[UPDATED] Small and Big Graphical Improvements

geminibruni

Hi, I would like to help you devs, to make even better the overall look of the game, If a few of my ideas will be taken inspiration from developers I would be really very happy ...

If you have comments and suggestions do not hesitate to make them!!!!


Also if you enjoy my ideas please click on "like" button in order to get noticed by developers!!
TANKS..



Improvements for the Baldur's Gate Start Screen, I believe that the black background on either side of the menu is not very nice to look at and then I thought it would be better to use a wallpaper, Also it would be nice to have in these screens the gold outer edge. Finally there are to fix some graphical glitches at the border of some buttons:Original:https://forums.beamdog.com/uploads/FileUpload/23/6da546a95ed178d5fe5eee4988f431.jpg
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Why don't make a separated Black Pits Main Menù?:
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GameStart Screen improvements: i'm a great lover of the Archaic's work Made on the Archaic GUI mod, and I personally find that one of the best improvements he's done was his beautiful Start Screen, so i took his idea using a dev style:Original:http://i.imgur.com/7mlkxAh.jpg
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When you press the button of Baldur's Gate
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When you press the button of Black Pits (
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Other some improvements to the general design for the various menu ingame:
- The main idea is to make more colorful and consistent the various screens, adding some gold edges and rearranging the various buttons. Be noted that many menus have had problems with the latest patch, in fact the new gold border often ends above the original design of the cells, the results are not lovely

- The my improved World Map, in the standard version was missing the golden edge, and I added the ui that inexplicably disappears when you enter this screen, not a good stuff... Original: https://forums.beamdog.com/uploads/FileUpload/47/c7d89d1bafb5c53a58ea9fdea5810d.bmp
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Detail Improvements for the World Map: I think the main problem is the scrolling compass that in addition to being very large (and unnecessary) has a very questionable design, after, are necessary some miscellaneous trim

Tiny solution:
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The my Improved Area MapOriginal:https://forums.beamdog.com/uploads/FileUpload/47/9078fb5d0067be97dd1eb67b237b7c.png
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The my Improved Statisctics Menu:Original:https://forums.beamdog.com/uploads/FileUpload/c2/1c0792bc0c931464851c7083468322.png
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The my Improved Inventory screen:Original:https://forums.beamdog.com/uploads/FileUpload/a0/2a5471426b893ec785467aab2abb2e.jpg

geminibruni

-The Start Screen:


After:

geminibruni

Dino

And whats wrong with the last screenshot?

geminibruni

I have modified a background, first was black...

geminibruni

I'm a great admirer of @Archaic's work on the Archaic GUI mod, and I personally find that one of the best improvements he's done was his beautiful Start Screen:



I think that while keeping your current style, you might consider moving towards this design direction , as the Archaic solution is clearly better and much more stylish!!

Your actual Start Screen:

Malicron

Isn't that just a modified vanilla ToB start screen?

Dino

I have to agree, that is a very attractive start screen, even though it looks very BG2ish and thus somewhat out of place.
That said, I wont be looking at the start screen much anyway.

devicem

Archaic, I want this!

metalmunki

For the main map, I would argue they should get rid of the scrolling compass entirely. screens and resolution these days can cope with the whole sword coast on one screen, surely?

meagloth

metalmunki said:

For the main map, I would argue they should get rid of the scrolling compass entirely. screens and resolution these days can cope with the whole sword coast on one screen, surely?

Not on an iPad mini. There would have to be some kind of zoom. I don't want to have to squint to see the name of an area, or even be able to tap on it. Some people have small laptop screens too.

alnair

iPads have pan-to-zoom gestures, though...

geminibruni

metalmunki said:

For the main map, I would argue they should get rid of the scrolling compass entirely. screens and resolution these days can cope with the whole sword coast on one screen, surely?

I Think is a good solution, the scrolling compass is not necessary....

geminibruni

the WorldMap following the advise of meralmunki:

geminibruni

Adding the golden borders on the Main Menù:

Pecca

There never were side bars with the world map. It's because it is wider than the rest of in-game screens. I guess it doesn't matter with EE anymore, but still there is no need for the sidebars there as the game wouldn't allow you to use them. So I think it's better now, when you can see more space.

Neurological

I like the idea to have a background on the empty space, but fior the startup screen I like the "list" style it have now, but thats a matter of likes I guess.

metalmunki

geminibruni said:

the WorldMap following the advise of meralmunki:

I like what you're going for! For some reason I can only see a small part of it, but I assume that was deliberate as you were just showing the width rather than the whole map.

metalmunki

geminibruni said:

Adding the golden borders on the Main Menù:

I do like this, with the background. However, for the background (and I'm just thinking outside the box here), what if it used a faded in/out slideshow of the images used for the chapter dream/narration? Either transitioning as you watch, or a different one every time the game loaded (perhaps tied to how far you are in the campaign).

LiamEsler

Unfortunately using a picture like that as the background isn't feasable due to the fact that we have people using a huge variety of resolutions. A tileable texture would be much more feasable, I'd imagine.

Shang

LiamEsler said:

Unfortunately using a picture like that as the background isn't feasable due to the fact that we have people using a huge variety of resolutions. A tileable texture would be much more feasable, I'd imagine.

I don't see any problem. Just use a big enough image, does not even need to scale, just show less on smaller resolutions and more on bigger. The really big screens might prove a problem but you can use media queries in html, I guess there's something for BG as well?

LiamEsler

@Shang We need to account for some fairly crazy resolutions, at which point the sheer size of the image could become problematic.

geminibruni

Or you can use an image of a standard size (like 1920x1200) and then adapt it to various resolutions, bigger or smoller as a desktop merge option...

Crawley

I totally agree with @geminibruni, just use like 3-4 different size images and crop them on-the fly to a given resolution.

If someone has dual monitor, I think the right-hand side should be tileable.

geminibruni

My improved version of StartScreen, i have used the base of Archaic GUI....

geminibruni

Buttons Details:

geminibruni

When the button are pressed

geminibruni

A possible BlackPits Main Menù

RedGuard

I think maybe if the Orc guy's eyes were glowing instead of his mouth that might look better. To me the mouth on fire looks a bit odd.

Dino

Why would you want to replace the skull with a random orc-face? I think the skull with souls circling around it is very iconic and also relevant in the context of the story.

RedGuard

I think the Orc face would be fine for the Black Pits menu. They'd still have the classic skull for the Baldur's Gate menu.