by Cody Bye on Oct 16, 2008
Players of massively multiplayer games know that they're going to be
spending untold amount of hours staring at their computer screens, and
if the user interface isn't attractive they will do anything in their
power to make it appealing. At
href="http://www.tentonhammer.com/events/blizzcon08/"
target="_blank">BlizzCon '08, the developers of
href="http://wow.tentonhammer.com/" target="_blank">World
of
Warcraft went into the details of putting together a solid
UI, and Ten
Ton Hammer's Jay "Medeor" Johnson weighs in on the entire panel and
whether or not it enjoyable to a typical player. His thoughts are
entertaining and engaging, so make sure you check them out!
One impression I always get at BlizzCon (well in both
of the ones I've
attended) is that Blizzard has a quiet fury raging behind the
scenes. When the UI team used terms like "formed a strike
team" and an "interdisciplinary group" to jump on the UI requirements
for the expansion, I get the impression of a military style crew
choppering in to solve the problem. A methodical march toward
creativity. The second panel illustrated this approach as Tom
led the second half of the discussion about the new Death Knight UI
component.