Now that would be an interesting game experience!

Re:Red Orchestra!

[vertinox]

The thing is... those are tools the player generally needs in order to succeed in the game. If you're going to go with something vague like, "your clip is getting light", you'd better not make it catastrophic for the player to run out of ammo.

If you have 50 rounds in a PPsh Soviet submachine gun and squeeze the trigger for 2 seconds... How many bullets to you have in the gun? What about a Mp41 or a Stg44?

You might be able to make a guess of how many bullets are left by your guns weight or pervious experience, but there weren't Aliens-esque LED's on these guns back in 1941 telling you how many bullets were in the thing.

Often times I will just empty the gun into something to reload because I know I might need a full clip down the road.

Removing a HUD is not an easy task

[LordZardoz]

The reasons that HUD displays exist is that they do their job quite well. They convey information to the player very directly and very simply.

If you were to try to make a fighting game without a health meter, you would have to convey the state of health of the player in a different manner. This could probably be done through modifying the character animations, and by changing certain key textures. But this solution will require custom art assets for every player in the game, and it would need to be quite detailed. This will add months of development time to what should be an otherwise very quick job. On top of that, while the efforts to remove HUD Elements to increase immersiveness can be very effective, such efforts do not deliver the most bang for the buck in terms of improving a game.

Using the above fighting game example, I would much prefer to have the developers add extra characters, or more combat moves.

END COMMUNICATION

Re:Removing a HUD is not an easy task

[grumbel]

### If you were to try to make a fighting game without a health meter, you would have to convey the state of health of the player in a different manner.

Or the game could be designed in such a way that there wouldn't be conventional health points in the first place. After all humans don't have a internal health meter either, so why should fighting games have one? Its just a convention that most fighting games follow these days, because every game did it that way. Bushido Blade is one of the few exceptions, you don't have 'energie' in that game, every hit with a sword can kill you there, no matter if the fight has just started or is running for multiple minutes. Hits on certain body parts can injure you and thus affecting your performance. This is bejoint just having a linear health meter displayed via animation, this is about having a non-linear health status in the game which is affected by all what happens to your character. So its not "50% healthy", but "arm broken, leg injured, etc.".

A different example of the same thing would be simulations, in most arcade-like games you have just a linear health meter, if its down you are dead, if its more then zero, even just 1%, you still have 100% performance on your vehicle. In more serious simulation however your vehicle doesn't have linear 'health', instead every system inside and outside of the vehicle can get damaged, so if in a flight game the gear gets hit, it gets broken and you have to do a belly landing, if radar gets it, you have to fly blind, your guns might not survive an attack, might jam, overhead or even explode, engines might catch fire, in a car game every tire might get damaged individually and thus affecting how well you can drive, etc. Such non-linearity in the 'health-meter' can lead to much more interesting and variing gameplay and especially much more interesting situations, its not just a "I survived or I died", things like trying to fly a broken plane home can be extremly fun challanges on their own and thus adding a lot of replay value, since each run of the same mission might turn out completly different.

Cycling colors?!?

[swmccracken]

"Cycling colors or animated textures can also invigorate a lifeless HUD while decreasing the threat of burn-in."

Aaargh! I HATE gratitious animation in programs. Things should NOT attract my attention unless they are important!

The other problem is that fundementally computer games are running on a computer. They are not real life - thus, a HUD showing "your" health is just part of the connection between you and the game-world. In real life, you would already know how you were feeling.

Something I never really understood about Doom 3.

[88NoSoup4U88]

Something I never really understood about a design decision in the development of Doom 3:
They had a very good thing going with some of the weapons showing the remaining ammo on the weapon itself, but imo the incosistency of some weapons that were -not- having that ability limited them in still sicking with a GUI for the ammo.

I don't get it why they didn't totally drop the GUI in favor of models with the ammo displayed on it.

A non-GUI thing, but a bit related: I -do- think that it was a very good decision of them to drop the 'use'-button in favor of point-and-clicking at items/objects within reach.

HUDs aren't all bad...

[MachDelta]

To me the question of HUD design really depends on the game.

Some titles really lend themselves to a simplified HUD. Something beautiful, elegant, and unobtrusive. For instance, Red Orchestra (as mentioned by another thread on this news posting) has all of three persistant elements: A paper doll, a clip count, and a pocket watch. Gorgeous HUD, awesome game.

On the other hand, some games DO lend themselves to detailed HUDs. Unfortunatly the only poignant example I can think of is a personal one, and that would be the custom interfaces in World of Warcraft. I've pieced together my own setup that not a lot of people seem to like (though i'm not suprised). During full raid-mode it's disgusting... to some, in the sense of filth... but to me, the only disgusting thing is just how much information I have. I'm an officer in my guild, so one of my duties is keeping things organized during raids. This means status indicators on all 40 players, multiple chat boxes, indicators of what the monsters are doing, etc, etc etc. A good 3/4ths of my screen is partially obscured by something.... and y'know what? I love it! I equate it to landing an aircraft by instrument (which, I guess, would be another example: flight sims). It may not look 'pretty' but in terms of control, precision, and raw data, its unrivaled by anything one could ever dream of with a spartan HUD.

So while I do enjoy the slimmed down or integrated HUDs we're seeing in more and more games, I still think a good solid HUD isn't something a developer (or player!) should shy away from in all situations. Sometimes half the fun of a game is being swept away in an avalanche of input, and then deciding how to act on it!

Do I feel lucky?

[l3prador]

I agree with the ammo... People manage to keep track in real life and the movies fine without any HUD telling them how much ammo they have. Or, they lose track and it makes it more dramatic... I mean, Dirty Harry just wouldn't be as cool with a little ammo gauge on his gun.

Well, do ya, punk?

Did anyone actually RTFA? Crap!

[Vo0k]

Read the citation only if you wish to see how horrible drone-journalism it is. Otherwise just look at the highlight:

It is only recently that console developers have begun to address the hi-def revolution taking place in living rooms around the globe. According to the Consumer Electronics Association, over 12 million high-definition televisions (HDTVs) were sold in the United States between 1998 and 2004, and the market continues to grow rapidly; research firm Strategy Analytics has predicted HDTVs in almost 30 million American homes by 2008. With the advent of a new generation of consoles, developers are finally taking advantage of the ultra-sharp screen resolutions and theater quality sound offered by these increasingly common home entertainment systems. However, millions of high-definition televisions have an Achilles heel that can hinder developers as well: burn-in.

Coming Next to Slashdot: Fanless PCs, because PC fans contribute to drafts in your room and may cause cold, flu etc.

Re:Did anyone actually RTFA? Crap!

[jskiff]

Maybe my sarcasm detector is off the mark, but I don't get it.

I have a CRT HDTV, and burn in does concern me. You may be familiar with seeing it in places where they leave CNN or MSNBC on all the time, and even if you change the channel you can still see the station logo that has been burned into the screen. CRT HDTVs are particularly susceptible to this, while DLPs are not.

I specifcially limit my video game playing on my HDTV, even though it's connected to a 5.1 surround sound system, because I don't want the health meters, HUDs, etc. burned into my TV. My next TV will probably be a DLP, which will allow me to play on the big screen all the time.

Metroid Prime/Prime 2 do this well

[Akaihiryuu]

The HUD in the Metroid Prime games is actually really well done. Of course, in that game it has a reason to be there...since you're walking around in a really high tech powered armorsuit. It's okay to have a HUD if it's believable in the context of the game and isn't excessive.

From Snow Crash:

[thesupermikey]

"A screaming display flashes up on the goggles informing him that the millimeter-wave radar notices a steam of bullets heded in hi direction an would like to know where they came from, Sir?...He tuns off all the techno-shit in his goggles. All it does is confuse him; he stands there reading statices about his own death even has its happening to him. Very Post-Modern. Time tp get immersed in Reality, like the people around him" Neal Stephenson

Steel Battalion

[FLAGGR]

That game was 80% HUD, but it felt leet watching your mech boot up, and looking at all the pretty radars and switches and shit. Hell, look at the controller. Man I want that game..

Google redefines HUDs in games

[BlueFiberOptics]

Next week, Google will unveil its new gHUD technology. gHUD allows the player to immerse themselves within a game without information overload. Rival Yahoo's HUD currently only lets players see 1/4 of their screen.