Hollow Knight is an amazing game that also tells you what’s your enemies Almost everything is a cold color so that when you see the forgotten crossroads over run with the infection it feels dangerous That’s Color Theory
Hollow Knight managed to make me afraid of the color orange, which is generally a warm, friendly color. I'd say Team Cherry succeeded very well with utilizing colors in their game.
@@donutstarve3012 me too man, i had just finished dealing with deepnest (including nosk), so i took the tram to ancient basin and from there i went up to the city of tears, upgraded my nail, and went to dirtmouth from the stag station, i then noticed an orange cloud coming from below the well you normally use to go to the forgotten crossroads, i went down and i got scared shitless when i looked at the area, i really didn't expect anything like that after killing herrah
@@isadoracostahamsi163 It was frustrating. I found that glass tube, it would not break whatever I did. Got Sonar Blast, read "don't use near glass," immediately went back and tried it...nothing. tried it some 5-10 more times in different places, nada. Gave up frustrated. Eventually found the roll, explored everything else, completely forgetting about the glass tube until I happened to refind it, used the roll, it worked, and I got hit by the fire. Ha. Ha. Ha. Great. Design. Really. Really. Good.
@@sanfransiscon Well, yes, it does help, but it's best to use different fonts only to group information under a similar category (i.e. using similar fonts for status effects and MP and HP counts in a JRPG), and when it comes to _prioritization_ of information, size and chromatic differences will do just fine.
@@Zimran03 Was gonna say, I never had any issue understanding what was happening in XB2. Sure, the tutorial dump was annoying, but once you're in the flow of battle it all makes sense.
@@goldencyclone4984 Yea the long tutorial was annoying but its better than playing XBX and then realizing the game doesn't tell you any of the important stuff in the HUD and menus. So now you then have to read the 50+ page digital manual multiple times to have a basic understanding. And then still not have everything explained to you. The UI in that game was so small that I had to sit closer to the tv just to play it.
@@Zimran03 I feel ya on XCX, It was baad with font size and also getting across what the different arts did. Especially with how much I played on a 720p monitor or the gamepad I kinda had to guess
I'm glad I didn't pick up Yooka-Laylee, because that type of puzzle inconsistency frustrates me like nothing else. I'm getting worked up just by watching this, haha. Hollow Knight was terrifying at first. Not having a map of any sort was almost too overwhelming. I actually almost gave up on the game, but I pressed forward and once I found the cartographer in a new area and bought some map upgrades, it became really satisfying to explore every nook and cranny to completely fill out the maps. I became much more confident in my exploration abilities as the game progressed. Masterfully designed.
Only reason I have Yooka-Laylee is because it is a free game on Twitch Prime this month, I finished the first world (about as much as I could) and that was about it, I went to my yearly FFVI playthrough
*Gungnir:* "Hey House of the Dead, how many fonts are you on?" *House of the Dead:* "Like, maybe 5 or 6, my dude!" *Gungnir:* "You are like a little baby. Watch this..." 𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕭𝖆𝖙𝖙𝖑𝖊 𝕳𝖆𝖘 𝕭𝖊𝖌𝖚𝖓!! 𝘋𝘦𝘧𝘦𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘦𝘯𝘦𝘮𝘺! ꜰ ᴏ ʀ ᴠ ɪ ᴄ ᴛ ᴏ ʀ ʏ
Not gonna lie about Hollow Knight. Wasn't initially a fan of the map system, but once I got it, it felt like I was growing as the character. Plus, the UI of the game is pretty clean.
Gungir's so painful to look at.. And it's not like strategy games have to look complicated. With Fire Emblem Awakening, for example, when you're about to attack an enemy, it shows you 6 boxes. Your Hp-> How much Hp you'll have after combat (if you double attack, it will show up as a 2x symbol.) Your hit % for each attack And your critical hit %. These three boxes also are shown for the enemy. When looking at character stats, they are arranged from top to bottom. Str (if there is any modifier next to any stat, there will be a +X next to that value) Mag Skill Spd Luck Def Res Hp is display separately, at the top of the screen to emphacize how important it is to keep your units alive. It's the easiest thing in the world to judge how one unit will do against another just by looking at there stats, which are arranged neatly and efficiently. It isn't a chore to strategize thoroughly.
It probably went under the radar since it‘s only platforms are X-box and epic games store... Epic games store has a pretty bad reputation so there goes a big percentage of the gaming community. I‘ll take myself as an example: I have tons of games on steam so it would just be an unnecessary hassle to own games on 2 seperate libraries. Constantly switching between the stores gets annoying after a while and as paying method i prefer to use steam wallet, which means i would have to get more digital currency to buy something in epic store. (I dont own a credit card) And since i dont own an X-box i can‘t buy it there either. (I do agree though that it‘s an awesome game wich deserves more attention)
The worst part is that the "TOO MANY FONTS" logo is actually good design. It shows you exactly what the show's about and what the point is: Pointing out and mocking games with *Too Many Fonts*. Beautiful.
Go back and play the first WarioWare, and I feel like you may notice that game was oftentimes pretty rough at conveying information about microgames - commands will be generic, you often don't get a sense of which character you're playing as, and things don't work as you think they would - definitely something that got improved in future games!
We wrote this specifically with Smooth Moves and Gold in mind but I also went and played the first WarioWare recently and yeah. It is rough in regards to this. 90% of the time it's fine but there are quite a few microgames that are not intuitive enough for how fast the game is. Stuff like the one where a person is bouncing on a trampoline but you control the trampoline and the "Sniffle" game come to mind. Some of the harder minigames can feel borderline impossible to do successfully unless you're already prepared for them. But in the newer games, almost every microgame is intuitive with only a handful of exceptions.
@@DesignDoc For sure - I remember there being a Game and Watch inspired one where you have to cross to the opposite side while avoiding objects falling from above but the prompt only said something like "Avoid!" - whenever I would play it I wouldn't realize until it was too late that there was a win condition besides just surviving, lol
0:39 this intro segment was done best in the very first episode of the series. There was something about words "[the] presentation [of] information" together with the icons still on screen, the iconss being just that, the presentation of information. The newer way doesn't have the same charm and natural dynamic.
@@DesignDoc It's on the same screen as "Featuring Dante from the Devil May Cry series" and a Homestar Runner "Let's put one of those beefy fonts back on for good measure." and I can't see it as anything besides a SBPF gag.
One more thing about the hyrule warriors design, something I found happening to me is when an objective is about to fail but the game won’t notify me until the other notifications pop up first. In those moments, it can be really annoying when you suddenly fail just cause the game’s own warning came in too late
Hollow Knight's incomplete map will be terrible had they designed the world badly. But they didn't. You can simply look on the background/enemy, and you just know that you're transitioning to a different area. It also enhances the Metroidvania (never played it tbh, I just know it as a descriptor) aspect of finding new paths ect.
I kinda want somebody to make a compilation of just the title screens for the Good/Bad Design cards. The Good Design ones are all unique for each episode and are so pretty, and the Bad Design ones usually have so many easter eggs in 'em
The issues you described with HW’s design is why I constantly checked the battle log to see who said what and when and also what the missions are. The other issue, regarding the amount of options in the menu and then being misleading, is why I completely forgot about checking the combos and other things in Warrior Info. I usually checked Battlefield Info and the other top options.
Dude, I just subbed to your channel today. It's so interesting to just hear the background music of a bunch of games I played in your videos. I love your content.
The hunters journal in hk also gave some motivationl to stay around complete it find new bugs explore fight screw around with few of them try out new strats or make you seek for upgrades delaying you before you go somewhere to early also if you shared an opinion with the hunter it would be satisfying and a relief that it was meant to be that way mostly. It was a small feature but a really Big one for the first play experiance (even in my 5th playtrough it was a fun and a good refreshing feature after forgetting a lot of the game).
I am in full agreement with you on everything except Hollow Knight. Loved that game, but I ran into a lost wall. I knew where I needed to go, but had no idea how to get there. Went around to every angle, missing something and did other more advanced quests till it was the last one. Never beat that game, and not for lack of trying either. I was so far in too nothing short of watching a walk through and starting over to make sure I get what I need, but at that point I may as well just watch a play through.
The only problem I remember having with Ico was the one puzzle that involved timing your jump in sync with a piston's motion in order to get a jump boost. (On the original PS2 version, the puzzle was only in the PAL release, not the US one.) It was a completely different kind of puzzle than everything else in the game up to that point. I didn't even think that jumps interacting with the environment in that way we a thing the game engine was capable of. It stumped me in the same way that the infamous barrel in Sonic 3's Carnival Night Zone stumped so many players - it just wasn't the kind of interaction that the game had taught me to consider.
11:19 Funny thing is, they pretty much lifted the UI wholesale from Dynasty Warriors, except the character bubbles were voiced, and the notifications were accompanied by a sound effect & mini-map ping based on how severe it is. And that *still* sucked! The notifications were still a one-line queue, so you'd get something like "General X is under attack!" showing up on screen after they've already been killed.
Just a quick talk about too many fonts. If a game is translated into Chinese that issue would usually not exist, because that would quickly make you broke as commercial Chinese fonts are expensive, while free Chinese fonts are basically just Noto Sans/Serif and Wenquanyi. Therefore, games that are in Chinese usually use a single font for everything, while Final Fantasy and other SE titles (for example, Octopath Traveler) seems to prefer using 2 or 3, but that's it. They are mostly not on the same screen, or at least not for the same purpose, though.
I'm currently taking a graduate level Human Factors Psychology class..a lot of what you discuss in this video was very helpful for my term project! Bravo! :-)
IMO open-world games should try and revamp how waypoints/collectables are distributed. It's obviously pretty convenient to have everything auto- spotted as soon as you climb/activate a tower, but that's not how tracking stuff actually works. I say make every type of discoverable object/area its own mini-mission to get onto your map. You could read some in-universe books about a place, talk to people about something interesting they saw somewhere, track an animal/monster, piece together a torn up map/set of USB drives, spot taller and more conspicuous stuff via climbable tower, observe the scenery/nature for in-game tells on where caves/ruins and the like might be located. Basically make everything on your map contextual to what would be the most obvious way to find out about it, instead of just knowing about every objective across the board all at once.
One of the problems in FPS games apart from field of view, its how to handle the weapon space that hide a wide part of the screen and in competitive scenaries this is notable and a problem of balance the inmersion that brings the weapon animation and the utility of a clean screen for improve aiming.
I really wanted to like Hyrule Warriors, but just the idea of mashing buttons to the infinity and beyond is just repellent to me, now I have another reason to hate the game
Hyrule warriors was very confusing at the beginning but once u get the hang of it u understand everything and never get overwhelmed. That being said the UI can be way more clear
I feel like the game Grim Dawn (at least in its current state as I can't speak for its previous iterations) did what Hollow Knight did with exploration, but better. It doesn't blatantly encourage players to go out and explore, and you don't even need to explore the map to progress the plot, but going out and exploring the map provides the player with a lot of potential exp, loot, and even secret lore elements that aren't needed for the plot, but provide context for the area you are exploring by showing you the perspective of someone who either lived in the area or ventured through the area. You can also often find secret dungeons and shrines, the latter of which is used for the really overwhelming-at-first-glance (but is actually pretty nice and easy to understand) Devotion tree. As well, when you start out in an area there is no map. You make the map as you go along so you know exactly where you've been and what you have yet to explore. In future runthroughs of the area your map will still exist of the area (at least what you explored of it), but everything will be greyed out and as you explore the area again colour will begin to fill the map in areas you've been through, so you always know where you've been and where you haven't. Only thing I'd improve with it (and this might be a feature already and I'm just a derp) is the inclusion of self-placed map markers to remember the locations of secrets that you've found, but for whatever reason didn't delve into at the time. The game does this with shrines luckily, but the hidden dungeons that don't have a map marker (that are usually special event dungeons) aren't labeled on the map for you. The game also compensates for you exploring. There was one questline I had where the NPC told me to kill a monster, but I already had and it actually gave me the prompt to tell him "oh, I killed that already," and this happened multiple times. All because I just went out and explored at my heart's content. Really felt rewarding for exploring too because I didn't have to keep running back and forth like I would have if I hadn't explored.
What a coincidence! I'm playing Hollow Knight for the first time this days, and I think i'll be going for 112% completion. That game is hard as hell but extremely satisfying!
@@g-1050 Yea, right now I'm collecting all the things I missed, whike psycologically preparing for the hardest bosses/trials/things. Grimm first form was quite a challange. I have to train myself in order to dechipher attack patterns. Wish me luch XD.
I've played the entire game like a dozen times, including a couple successful Steel Soul runs, but still struggle with the later bosses in the pantheon. The skill floor for getting 112% is almost as high as you would expect the main campaign's skill ceiling to be before watching speedrunners absolutely demolish it and make you realize just how much of a noob you really are.
The battle UI for Dissidia NT has been altered to what it is now in the console release since most complained that the Arcade UI took up too much of the screen and was too complex.
I love that Xenoblade is one of your favorite series and yet its constantly showing up as an example of terrible UI design. It reminds me of the Frasier episode where they bring up that the only thing better than a perfect meal is an otherwise perfect one with one flaw they can pick at all evening.
My one problem with Hollow Knight is that I assumed to bouncy shrooms could be bounced on by an ability I hadn’t I unlocked yet, instead of the nail bounce you begin with. I got lost for quite a while because of this.
Oof, as a Musou fan, Hyrule Warriors' problem looks serious. I've sometimes had to skip on dialog and have to read it later but that's to be expected; you're in an intense battle and characters are participating in it. At least they're voiced usually, and in english versions (looking at you, Warriors Orochi 4 with japanese only dub), it's not a problem
1:31 Huh? But don't they all are to different degrees? 16:10 Yeah, but the instruction screen seems it's there for courtesy, when the minigame starts they give you a quick visual guide that lasts a second just before the "Start!" order is shout. 17:13 You got me, I thought that was gonna be the name of the game for a second =)
So, I got really into borderlands 2 recently; and I keep running into a problem whil playing it that reminded me of this video: some of the random bits of trash in the game have a green stench. This by itself is not a problem except, the game absolutely hammers home that green in its visual language green means one of three things: corrosive damage, lootable chest, or interactable widget (typically associated with the active quest). Having the green stench creates a point of interest, but then betrays that interest when there's nothing there: I spent a minute confused about why there wasn't anything to find there; which ties into another problem: Some lootable chests are quest-locked, meaning they can't be opened except during certain quests because they contain quest specific items. And this wouldn't be a problem, except they're for the most part, also signified with a green marker. I spent 5 minutes in frostburn canyon confused about why I couldn't open the treasure latrine near the start of the area: turns out it's because it's a quest-locked chest. And this problem could have easily been solved (and in some cases was solved) by having quest locked chests glow red, which the game uses to say "No." Like someone on the development team had that idea, and put it into practice in some parts of the game, but not others. Irksome. -- Also, there's the matter of loot. This is more to do with cluttersome information than inconsistant information, but all loot has a glowing line above it to indicate to you that it exists. ALL LOOT. Including ammo drops which because for most ammo types the game is pretty generous, you won't be able to pick up because you're full up on that ammo. So, when your going around picking through the loot of a big battle, you may wind up looking at the same ammo drop several times, or not being able to focus on the actual loot (weapons, etc) because of how much ammo is laying around. Ammo should only glow if your not full up on it; so as to clean up the visual indicators. And because items have rarities, you should be able to set which rarities you are interested in, and have only those rarities glow, because the glow of common weapons after a boss fight are difficult to ignore because there are so many of them. It'd be nice to have a setting to just turn that off: give the player a bit more control over what information they feel is important. -- And lastly, I recently beat the game and got to NG+ which it calls True Vault Hunter mode; and something about it almost immediately irked me. Unlike in the new game run through, some shielded enemies are resistant to one of the game's elemental damage types. Which would fine, except there's no indicator to show you that. Some enemies in the group will just randomly not be as effected by your weapon of choice, and the only way to know that is to shoot at them and read the 'resist' text as it pops up. Random enemy resistances is supposed to add a layer of complexity to fights, and I respect that, but if your not going to tell me they have resistances, until I shoot at them: well, I'm playing a one-shot one-kill sniper, and it's a bit late to switch to a less ineffective weapon after I shot them. It's more annoy than difficult when you fail to communicate that those random resistances visually. And that's setting aside the fact that the game's not really designed to handle random resistances: switching weapons takes a long time, and you only have four weapons slots at any given time, and only one grennade, which might seem like enough (one for each elemental damage type), but factor the six gun types which are appropriate for different situations (I like to kit with a sniper rifle, shotgun, pistol, and rpg), and that different guns behavior differently even with their own category, and your left without the ability to tool an actually usable kit to deal with random damage resistances. It just feels like a cheap artifical inflation of difficulty that can't be overcome with skillful mastery of the gameplay.
My class in college of typography actually worked... I could count the Dissidia fonts before Design Doc did it... I hated the teacher but he actually teach me well
One game I think you might wanna take a look at is The Caligula Effect, specifically to compare the Vita version to the remade PS4 and PC version. The difference in UI is quite stunning.
I personally find Little Big Planet's creation system very intuitive, but even if we go by the idea that it's highly complicated (it's not), it's leagues better for high level creation than Mario Maker is because it just allows for drastically more options and also, look at the sorts of weird contraptions Mario Maker needs in order to do simple things and look at all of the design limitations such contraptions impose and LBP2's micro chip system is way easier to manage. Pair that with the fact that the system is inherently designed to let you play and create your level at the same time and playtesting is also a lot easier.
There is a wonderful racing game called Split/Second which has a fantastic UI, even ten years later. It eliminates all unnecessary information from the UI. No MPH, no track map, no position stats. And all the UI info you do need is placed on your back bumper, where your eye naturally falls. And everything in the game happens quickly. There is no wasted time or space.
The moment I saw too many fonts I half expected DK Country Tropical Freeze, but holy shit gungnir it's like they have some rule on never using a font for more than one thing.
Yeah I did have fun with the Hyrule Warriors(I played the 3ds version) but sometimes the multiples that I cannot handle. Even if I have 3 or 4 members, not only sometimes is hard but command them isn't great. A great example is when I have a side mission in Thinke 1st quest. I miss the objective because I was on facus on the main. This something that FH Warriors did fix (I think). Let's hope that Persona 5 Strickers does shines in this part (in other words P5 *Mouso style).
When it comes to navigating and getting lost in the map in open-world games, Dishonored 2 kind of relies on a simpler option: In the options screen, you can turn all the objective markers and other user-interface elements off. Fortunately, the game was designed to be played without guides as the environment does a good job at guiding you.
One thing I dont like about hyrule warriors too is that the victory screen sounds like I lost. I got used to it but its still annoying when you start playing
Hollow Knight is an amazing game that also tells you what’s your enemies
Almost everything is a cold color so that when you see the forgotten crossroads over run with the infection it feels dangerous
That’s Color Theory
Hollow Knight managed to make me afraid of the color orange, which is generally a warm, friendly color. I'd say Team Cherry succeeded very well with utilizing colors in their game.
Yes
Wait holy shit they hearted my comment yes
infected crossroads friggin terrified me when I first saw it
@@donutstarve3012 me too man, i had just finished dealing with deepnest (including nosk), so i took the tram to ancient basin and from there i went up to the city of tears, upgraded my nail, and went to dirtmouth from the stag station, i then noticed an orange cloud coming from below the well you normally use to go to the forgotten crossroads, i went down and i got scared shitless when i looked at the area, i really didn't expect anything like that after killing herrah
I was a contestant on "Too Many Fonts" once, but I misunderstood what it was about. I probably looked a bit silly with my 20 fondue sets.
This is stupid but I like it.
Too Many Cooks?
And my parents wonder why I spend all day on the internet.
hazbin hotel profile picture located
@@penntopaper9305 No, that's my actual face.
This glass...but not that glass...okay but that glass this time.....but never THAT glass....unless it's a Tuesday.
That was mildly infuriating to watch. Can’t imagine how it was to play.
G7! I win!
Verick Rincon What are you Neanderthals doing?
@@isadoracostahamsi163 It was frustrating. I found that glass tube, it would not break whatever I did. Got Sonar Blast, read "don't use near glass," immediately went back and tried it...nothing. tried it some 5-10 more times in different places, nada. Gave up frustrated. Eventually found the roll, explored everything else, completely forgetting about the glass tube until I happened to refind it, used the roll, it worked, and I got hit by the fire.
Ha. Ha. Ha. Great. Design. Really. Really. Good.
Gungnir is just unbeatable in terms of font count.
Lugmillord I get a headache just looking at the game...
Alright gang: it's time to make an indie game to beat the reigning champion!
Every letter in a single word will be a different font.
I'm still not sure what the problem with having lots of fonts are. Doesn't it help differentiate the types of messages?
@@sanfransiscon Well, yes, it does help, but it's best to use different fonts only to group information under a similar category (i.e. using similar fonts for status effects and MP and HP counts in a JRPG), and when it comes to _prioritization_ of information, size and chromatic differences will do just fine.
"Xenoblade Chronicles 2!"
Me: Wait what? But it-
"How many fonts is that? ONE? That's NOT ENOUGH FONTS"
Me: o
I got baited too... I eventually realized there was a crapton of text... but only one font... :o
Ayr Yea Xenoblade 2 Somehow organizes all of that battle information neatly.
@@Zimran03 Was gonna say, I never had any issue understanding what was happening in XB2. Sure, the tutorial dump was annoying, but once you're in the flow of battle it all makes sense.
@@goldencyclone4984 Yea the long tutorial was annoying but its better than playing XBX and then realizing the game doesn't tell you any of the important stuff in the HUD and menus. So now you then have to read the 50+ page digital manual multiple times to have a basic understanding. And then still not have everything explained to you.
The UI in that game was so small that I had to sit closer to the tv just to play it.
@@Zimran03 I feel ya on XCX, It was baad with font size and also getting across what the different arts did. Especially with how much I played on a 720p monitor or the gamepad I kinda had to guess
The Knight is in the thumbnail
The title says “The best and WORST of game design”
Me, quietly: _Don’t_
same
I was begging he put the game in Good Design for half the video.
Lol, I literaly watched this vid JUST to check out if HK is gonna be in the "bad" category, great clickbait tbh if you think about it
all of us hollow knight fans teleport behind Design doc*
THE COUNCIL HAS ARRIVED
I was like “You better not” when I saw the Knight
8:40 **City of Tears OST starts**
HECK YEAH, HERE WE GO
Hollow Knight is fun!
"You know what game nails that balance very well ? "
I see what you did there Sir !
Yep, that was a good one.
I was expecting Hollow Knight but slightly hoping BotW would get mentioned as well, since it also achieves that balance
I'm glad I didn't pick up Yooka-Laylee, because that type of puzzle inconsistency frustrates me like nothing else. I'm getting worked up just by watching this, haha.
Hollow Knight was terrifying at first. Not having a map of any sort was almost too overwhelming. I actually almost gave up on the game, but I pressed forward and once I found the cartographer in a new area and bought some map upgrades, it became really satisfying to explore every nook and cranny to completely fill out the maps. I became much more confident in my exploration abilities as the game progressed. Masterfully designed.
Only reason I have Yooka-Laylee is because it is a free game on Twitch Prime this month, I finished the first world (about as much as I could) and that was about it, I went to my yearly FFVI playthrough
I did not expect to laugh as hard as I did at your too many fonts show
Neither did we.
11:19 *Featuring Dante from the Devil May Cry series*
God those transitions are treats
I just realised that “dumb ways to die” was basically a modern warioware for mobile phones
*Gungnir:* "Hey House of the Dead, how many fonts are you on?"
*House of the Dead:* "Like, maybe 5 or 6, my dude!"
*Gungnir:* "You are like a little baby. Watch this..."
𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕭𝖆𝖙𝖙𝖑𝖊 𝕳𝖆𝖘 𝕭𝖊𝖌𝖚𝖓!! 𝘋𝘦𝘧𝘦𝘢𝘵 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘦𝘯𝘦𝘮𝘺! ꜰ ᴏ ʀ ᴠ ɪ ᴄ ᴛ ᴏ ʀ ʏ
Glad to see Hollow Knight being mentioned.
Not gonna lie about Hollow Knight. Wasn't initially a fan of the map system, but once I got it, it felt like I was growing as the character. Plus, the UI of the game is pretty clean.
Agreed 1000%
the whole game pretty much makes you feel like youre getting better in skill personally not just a bunch of in game stats "levelling up".
MoonSpirit in the beginning, i didn’t understand the map, it was kind of unclear and not very detailed, but now its kinda cool!
@@bence0302bence * 112%
I just wish bosses had health bars ( I'm bad at them,and I don't even know how far I got. It can break my will.)
Those 'Bad Design' screens are terrible! The title is clearly visible in the middle of the screen! I know exactly what's going on!
Gungir's so painful to look at..
And it's not like strategy games have to look complicated.
With Fire Emblem Awakening, for example, when you're about to attack an enemy, it shows you 6 boxes.
Your Hp-> How much Hp you'll have after combat (if you double attack, it will show up as a 2x symbol.)
Your hit % for each attack
And your critical hit %.
These three boxes also are shown for the enemy.
When looking at character stats, they are arranged from top to bottom.
Str (if there is any modifier next to any stat, there will be a +X next to that value)
Mag
Skill
Spd
Luck
Def
Res
Hp is display separately, at the top of the screen to emphacize how important it is to keep your units alive.
It's the easiest thing in the world to judge how one unit will do against another just by looking at there stats, which are arranged neatly and efficiently. It isn't a chore to strategize thoroughly.
How about a game where your character traveled from the distant past so his map is incredibly outdated, even when it comes to the layout of the land?
If I'm not mistaken, Zelda Skyward Sword has a small segment where that is the case. Tbh it's a very frustating part, but I do appreciate the idea
In Darkwood, you find a map that your character says is two years old and completely outdated now.
This sounds like one of those elements that could be AMAZING if pulled off well, and just really frustrating if it's not.
@White-Van Helsing it's amazing!
Google maps has a part like that
Look at him moving a cursor with a controller.
Disgusting
I would agree but I'm not sure you can record the screen on handheld mode
@@marcelostringer no for some reason there isn't one.
That's one of the best sponsorship/ad segues that I've ever seen. You could almost say it was a...good design.
9:35 i was expecting the outer wilds. God damnit this game has gone under the radar so bad, and it's one of the best open worlds ive ever played.
@Arie Elberian definitely!
That game goes to good game, bad business decisions but that's another topic.
It flew under the radar cause it went epic exclusive, pretty sad.
It probably went under the radar since it‘s only platforms are X-box and epic games store...
Epic games store has a pretty bad reputation so there goes a big percentage of the gaming community. I‘ll take myself as an example:
I have tons of games on steam so it would just be an unnecessary hassle to own games on 2 seperate libraries.
Constantly switching between the stores gets annoying after a while and as paying method i prefer to use steam wallet, which means i would have to get more digital currency to buy something in epic store. (I dont own a credit card)
And since i dont own an X-box i can‘t buy it there either.
(I do agree though that it‘s an awesome game wich deserves more attention)
MjrCinnaminBun Fuck off...
The Yooka Laylee issue could have easily been solved with color patterns for the glass.
This. Definitely. Maybe a clear difference in the density of cracks, too.
That mission queue noise is ingrained into my head due to the hundreds of hours I have on Hyrule Warriors
The worst part is that the "TOO MANY FONTS" logo is actually good design.
It shows you exactly what the show's about and what the point is: Pointing out and mocking games with *Too Many Fonts*. Beautiful.
"You'd have nothing. Actually, you'd have Game & Wario.
Which is adjacent to nothing."
You put that mask in the thumbnail, you get me to come running, sir
I don't have time for another video. I need to go.
Oh, thumbnail featuring Holl...
Shit I clicked on it.
Go back and play the first WarioWare, and I feel like you may notice that game was oftentimes pretty rough at conveying information about microgames - commands will be generic, you often don't get a sense of which character you're playing as, and things don't work as you think they would - definitely something that got improved in future games!
We wrote this specifically with Smooth Moves and Gold in mind but I also went and played the first WarioWare recently and yeah. It is rough in regards to this. 90% of the time it's fine but there are quite a few microgames that are not intuitive enough for how fast the game is. Stuff like the one where a person is bouncing on a trampoline but you control the trampoline and the "Sniffle" game come to mind. Some of the harder minigames can feel borderline impossible to do successfully unless you're already prepared for them. But in the newer games, almost every microgame is intuitive with only a handful of exceptions.
@@DesignDoc For sure - I remember there being a Game and Watch inspired one where you have to cross to the opposite side while avoiding objects falling from above but the prompt only said something like "Avoid!" - whenever I would play it I wouldn't realize until it was too late that there was a win condition besides just surviving, lol
After hundreds of cumulative hours in Hyrule Warriors, it's kind of nice to look back and say
"...Yeah, the menu really is kind of bad."
0:39 this intro segment was done best in the very first episode of the series. There was something about words "[the] presentation [of] information" together with the icons still on screen, the iconss being just that, the presentation of information.
The newer way doesn't have the same charm and natural dynamic.
his name is cornifer ):
i cant belive you didnt even talk to him twice
I hear Sonic Rider Zero Gravity music at the start. I’m pretty excited now! :)
I was looking for someone to say that! I LIVED that game as a kid!
Ashrevyr same :)
@@yolobot4644 that was surprising, I didn't expect you to reply so quickly after a year
Ashrevyr I look at every notification I get and I use RUclips too much.
@@yolobot4644 fair point
Would love to see more TOO MANY FONTS it's a masterpiece, well done
9:30 “You know what game nails that balance?”
I see what you did there.
i'm a simple man
i see hollow knight mask, i press click.
Funny to have that thumbnail show up just as I take a break from my Hollow Knight replay.
11:19 "Oops I made ze bad design" Is that a Super Best Friends reference? :o
maaaaaybe
@@DesignDoc :O Interesting.
On another note, thank you for making another Good Design Bad Design video. Very informative. :D
@@darrelsam419 No prob! They're fun to make.
@@DesignDoc It's on the same screen as "Featuring Dante from the Devil May Cry series" and a Homestar Runner "Let's put one of those beefy fonts back on for good measure." and I can't see it as anything besides a SBPF gag.
When you pulled out Xenoblade chronicles 2 my heart skipped a beat. Phew!
Xenoblade chronicles 2 is amazing
I was SO confused and then amused
I was "where are the different fonts?" and then he pulled a sneaky one^^
I saw Xenoblade 1 at the beginning too and was worried the entire way through
That Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity music at the beggining gave me hope...
One more thing about the hyrule warriors design, something I found happening to me is when an objective is about to fail but the game won’t notify me until the other notifications pop up first. In those moments, it can be really annoying when you suddenly fail just cause the game’s own warning came in too late
Ironically, the "cleaner option" for Super Mario Maker 2 is one of the biggest points of critique.
Next time you should do "mediocre design, mediocre design" where you point out a bunch of okay menus that do their jobs and that's it.
The Sonic Riders Zero Gravity menu theme is always a win from me
I love this Animaniacs inspired series. You are a man of culture. Side note: I put this in my Game Design playlist.
Hollow Knight's incomplete map will be terrible had they designed the world badly. But they didn't. You can simply look on the background/enemy, and you just know that you're transitioning to a different area. It also enhances the Metroidvania (never played it tbh, I just know it as a descriptor) aspect of finding new paths ect.
Okay. The president of Nintendo is watching!
It's a joke, right?
Absolutely not!
@@Flymerick yes, check his about
Edit: just in case is not clear: he is NOT the real one, and it says so in his about
I know who Furukawa is, but i think the true president wouldn't show himself like this.
I could be wrong anyways.
It's just a joke @@Flymerick
I kinda want somebody to make a compilation of just the title screens for the Good/Bad Design cards. The Good Design ones are all unique for each episode and are so pretty, and the Bad Design ones usually have so many easter eggs in 'em
I was wondering why you never mentioned Hollow Knight in your other videos. This explains it!
The issues you described with HW’s design is why I constantly checked the battle log to see who said what and when and also what the missions are. The other issue, regarding the amount of options in the menu and then being misleading, is why I completely forgot about checking the combos and other things in Warrior Info. I usually checked Battlefield Info and the other top options.
I want to enter my school projects into Too Many Fonts, but then I remember that graphic design is my passion and I only use 1 font
NEXT UP ON "TOO MANY FONTS": JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Eyes of Heaven
Do i hear the Menu theme from Sonic Riders Zero Gravity at the beginning??? My Dude
Your videos just get better and better. Really good stuff.
*Hears Sonic Riders Zero Gravity menu theme* so you're a man of culture I see
Dude, I just subbed to your channel today. It's so interesting to just hear the background music of a bunch of games I played in your videos. I love your content.
You really deserve more subs.
This serie of videos alone is informative, funny and introduced me to Pyre.
The hunters journal in hk also gave some motivationl to stay around complete it find new bugs explore fight screw around with few of them try out new strats or make you seek for upgrades delaying you before you go somewhere to early also if you shared an opinion with the hunter it would be satisfying and a relief that it was meant to be that way mostly. It was a small feature but a really Big one for the first play experiance (even in my 5th playtrough it was a fun and a good refreshing feature after forgetting a lot of the game).
I spotted the "thanks, I hate it"!
I understood that reference!
I am in full agreement with you on everything except Hollow Knight. Loved that game, but I ran into a lost wall. I knew where I needed to go, but had no idea how to get there. Went around to every angle, missing something and did other more advanced quests till it was the last one. Never beat that game, and not for lack of trying either. I was so far in too nothing short of watching a walk through and starting over to make sure I get what I need, but at that point I may as well just watch a play through.
Yeah, random wall-hiting aside, Hollow Knight is the way to go for exploration. It's a pity silksong is steping back by including a quest system.
I wish you talked about Ico in the bad design part. The game is not friendly to new players; I had to use a guide to play through it.
The only problem I remember having with Ico was the one puzzle that involved timing your jump in sync with a piston's motion in order to get a jump boost. (On the original PS2 version, the puzzle was only in the PAL release, not the US one.)
It was a completely different kind of puzzle than everything else in the game up to that point. I didn't even think that jumps interacting with the environment in that way we a thing the game engine was capable of. It stumped me in the same way that the infamous barrel in Sonic 3's Carnival Night Zone stumped so many players - it just wasn't the kind of interaction that the game had taught me to consider.
11:19 Funny thing is, they pretty much lifted the UI wholesale from Dynasty Warriors, except the character bubbles were voiced, and the notifications were accompanied by a sound effect & mini-map ping based on how severe it is.
And that *still* sucked! The notifications were still a one-line queue, so you'd get something like "General X is under attack!" showing up on screen after they've already been killed.
8:39
TFW the subject's excellent soundtrack in the background gives away the joke.
Yooka-Laylee problems: "Why can't I lick that?!"
Yo, is that the Sonic Riders Zero Gravity Menu theme? WHOA
Just a quick talk about too many fonts. If a game is translated into Chinese that issue would usually not exist, because that would quickly make you broke as commercial Chinese fonts are expensive, while free Chinese fonts are basically just Noto Sans/Serif and Wenquanyi. Therefore, games that are in Chinese usually use a single font for everything, while Final Fantasy and other SE titles (for example, Octopath Traveler) seems to prefer using 2 or 3, but that's it. They are mostly not on the same screen, or at least not for the same purpose, though.
I'm currently taking a graduate level Human Factors Psychology class..a lot of what you discuss in this video was very helpful for my term project! Bravo! :-)
IMO open-world games should try and revamp how waypoints/collectables are distributed. It's obviously pretty convenient to have everything auto- spotted as soon as you climb/activate a tower, but that's not how tracking stuff actually works.
I say make every type of discoverable object/area its own mini-mission to get onto your map. You could read some in-universe books about a place, talk to people about something interesting they saw somewhere, track an animal/monster, piece together a torn up map/set of USB drives, spot taller and more conspicuous stuff via climbable tower, observe the scenery/nature for in-game tells on where caves/ruins and the like might be located.
Basically make everything on your map contextual to what would be the most obvious way to find out about it, instead of just knowing about every objective across the board all at once.
One of the problems in FPS games apart from field of view, its how to handle the weapon space that hide a wide part of the screen and in competitive scenaries this is notable and a problem of balance the inmersion that brings the weapon animation and the utility of a clean screen for improve aiming.
I really wanted to like Hyrule Warriors, but just the idea of mashing buttons to the infinity and beyond is just repellent to me, now I have another reason to hate the game
11:17 love the Homestar Runner reference there. "Let's put one of those beefy fonts back on there for good measure, that looks really good."
Hyrule warriors was very confusing at the beginning but once u get the hang of it u understand everything and never get overwhelmed. That being said the UI can be way more clear
I feel like the game Grim Dawn (at least in its current state as I can't speak for its previous iterations) did what Hollow Knight did with exploration, but better. It doesn't blatantly encourage players to go out and explore, and you don't even need to explore the map to progress the plot, but going out and exploring the map provides the player with a lot of potential exp, loot, and even secret lore elements that aren't needed for the plot, but provide context for the area you are exploring by showing you the perspective of someone who either lived in the area or ventured through the area. You can also often find secret dungeons and shrines, the latter of which is used for the really overwhelming-at-first-glance (but is actually pretty nice and easy to understand) Devotion tree. As well, when you start out in an area there is no map. You make the map as you go along so you know exactly where you've been and what you have yet to explore. In future runthroughs of the area your map will still exist of the area (at least what you explored of it), but everything will be greyed out and as you explore the area again colour will begin to fill the map in areas you've been through, so you always know where you've been and where you haven't. Only thing I'd improve with it (and this might be a feature already and I'm just a derp) is the inclusion of self-placed map markers to remember the locations of secrets that you've found, but for whatever reason didn't delve into at the time. The game does this with shrines luckily, but the hidden dungeons that don't have a map marker (that are usually special event dungeons) aren't labeled on the map for you.
The game also compensates for you exploring. There was one questline I had where the NPC told me to kill a monster, but I already had and it actually gave me the prompt to tell him "oh, I killed that already," and this happened multiple times. All because I just went out and explored at my heart's content. Really felt rewarding for exploring too because I didn't have to keep running back and forth like I would have if I hadn't explored.
What a coincidence! I'm playing Hollow Knight for the first time this days, and I think i'll be going for 112% completion. That game is hard as hell but extremely satisfying!
You're a crazy man for even trying to attempt the 112%. I salute you and wish you best of luck!
Geeno Beghelli everybody is gangsta until they reach the pantheon of hollow nest.
@@g-1050 Yea, right now I'm collecting all the things I missed, whike psycologically preparing for the hardest bosses/trials/things. Grimm first form was quite a challange. I have to train myself in order to dechipher attack patterns. Wish me luch XD.
I've played the entire game like a dozen times, including a couple successful Steel Soul runs, but still struggle with the later bosses in the pantheon. The skill floor for getting 112% is almost as high as you would expect the main campaign's skill ceiling to be before watching speedrunners absolutely demolish it and make you realize just how much of a noob you really are.
You’ve probably already done it now but just in case, Pantheon of Hallownest doesn’t count towards the 112% completion.
The battle UI for Dissidia NT has been altered to what it is now in the console release since most complained that the Arcade UI took up too much of the screen and was too complex.
I love that Xenoblade is one of your favorite series and yet its constantly showing up as an example of terrible UI design. It reminds me of the Frasier episode where they bring up that the only thing better than a perfect meal is an otherwise perfect one with one flaw they can pick at all evening.
The fact that you made a whole show instead of actually explaining the problem and still made it clear is just hilarious to me
My one problem with Hollow Knight is that I assumed to bouncy shrooms could be bounced on by an ability I hadn’t I unlocked yet, instead of the nail bounce you begin with. I got lost for quite a while because of this.
Oof, as a Musou fan, Hyrule Warriors' problem looks serious.
I've sometimes had to skip on dialog and have to read it later but that's to be expected; you're in an intense battle and characters are participating in it. At least they're voiced usually, and in english versions (looking at you, Warriors Orochi 4 with japanese only dub), it's not a problem
I've been waiting for this video! Can't wait to watch it!
1:31 Huh? But don't they all are to different degrees?
16:10 Yeah, but the instruction screen seems it's there for courtesy, when the minigame starts they give you a quick visual guide that lasts a second just before the "Start!" order is shout.
17:13 You got me, I thought that was gonna be the name of the game for a second =)
Haha, certainly enjoyed that Giantbomb footage from Mr. Ben Pack during the Dissidia section :D
So, I got really into borderlands 2 recently; and I keep running into a problem whil playing it that reminded me of this video: some of the random bits of trash in the game have a green stench. This by itself is not a problem except, the game absolutely hammers home that green in its visual language green means one of three things: corrosive damage, lootable chest, or interactable widget (typically associated with the active quest). Having the green stench creates a point of interest, but then betrays that interest when there's nothing there: I spent a minute confused about why there wasn't anything to find there; which ties into another problem:
Some lootable chests are quest-locked, meaning they can't be opened except during certain quests because they contain quest specific items. And this wouldn't be a problem, except they're for the most part, also signified with a green marker. I spent 5 minutes in frostburn canyon confused about why I couldn't open the treasure latrine near the start of the area: turns out it's because it's a quest-locked chest. And this problem could have easily been solved (and in some cases was solved) by having quest locked chests glow red, which the game uses to say "No." Like someone on the development team had that idea, and put it into practice in some parts of the game, but not others. Irksome.
--
Also, there's the matter of loot. This is more to do with cluttersome information than inconsistant information, but all loot has a glowing line above it to indicate to you that it exists. ALL LOOT. Including ammo drops which because for most ammo types the game is pretty generous, you won't be able to pick up because you're full up on that ammo. So, when your going around picking through the loot of a big battle, you may wind up looking at the same ammo drop several times, or not being able to focus on the actual loot (weapons, etc) because of how much ammo is laying around. Ammo should only glow if your not full up on it; so as to clean up the visual indicators.
And because items have rarities, you should be able to set which rarities you are interested in, and have only those rarities glow, because the glow of common weapons after a boss fight are difficult to ignore because there are so many of them. It'd be nice to have a setting to just turn that off: give the player a bit more control over what information they feel is important.
--
And lastly, I recently beat the game and got to NG+ which it calls True Vault Hunter mode; and something about it almost immediately irked me. Unlike in the new game run through, some shielded enemies are resistant to one of the game's elemental damage types. Which would fine, except there's no indicator to show you that. Some enemies in the group will just randomly not be as effected by your weapon of choice, and the only way to know that is to shoot at them and read the 'resist' text as it pops up. Random enemy resistances is supposed to add a layer of complexity to fights, and I respect that, but if your not going to tell me they have resistances, until I shoot at them: well, I'm playing a one-shot one-kill sniper, and it's a bit late to switch to a less ineffective weapon after I shot them. It's more annoy than difficult when you fail to communicate that those random resistances visually.
And that's setting aside the fact that the game's not really designed to handle random resistances: switching weapons takes a long time, and you only have four weapons slots at any given time, and only one grennade, which might seem like enough (one for each elemental damage type), but factor the six gun types which are appropriate for different situations (I like to kit with a sniper rifle, shotgun, pistol, and rpg), and that different guns behavior differently even with their own category, and your left without the ability to tool an actually usable kit to deal with random damage resistances. It just feels like a cheap artifical inflation of difficulty that can't be overcome with skillful mastery of the gameplay.
"Not enough fonts!"
LMAO
My class in college of typography actually worked... I could count the Dissidia fonts before Design Doc did it... I hated the teacher but he actually teach me well
Oh hey, you went over Hyrule Warriors like you said you would. Thanks.
Good design: [city of tears music fades in]
me: yeah that's what i thought
There's a game called Geometry Dash that has a really complex level editor.
But once you mastered it you can make a game inside a game
@8:40
Goosebumps. It was so subtle.
One game I think you might wanna take a look at is The Caligula Effect, specifically to compare the Vita version to the remade PS4 and PC version. The difference in UI is quite stunning.
I personally find Little Big Planet's creation system very intuitive, but even if we go by the idea that it's highly complicated (it's not), it's leagues better for high level creation than Mario Maker is because it just allows for drastically more options and also, look at the sorts of weird contraptions Mario Maker needs in order to do simple things and look at all of the design limitations such contraptions impose and LBP2's micro chip system is way easier to manage. Pair that with the fact that the system is inherently designed to let you play and create your level at the same time and playtesting is also a lot easier.
The Lorem Ipsum references made me chuckle. Thanks.
There is a wonderful racing game called Split/Second which has a fantastic UI, even ten years later. It eliminates all unnecessary information from the UI. No MPH, no track map, no position stats. And all the UI info you do need is placed on your back bumper, where your eye naturally falls. And everything in the game happens quickly. There is no wasted time or space.
The moment I saw too many fonts I half expected DK Country Tropical Freeze, but holy shit gungnir it's like they have some rule on never using a font for more than one thing.
Yeah I did have fun with the Hyrule Warriors(I played the 3ds version) but sometimes the multiples that I cannot handle. Even if I have 3 or 4 members, not only sometimes is hard but command them isn't great. A great example is when I have a side mission in Thinke 1st quest. I miss the objective because I was on facus on the main. This something that FH Warriors did fix (I think). Let's hope that Persona 5 Strickers does shines in this part (in other words P5 *Mouso style).
When it comes to navigating and getting lost in the map in open-world games, Dishonored 2 kind of relies on a simpler option: In the options screen, you can turn all the objective markers and other user-interface elements off. Fortunately, the game was designed to be played without guides as the environment does a good job at guiding you.
I legit freaked out when he said “this episode of too many fonts is sponsored by square space”
That’s too good of a transition
Good call opening the "too many fonts" segment with Undertale music, a game that features a few characters that personify terrible fonts.
With Hollow Knight I really felt like I was wasting a slot just to know where I was and I didn't like that.
Loved the bait and switch with xenoblade chronicles 2
One thing I dont like about hyrule warriors too is that the victory screen sounds like I lost. I got used to it but its still annoying when you start playing