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The game menu.
  • Marrend
  • Added: 08/11/2013 05:28 PM
  • Last updated: 03/29/2024 12:48 PM
  • 6365 views

Posts

Pages: 1
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
The intention here is to have something interesting (or at least related to the game) in the background, but I'm not sure what.
Keep it simple. A subtle, organic texture should go well with this... Also, try to spice up the menu a little with icons, colors, etc; I hear that is easy to do in VX. Oh, and procure some good quality images for the facesets, if you can.
edchuy
You the practice of self-promotion
1624
Since the game is about Investigations, a magnifying glass is probably one of the more representative objects of such work. It could be focusing on a word (such as truth, facts, justice, etc.) or object (fingerprints, binary code, DNA, etc.) that represent what is being sought. Depending on how complex you want, said word or object can be mixed with other things that distract. Here is an example of what I'm thinking for your background:



Obviously, the image would have to be translucent and the colors should be a soft tone, but a good contrast with the background, unless you integrate the background color into the image itself.
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
I like that image, edchuy! I might try and use it, with a smidgen of editing.
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
Image updated!

Call me crazy, but I don't mind the words having outlines so much. If it's an issue, getting rid of them can't be too hard, right? Also, I think want to make "facts" white as a contrast to the rest of the words.

*Edit: Who, exactly, do I credit for this image?
Adon237
if i had an allowance, i would give it to rmn
1743
having outlines is good, but not those outlines. They are too pixelated and really could be done smoother. Otherwise I love it. :)
edchuy
You the practice of self-promotion
1624
I'm glad you like the image, Marrend. Hopefully, you can get it to work

author=Marrend
*Edit: Who, exactly, do I credit for this image?


Apparently, it has been used by several websites. How to know where the original came from, I have no idea. Anyway, here's more of the same in the different sizes, if it helps:

Magnifying Glass Truth

Let me know what you do about crediting the image.
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
Currently, my priorities with this are to get the background to look better, figure out where it came from, then, maybe, get a "Load" option in here. I haven't made a decision about using icons yet.

*Edit: Huh. This "make this look better" thing might be harder than I thought!
edchuy
You the practice of self-promotion
1624
Well, Marrend seems you're getting somewhere. I think part of the problem is the blue background itself. It isn't a solid color, but has a slightly lighter color every other line. That causes the white edges of the letters to look jagged, which especially true in the left hand side of the menu. I would think you have two options: changing the background color to a solid one; changing the edges of the letters to a color that's closer to the background, so it blends in rather than stands out.

Regarding using icons I'm a bit of a sucker for them. When playing you get used to them so much after a while that you don't need to read the words to know what you're selecting.

LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
Instead of... whatever you're doing now, which has white jaggies all around the text, I would take the original white image, and then put your blue background pattern on top of it - on top of everything, including the text - at about 50% opacity. It'll end up lighter than before, but if that bothers you, then you can then fix that by darkening the entire resulting image.
Well, I'm not a fan of just using some Google image as a menu background; It can be very distracting. There's also subtly establishing a theme and being painfully obvious about it... But Ok. Just try inverting the colors and giving a 50% - 90% opacity to the picture, that should make the white outlines unnoticeable and some of the words in the background more readable.

Something like this, maybe: http://imageshack.us/a/img10/4349/d4vo.png
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
I've updated this, but this incarnation was done before I saw this recent commentary.

*Edit: This whole ordeal makes me think of Fact or Fiction and/or Truth or Tale. Not sure if anything is going to come of this or not.
LockeZ
I'd really like to get rid of LockeZ. His play style is way too unpredictable. He's always like this too. If he ran a country, he'd just kill and imprison people at random until crime stopped.
5958
The current one is certainly an improvement over the old one that had pixel artifacts around the text. Still has pixel artifacts around the maginifying glass, though. But you can only see them on the left edge of it; you can't see them where the main window covers it up. Hmm.

I like alterego's, and notice that the actual windows have no blue background in it. They're completely clear. I kinda think it actually looks better, just because the windows don't cover 100% of the screen and it looks more uniform this way, but that's just personal preference. It doesn't look worse, at least. Maybe not worth the trouble of going through all your menu code and nixing the windowbacks, if you're uncomfortable with scripting.
edchuy
You the practice of self-promotion
1624
I agree with the observations that LockeZ made regarding your current version. I wonder how it would look if the left edge were the same as the rest of the magnifying glass. Anyway, it is obvious that using white or light toned edges for the magnifying with the background definitely is the cause of jaggedness. BTW, did you change the colors in the rectangle in the bottom left above where the amount of gold is shown?

I do think alterego's version does a good job of integrating all the elements of the graphic with the background.
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
I have to admit, I also like alterego's version. Figuring out how to make it look like that, when the background and foreground are generated separately, well, let's see what I can do.
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
Actually, I'm going to try something different for this. Like, a logo for the Nakae Gazette. I'm not sure why I imagine it this way, but I'm "seeing" a spherical object (Earth?) with "Nakae" on top and "Gazette" on the bottom.

Either that, or have it more straight-forward: have "Nakae Gazette" centered in large print and the tag-line "Facts without the fiction" along the bottom in smaller print.
Marrend
Guardian of the Description Thread
21781
Or, I could forget all that, and just go with the "unaltered" original? I dunno. I've been doing absolutely nothing with this game, as the idea was that I'd get this down, and the title screen, before developing this too much further.

Though, being in something of a creative slump doesn't help much either.
Well, your choice. That's on you, then. :P
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