Goonhub
02-06-2015, 03:11 PM
There is a whole hell of a lot of room for improvement with the current implementation. First lets break down the current issues with the chem-window:
- It's not positioned correctly (and it's too tall)! On both of the computers I play ss13 on, the window open far above the screen space and needs to be manually adjusted by clicking its border. Each and every time. I know I'm not alone in this particular problem.
- The chemical auto-update is maddening! This is especially frustrating with the new chemistry updates or if you're attempting to use a stored chemistry recipe. Every tick the window resets its scrolling up to the top making chemistry an odd minigame rush against time to click the right ingredient as the chem's tick down.
- The window is poorly formated and sized. It's far too big compared to any other window in the game, takes up 1/3 of the screen, most of which is wasted blank space but STILL requires scrolling if you have practically anything in the beaker at all. Here's an example of wasted real estate:
Granted, some of this space is used when ingredients are added, but not much.
None of these issues are game breaking but they certainly are frustrating. Occasionally the window is big enough to get a scientist killed (if his own chemistry doesn't do that first) and it seems entirely unnecessary. Geneticists, for example, have a lot of information packed into their window and it's even got some leftover space for a pretty animation.
Suggestions for improvement:
I like the idea of keeping everything in one open window, rather than clicking through several menus and I think this would be easily doable with a formatting change. Here's a quick and dirty sketch of what an ideal chemistry window would look like {oversized version]:
![[Image: 0af95qL.png]](http://i.imgur.com/0af95qL.png)
The horizontal aspect allows for a comfortable positioning of the window in the upper right quadrant so that it covers a minimum of gameplay and chat space.
Separate scrolling window portions allow for there to be 10+ chems in a beaker but you don't have to scroll through them each every time just to add a few units of a basic chem. It also means that as a chemical reaction is underway you're not driving to madness and fits of two-dimensional rage trying to outrace a scrolling window
.
- It's not positioned correctly (and it's too tall)! On both of the computers I play ss13 on, the window open far above the screen space and needs to be manually adjusted by clicking its border. Each and every time. I know I'm not alone in this particular problem.
- The chemical auto-update is maddening! This is especially frustrating with the new chemistry updates or if you're attempting to use a stored chemistry recipe. Every tick the window resets its scrolling up to the top making chemistry an odd minigame rush against time to click the right ingredient as the chem's tick down.
- The window is poorly formated and sized. It's far too big compared to any other window in the game, takes up 1/3 of the screen, most of which is wasted blank space but STILL requires scrolling if you have practically anything in the beaker at all. Here's an example of wasted real estate:
Granted, some of this space is used when ingredients are added, but not much.
![[Image: hKkTklh.png]](http://i.imgur.com/hKkTklh.png)
None of these issues are game breaking but they certainly are frustrating. Occasionally the window is big enough to get a scientist killed (if his own chemistry doesn't do that first) and it seems entirely unnecessary. Geneticists, for example, have a lot of information packed into their window and it's even got some leftover space for a pretty animation.
Suggestions for improvement:
I like the idea of keeping everything in one open window, rather than clicking through several menus and I think this would be easily doable with a formatting change. Here's a quick and dirty sketch of what an ideal chemistry window would look like {oversized version]:
The horizontal aspect allows for a comfortable positioning of the window in the upper right quadrant so that it covers a minimum of gameplay and chat space.
Separate scrolling window portions allow for there to be 10+ chems in a beaker but you don't have to scroll through them each every time just to add a few units of a basic chem. It also means that as a chemical reaction is underway you're not driving to madness and fits of two-dimensional rage trying to outrace a scrolling window
.