All planned design/ art changes are now complete (new header, text color changes, etc.). We'll continue to pass along your feedback in this thread, but a lot of the feedback before this post was provided while changes were being made -- feel free to post your most up-to-date feedback after this post. Please be clear and concise in your post, in addition to being constructive, that way your feedback is heard.
NOTE: Functionality of the forums should not be included in this feedback, only art/design.
Thanks for your patience as all changes were made and verified.
Cheers,
Brandon =/\=
I won't mention anything about the colours, there is enough said about this 'decision'.
However I would like to mention the banner. The generic forum design isn?t as bad as it could be but the banner is the draw for people here. STO is bases on the Star Trek IP and not some home brand games like the others in PWEs line up, sell that.
I enjoy seeing Hansom Phaser Guy back, but as the banner stands it looks silly:
First: The game logo is too small, even more than the graphics; this is the draw for people.
Second: Age- HPG should be wearing his Odyssey uniform from the S8 adverts and holding a fleet phaser. The BOPs are really old as well.
Third: Inclusion- Where are Tiaru Jarok and ?Generic Klingon Barbarian?? or even Captains Shon, Tiaru Jarok, and Koren?
Fourth: Ships- The Norg BOP!? Use your banner to sell ST Cryptic, have the flagships or a D?D, Assault Cruiser, and Neg?Var, or 3 cryptic designs.
Fifth: Worf, Tasha, Tuvok. You paid for them where are they? I much as I like HPG et al. Where are the canon characters that fans know and love?
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though. JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
Art, design, and functionality, is not necessarily divisive realms. If the ability to read the forum is affected, that is a functionality issue, not merely an aesthetical complaint. A pure aesthetical assessment would be based on personal taste more than anything, would it not? So I would say that technically, the grey areas generate noise, seemingly in conjunction with the white text. Just as much as they did yesterday. Noise as in phantom imagery and emergent shapes. This is affecting the ability to process the input to some degree, which of course can be dismissed as a neglectable side effect!
Me, I'm going to get a headache very fast. And that affects my own functionality! And the text input preview window is absolutely not helping, it is barely readable. As in dysfunctional!
I'm actually finding this very unpleasant, if you could at least reset colours to the old set my eyes won't throw up ghost lines. Alternatively, how about allowing us to choose colour schemes in the User-CP?
Being able to match text to background colour is a boon to adding spoilers. Give it back, please.
"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects." — Lazarus Long --->Get the Forums Enhancement Extension!
This still stands: Too much grey. Grey is everywhere, it looks bland, unimpressive, old, generic.
I'd rather the black background back. As said by others, the contrast with colored text ain't good.
Buttons (being the same as pre Feb. 13) still look bad, pixelated.
Did I mention 'grey'? Yeah, grey quotes on grey background...
What I'm happy about is the small header.
TOIVA, Toi Vaxx, Toia Vix, Toveg, T'vritha, To Vrax: Bring in the Allegiance class. Toi'Va, Ti'vath, Toivia, Ty'Vris, Tia Vex, Toi'Virth: Add Tier 6 KDF Carrier and Raider. Tae'Va, T'Vaya, To'Var, Tevra, T'Vira, To'Vrak: Give us Asylums for Romulans.
(1) At the standard size, the font is still way to small to be comfortable to read.
(2) Grey color used for links and in other places is too similar to the background gray. It requires more strain to see what are and are not links now.
(3) Basically, because of the tiny font size and ridiculously difficult color choices throughout the forums are a chore to navigate at this point, the strain to read the tiny letters is headache inducing, and there seems to have been no thought given to how colors look against each other. (Grey on Grey and you expect us to see it ? Seriously?)
(4) I maintain that the entire thing no longer has any feel of 'Trek' to it. It looks uninspired and very "corporate" and "boring".
(5) The point brought up about all the smileys and buttons looking unprofessional is entirely true. Every single one of them has this very obvious white outline because they were made for a white background, not a grey one. It looks really silly.
(6) Much of the forums now has a soft focus, almost blurry look to it that is also kind of headache inducing.
Just a few thoughts
I will not visit the forums ever if these changes stick, because too many of them are headache inducing and I am already prone to migraines.
Please continue to consider things like the age of your user base, aging eyes (as pointed out before), people prone to headache from eyestrain, as you continue to consider updating and changing this.
I will watch tweets to see if this changes.
peace
- John
^^ Pretty much this!!
I quoted hippiejon because this sums up my feedback on the change after the entire change is completed, even though I said basically the same the first time I saw these changes.
I would just like to add that it's not only related to age or aging eyes, I'm neither older nor have I ever had any issues with my sight - however, this new forum color scheme and contrast are excessively straining on the eyes and after a while looking at it everything starts to blur.
I'm with hippiejon on this one, if these changes stick in this format, I'm afraid I won't be hanging out much on the forums. Sorry, but this ain't worth messing my eyes over.
This still stands: Too much grey. Grey is everywhere, it looks bland, unimpressive, old, generic.
I'd rather the black background back. As said by others, the contrast with colored text ain't good.
Buttons (being the same as pre Feb. 13) still look bad, pixelated.
Did I mention 'grey'? Yeah, grey quotes on grey background...
What I'm happy about is the small header.
I also think the grey's just wrong. Also, it looks amateurish when all the links that lead out of the forums are white and just piled up at the upper left corner of the page, and the background only transitions from black to grey after a certain point.
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
I'm back ... and I've read some replies this time too (rather than just writing my own). I know some forums have it already, but couldn't we have rotating headers that change each time the page is refreshed or you move forward / backwards on the forums?
You've got Phaser Guy, through in the Vulcan Woman image, and that LoR one, and then (as stated above me) Shon and Koren; they are leading our flag ships after all.
I was surfing the forums this morning from my Android phone w/Chrome and noticed that the text on the forum landing page doesn't display in a uniform way.
Some of the text is much larger than the rest... which is okay on a phone, but not so much when it doesn't all look the same.
If I can figure out how to post a screenshot of it for reference, I will.
The rest of the text (so far) in the threads themselves seems fine on a phone... I actually don't have to fiddle with zooming in to see quotes anymore.
So, some good with the not-so-good to report.
My views may not represent those of Cryptic Studios or Perfect World Entertainment. You can file a "forums and website" support ticket here Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
Okay then. I'm largely alright with this now that everything has settled down and the pink/purple is gone.
The only adjustment that I'd like is to change the color of the poster names. Change it to match the color of the Career Officer title (light blue, I think it is) and that would be great. It pops up much nicer on the dark background.
(1) At the standard size, the font is still way to small to be comfortable to read.
(2) Grey color used for links and in other places is too similar to the background gray. It requires more strain to see what are and are not links now.
(3) Basically, because of the tiny font size and ridiculously difficult color choices throughout the forums are a chore to navigate at this point, the strain to read the tiny letters is headache inducing, and there seems to have been no thought given to how colors look against each other. (Grey on Grey and you expect us to see it ? Seriously?)
(4) I maintain that the entire thing no longer has any feel of 'Trek' to it. It looks uninspired and very "corporate" and "boring".
(5) The point brought up about all the smileys and buttons looking unprofessional is entirely true. Every single one of them has this very obvious white outline because they were made for a white background, not a grey one. It looks really silly.
(6) Much of the forums now has a soft focus, almost blurry look to it that is also kind of headache inducing.
While like many, I'm happy to see the purple gone (though curious why it is there on other forums unless the plan is to remove it from those as well), the lack of consistency and differentiation between links/vlinks(alinks) is somewhat problematic as to where a person may think to go, remember where they've been, etc. At the resolutions many folks run, simply bolding links compared to standard vlinks doesn't quite provide that ease of quickly noting a difference.
The gray background, while it may be perfectly fine when used with certain set colors - is problematic with other colors (like when you guys do the notices in red - those can be somewhat painful to look at - the contrast is bad) that you use...it is definitely an issue for folks that use colored text in their signatures or even posts.
Consider the following, eh?
Federation/Starfleet Klingon Defense Force <--- is extremely difficult to read Romulan Republic
Consider the following, eh?
X, X, X, X
X, X, X X, X
X X, X
While at first glance, those may appear to jump off the screen at you as easily as if they were on a black or white background - there's a fuzz to the red that becomes annoying pretty quickly.
Consider the following, eh?
Some Rare Weapon Some Very Rare Weapon Some Ultra Rare Weapon
Those first two have me reaching for a half empty bottle of Excedrin.
While the majority of font sizes are the same, there was a selection that was previously 13.3ish which has been reduced to 12. 13.3 vs. 11 was one thing, while 12 vs. 11 is kind of meh - it does not provide enough separation - doesn't distinguish item X from item Y.
The fade/transition on the header happens too quickly. It could stand to be taller with a more gradual fade.
The various buttons (quote, reply, preview, etc) need to be cleaned up. While the issue existed even with the previous background, it's something that should be cleaned up. They're obviously designed for a white background and never had any transparency/alpha layer set for them to be used with a non-white background.
Overall, the retro minimalist style suggests the intended audience is using cell phones from the late 90's. While it is understandable that in today's world one needs to design for the mobile web, the mobile web itself has come a long way since the late 90's...
You can find/contact me in game as @PatricianVetinari. Playing STO since Feb 2010.
Then simply start using the forums!
Can be enabled/disabled at will via the addon.
As long as the logo and background images remain available via their CDN (no reason it shouldn't), it'll work just fine.
Hope people find this useful.
EDIT:
List of updates done so far
- Added left and right border lines back to posts
- Hacky fixed posts left/right divider gap that shows if someone has a short signature
- Darkened quick edit, quick reply and advanced reply text input areas
- Drop down menus up top (search, go to page, search this thread etc) darkened to match theme
- Advanced reply height now even bigger than quick reply by default
- Fixed reply text boxes to that can now be extended height wise once again. Width has been set to a fixed width.
- Advanced search background darkened
- Avatars now centre correctly horizontally, good for users like dalolorn with thinner pictures
- Banner ad up top shrunk down to 0 pixels so you cant see it any more
- Made the login link easier to see and click on
- Removed blanket bolding of all thread topics in sub-forum lists, so threads you've read are no longer bolded as well (unread = bold still)
- 'New Notifications' number (when greater than 0) will now turn red, so it's obvious when you have unread.
- Fixed drop down menus (near top of forum) link colours so they're easier to read
- Fixed 'Your Control Panel' links so they don't use the new huge red 'Login' style. Made link areas bigger for easier clicking
- Post # link now blue instead of white
- Fixed Chrome support for some elements.
- Replaced forum button images with nicer ones from Blacklight forums
- Threads long enough to fill pagination with all 3 digit numbers sent the right hand side of it out of view and thus unusable. Reduced page number padding so threads with 3 digit page numbers show all the width of the pagination block.
Hmm, I definitely like this a bit better. Larger text, easier to read. Maybe add a gray border around user posts, which have a black background and look a bit odd. Otherwise it looks good.
Good gravy. I went to try this install out, and it wanted me to install everything from a new zip program to changing all my defaults to yahoo and beyond.
Comments
I won't mention anything about the colours, there is enough said about this 'decision'.
However I would like to mention the banner. The generic forum design isn?t as bad as it could be but the banner is the draw for people here. STO is bases on the Star Trek IP and not some home brand games like the others in PWEs line up, sell that.
I enjoy seeing Hansom Phaser Guy back, but as the banner stands it looks silly:
First: The game logo is too small, even more than the graphics; this is the draw for people.
Second: Age- HPG should be wearing his Odyssey uniform from the S8 adverts and holding a fleet phaser. The BOPs are really old as well.
Third: Inclusion- Where are Tiaru Jarok and ?Generic Klingon Barbarian?? or even Captains Shon, Tiaru Jarok, and Koren?
Fourth: Ships- The Norg BOP!? Use your banner to sell ST Cryptic, have the flagships or a D?D, Assault Cruiser, and Neg?Var, or 3 cryptic designs.
Fifth: Worf, Tasha, Tuvok. You paid for them where are they? I much as I like HPG et al. Where are the canon characters that fans know and love?
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though.
JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
Get the Forums Enhancement Extension!
Me, I'm going to get a headache very fast. And that affects my own functionality! And the text input preview window is absolutely not helping, it is barely readable. As in dysfunctional!
---
U.S.S. Maelstrom, NCC-71417 (Constitution III-class/flagship) --- Fleet Admiral Hauk' --|-- Dahar Master Hauk --- I.K.S. qu'In 'an bortaS (D7-class / flagship)
And once again Perfect Cryptic didn't dissapoint me. Why even ask for our feedback when you guys are doing what you want to do anyway?
Examples: Console Icon Revamp, ARC,..
Being able to match text to background colour is a boon to adding spoilers. Give it back, please.
I'd rather the black background back. As said by others, the contrast with colored text ain't good.
Buttons (being the same as pre Feb. 13) still look bad, pixelated.
Did I mention 'grey'? Yeah, grey quotes on grey background...
What I'm happy about is the small header.
Toi'Va, Ti'vath, Toivia, Ty'Vris, Tia Vex, Toi'Virth: Add Tier 6 KDF Carrier and Raider.
Tae'Va, T'Vaya, To'Var, Tevra, T'Vira, To'Vrak: Give us Asylums for Romulans.
Don't make ARC mandatory! Keep it optional only!
^^ Pretty much this!!
I quoted hippiejon because this sums up my feedback on the change after the entire change is completed, even though I said basically the same the first time I saw these changes.
I would just like to add that it's not only related to age or aging eyes, I'm neither older nor have I ever had any issues with my sight - however, this new forum color scheme and contrast are excessively straining on the eyes and after a while looking at it everything starts to blur.
I'm with hippiejon on this one, if these changes stick in this format, I'm afraid I won't be hanging out much on the forums. Sorry, but this ain't worth messing my eyes over.
Same as others, I find this change terrible, it hurts my eyes. Why so small fonts?? And the grey background makes the small fonts even worse.
As happy as I am to see Handsome Phaser Guy back, I'd go for some Shon art.
Anything that isn't Commander T'TRIBBLE again
Also, the fact the forum links back to ARC (read:malware) is particularly annoying.
I also think the grey's just wrong. Also, it looks amateurish when all the links that lead out of the forums are white and just piled up at the upper left corner of the page, and the background only transitions from black to grey after a certain point.
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
Agreed.
But c'mon, T'TRIBBLE had some nice...assets.
Seriously, T'TRIBBLE was pointless and impractical objectification. Gimme Shon looking manly or Koren with a sword.
You've got Phaser Guy, through in the Vulcan Woman image, and that LoR one, and then (as stated above me) Shon and Koren; they are leading our flag ships after all.
Some of the text is much larger than the rest... which is okay on a phone, but not so much when it doesn't all look the same.
If I can figure out how to post a screenshot of it for reference, I will.
The rest of the text (so far) in the threads themselves seems fine on a phone... I actually don't have to fiddle with zooming in to see quotes anymore.
So, some good with the not-so-good to report.
Link: How to PM - Twitter @STOMod_Bluegeek
The only adjustment that I'd like is to change the color of the poster names. Change it to match the color of the Career Officer title (light blue, I think it is) and that would be great. It pops up much nicer on the dark background.
Mine Trap Supporter
HippieJon and VirusDancer pretty much sum up why:
You can find/contact me in game as @PatricianVetinari. Playing STO since Feb 2010.
Get ready for the merge...
So, went about altering it back to the 2013 look, and fixed some things that have been annoying me for a long time.
Some screenshots with notes on changes:
Image 1
Image 2
Image 3
Image 4
Image 5
Image 6
Forgive the compression, site had size limits
How do you get this happening in your browser?
Install the Stylish addon for Firefox (theme was built with this) or Chrome.
Then, go HERE, and install the theme I've made.
Then simply start using the forums!
Can be enabled/disabled at will via the addon.
As long as the logo and background images remain available via their CDN (no reason it shouldn't), it'll work just fine.
Hope people find this useful.
EDIT:
List of updates done so far
- Added left and right border lines back to posts
- Hacky fixed posts left/right divider gap that shows if someone has a short signature
- Darkened quick edit, quick reply and advanced reply text input areas
- Drop down menus up top (search, go to page, search this thread etc) darkened to match theme
- Advanced reply height now even bigger than quick reply by default
- Fixed reply text boxes to that can now be extended height wise once again. Width has been set to a fixed width.
- Advanced search background darkened
- Avatars now centre correctly horizontally, good for users like dalolorn with thinner pictures
- Banner ad up top shrunk down to 0 pixels so you cant see it any more
- Made the login link easier to see and click on
- Removed blanket bolding of all thread topics in sub-forum lists, so threads you've read are no longer bolded as well (unread = bold still)
- 'New Notifications' number (when greater than 0) will now turn red, so it's obvious when you have unread.
- Fixed drop down menus (near top of forum) link colours so they're easier to read
- Fixed 'Your Control Panel' links so they don't use the new huge red 'Login' style. Made link areas bigger for easier clicking
- Post # link now blue instead of white
- Fixed Chrome support for some elements.
- Replaced forum button images with nicer ones from Blacklight forums
- Threads long enough to fill pagination with all 3 digit numbers sent the right hand side of it out of view and thus unusable. Reduced page number padding so threads with 3 digit page numbers show all the width of the pagination block.
http://sto-forum.perfectworld.com/showthread.php?p=15156361#post15156361
I wish...
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
But as for the rest, it hurts my eyes. I loved the previous design, except for the signature line. This is gonna be painful to adjust to.
Join the Deltas today!
Good gravy. I went to try this install out, and it wanted me to install everything from a new zip program to changing all my defaults to yahoo and beyond.