Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Bohandas]

BTW, I actually found an instructional flash-game that gives a pretty good explanation (after talking about a bunch of other things) of the same point that I was making in my original post (well, technically it was an equivalent argument about sprite graphics vs. realistic 3d rendering, but the point made is equivalent)

[zwei]

Graphical tilesets and text graphics tend to follow completely different design philosophies.

Text graphics are representative. They represent concepts the same way the written word does. Just as we see the word "chair" and think of a chair, the same applies when seeing the glyph for a chair in DF.

Except you have limited vocabulary and ever-growing amount on things you want to express.

Goat-goose-goblin problem.

What is this?:

Code: [Select]

xxxx

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

bin full of bolts, archery target, staircase, floodgate ... and of course, good old letter x.

[G-Flex]

Your vocabulary isn't as limited as you think. Well, it is right now in DF, but there's no particular reason that can't change. There are a nearly unlimited number of text glyphs in existence, and you can always make more. I wasn't talking about the specific subset containing extended ASCII characters that DF (kinda) uses, I was talking about the use of text or text-like graphics in general. You could use Kanji, or Greek, or Cyrillic, or Hebrew, or Klingon, or make something up; the choice is pretty arbitrary except in cases where the letter stands for a word/letter representing the concept as written (such as "d" for "dog").

[zwei]

Your vocabulary isn't as limited as you think. Well, it is right now in DF, but there's no particular reason that can't change. There are a nearly unlimited number of text glyphs in existence, and you can always make more. I wasn't talking about the specific subset containing extended ASCII characters that DF (kinda) uses, I was talking about the use of text or text-like graphics in general. You could use Kanji, or Greek, or Cyrillic, or Hebrew, or Klingon, or make something up; the choice is pretty arbitrary except in cases where the letter stands for a word/letter representing the concept as written (such as "d" for "dog").

Of course, you can expand to other character sets.

But then, wouldn't you be better off simply making your own glyphs and symbols?

Maybe symbols that represent displayed object more directly? Like custom chair symbol that represents chair and happens to look like a chair?.

Because that is not that much different from picking existing character that looks sorta-chairlike.

[G-Flex]

But then, wouldn't you be better off simply making your own glyphs and symbols?

Maybe symbols that represent displayed object more directly? Like custom chair symbol that represents chair and happens to look like a chair?.

Because that is not that much different from picking existing character that looks sorta-chairlike.

Sure, why not? If you can design glyphs that work well for that without losing the simple, abstract benefit of text graphics, then fine, but considering how much is out there already, that may not be necessary, especially since you can then use preexisting fonts (and I mean real fonts, capable of being rendered at different resolutions).

[Vattic]

Which is what I suggested earlier.

One alternative solution would be comparable to how dwarves are represented currently. Goblins, humans, and elves could have their own equivalent to the bearded smiley dwarves already have. I'd happily see simple abstract sprites for each creature which are still colour coded. This could even apply to other things like furniture and workshops.

I even decided to carry this out for the entity races since then. I ended up with this:



Anyone interested in the whole tileset can go here.

[Footkerchief]

You've been here long enough to know that this argument has already been had many times:

http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=44572.msg864521#msg864521
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=43547.0
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=47602.msg961013#msg961013
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=26911.0
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=4427.0
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=82263.0
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=41266.msg857734#msg857734

[G-Flex]

Which is what I suggested earlier.

One alternative solution would be comparable to how dwarves are represented currently. Goblins, humans, and elves could have their own equivalent to the bearded smiley dwarves already have. I'd happily see simple abstract sprites for each creature which are still colour coded. This could even apply to other things like furniture and workshops.

I even decided to carry this out for the entity races since then. I ended up with this:



Anyone interested in the whole tileset can go here.

Not distinct enough, in my opinion.

You've been here long enough to know that this argument has already been had many times:

http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=44572.msg864521#msg864521
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=43547.0
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=47602.msg961013#msg961013
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=26911.0
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=4427.0
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=82263.0
http://www.bay12forums.com/smf/index.php?topic=41266.msg857734#msg857734

... And? That doesn't mean it's a closed subject. I'm not really sure what point you're trying to make.

[Lysabild]

Game will and should obviously stay ASCII, but I personally prefer tilesets and would love some more support for it.

[moki]

I'd love more support for tilesets. Like, make it possible to have a away to display levers as little lever-symbols without messing up ó and ò in text. I played a long time with mayday's set, but after a while it got very annoying to have random objects in the middle of text or tree-symbols in raised drawbridges. So basically, what's done for creatures in graphic sets (having graphics for say, a craftsdwarf, an axedwarf, a bowgoblin, etc. without messing up text or the tiles for other creatures), only for furniture, buildings and all other in-game stuff. Give us the possibility to make separate graphics for every game object, not only creatures, and the modders will do the rest. It would make it possible to have very detailed and advanced tilesets but doesn't mess up the traditional ASCII display.
Currently I play with a 12x12 ASCII set that I made myself. It's basically the standard set, only slightly enlarged, put into a square and with lots of pseudo-antialiasing. I'd probably keep using it, even if there were more possibilities, because I got used to it.  But I imagine, better tilesets (which are not possible right now) would help new players to understand the game instead of screaming "Waaah, Matrix!" and turning off their computer right away.

3D graphics on the other hand... no, that's just not Dwarf Fortress and also out of the frame of what's possible for Toady. Even something rather simple (compared to completely rendered 3d graphics) like Stonesense's sprite based pseudo-3d would need a rewrite of way too many things to work. Opening up the interface for modification will probably be done in the future and make some improvements possible, but only Toady knows, what the far future brings for DF.

Generally, I like ASCII graphics... I could write several pages about the psychology of pictograms and visual abstraction, but others will explain (or already have) that much better. I just prefer it and that's not even, because I grew up with roguelikes (I didn't), but because it produces relatively little visual clutter. If I can have a simple 12x12 symbol or a detailed 16x16 graphic which mean the very same, I'd choose the simple symbol any time.

Just imagine you're standing in front of two toilet doors, male and female... there's probably a very simplified version of gender symbols on each door, which makes it possible to choose the right one. Now imagine the same two doors but on each one is a detailed drawing or photo of a man or woman... does that make understanding the meaning and deciding which door to open any easier? For me it wouldn't, especially after a few beers.
Now imagine the same with 256 doors (ok, unlikely in a toilet...), each having its own little symbol. I'd prefer something simple that can be understood at a glance instead of more complicated stuff. The same applies to DF tilesets. The simpler, the better, as long as there is a way to make a visual connection (╤ does look somewhat like a table and g obviously does not stand for "elephant")
Vattic's symbols actually do a good job of characterizing the entities without making things too cluttered.

[G-Flex]

One problem I see for text(-like) graphics is that when the number of things you need to represent gets larger and larger, you likely need more detail in each glyph, making simple pictograms more challenging.

For example, take creature graphics. Distinguishing between dogs and cats is easy, but no matter how many glyphs you have available, how do you easily sort between the dozens of animals DF has, including, say, every type of gibbon? I'm not sure how to solve that problem (except for that one program I made to generate digraphic creature tiles, so you have things like "Dg" for dogs and "Dr" for dragons).

[Sonlirain]

Personally i like usiong titlesets.
I DID play with stnadard ASCII for some time (especially at the begining) but graphic sets make the game a LOT easier to read.

For example a jungle in ascii is a mess of green symbols making finding trees and shrubs at first glance impossible.
Why?
Because everything is the same shade of green on a black background.

[moki]

@G-Flex:
That's indeed hard, especially when you try to limit yourself to small sizes. There are only so many easily discernible symbols that can be drawn in 144 (12x12) or 256 (16x16) pixels. Some designers of 16x16 sets have become pretty good at this, but I think that too few tiles (too little information) fits on one screen with those. I'd probably use one of those, if I had a 40" 1600p screen... Actually, this difficulty is one of the reasons that ASCII works so well. Your attempt with the double letters is the most logical solution for those who think, that many different symbols are necessary. Actually, it's one of the few "graphics" sets that I actually liked.
I still prefer my simple tileset. For me, it's usually good enough to see a g moving around the landscape to know what it is. If it's randomly walking about, it's probably a goat (or maybe some kind of gibbon), if it's flying, it's a goose and if it's trying to kill my woodcutter I should send the militia to strike that goblinite. This works for most creatures and when in doubt, there's still the v button. One of the biggest problems is spotting a macedwarf between all the corpses and blood splatter (red on red) or a bowgoblin in a forest (green on green). It doesn't stand out enough, especially when I use custom colors with a little less contrast. But currently, I have no idea what to do against that.

[drilltooth]

arguements to be made on both sides.. I'm just used to the cp437.

[G-Flex]

For example a jungle in ascii is a mess of green symbols making finding trees and shrubs at first glance impossible.
Why?
Because everything is the same shade of green on a black background.

That's a problem with colors, not tiles, really. The game specifies the colors, really.

I still prefer my simple tileset. For me, it's usually good enough to see a g moving around the landscape to know what it is. If it's randomly walking about, it's probably a goat (or maybe some kind of gibbon), if it's flying, it's a goose and if it's trying to kill my woodcutter I should send the militia to strike that goblinite. This works for most creatures and when in doubt, there's still the v button.

That's a point, but creature behavior isn't distinct enough for it to be reliable, and you ideally shouldn't have to use the v key to distinguish between things that are so dissimilar.

Of course, we have another dimension to use here: Color. When you have different, similar creatures (like all the damn gibbons), color is useful, especially if color support moves beyond the 16-color palette in the future. I might make a suggestion thread regarding how best to handle that in the near future.