Remove or rework the party button

[Arborinus]

This patch was implemented, making the party button unscannable, but why? How will mechanics make disco station ever again?

EDIT: The button was made unscannable most probably because of eye strain, but it is still in the game, which may still cause issues. Let's discuss how it can be changed or whether it should just be removed.

[Lady Birb]

The problems are that the disco lights can hurt some individual's eyes and deconstructing a party button after activating it makes it completely impossible to turn the light off. Disco station stopped being funny the very same round that it was discovered you can scan the party button, and when we are talking about the well-being of players outside the game, I think it takes precedence over your fun.

[Arborinus]

The problems are that the disco lights can hurt some individual's eyes and deconstructing a party button after activating it makes it completely impossible to turn the light off. Disco station stopped being funny the very same round that it was discovered you can scan the party button, and when we are talking about the well-being of players outside the game, I think it takes precedence over your fun.

... Then remove the button or make it not as harmful. This change doesn't really seem to have to do with that you said.

[Xeram]

The problems are that the disco lights can hurt some individual's eyes and deconstructing a party button after activating it makes it completely impossible to turn the light off. Disco station stopped being funny the very same round that it was discovered you can scan the party button, and when we are talking about the well-being of players outside the game, I think it takes precedence over your fun.

... Then remove the button or make it not as harmful. This change doesn't really seem to have to do with that you said.

I don't think you at all read what Birb said before replying so let me try:

Having party buttons everywhere flashing shittons of colors absolutely kills my eyes and gives me a goddamn headache. I can't imagine how awful it is for anyone sensitive to flashing colors. This alone makes the mass spread of them absolute shit. It was even more absolute shit when you could make the effect permanent by constructing a party button, turning it on, then destroying it so the room could never stop flashing until the end of the round.

Games should not make players have to make the choice between possibly experiencing physical pain or not playing.

[Arborinus]

The problems are that the disco lights can hurt some individual's eyes and deconstructing a party button after activating it makes it completely impossible to turn the light off. Disco station stopped being funny the very same round that it was discovered you can scan the party button, and when we are talking about the well-being of players outside the game, I think it takes precedence over your fun.

... Then remove the button or make it not as harmful. This change doesn't really seem to have to do with that you said.

I don't think you at all read what Birb said before replying so let me try:

Having party buttons everywhere flashing shittons of colors absolutely kills my eyes and gives me a goddamn headache. I can't imagine how awful it is for anyone sensitive to flashing colors. This alone makes the mass spread of them absolute shit. It was even more absolute shit when you could make the effect permanent by constructing a party button, turning it on, then destroying it so the room could never stop flashing until the end of the round.

Games should not make players have to make the choice between possibly experiencing physical pain or not playing.

I am aware of the eye strain and have experienced it myself. In fact, I have suggested before in IRC that it should be slowly shifting colors, not rapidly flashing. As far as I'm aware it has not been changed since it's original implementation long ago which means a different community/coding mindset. 

The patch does not actually remove the party button or address any of these issues, besides the mass production. I wasn't aware that was the reason it was changed at all, which is why I made this thread. I feel strongly about removing old fun things and was slightly peeved that it was just implemented without any community input. If there had been replies to that thread or something in the changelog explaining more about it I probably wouldn't have made this thread. As I suggested, why not discuss removing the button or changing it since this is an issue that affects people so strongly? I updated the main post to reflect this.

I did not mean to imply anything negative towards visually impaired people.

[poland spring]

Make it slow shift and remove restrictions

[Vitatroll]

Games should not make players have to make the choice between possibly experiencing physical pain or not playing.

Hah. That's practically the premise of sierra PnC adventure games.

Anyways, making them unscannable was a stopgap measure because everyone agreed headaches and epilepsy are bad, but nobody wanted to get rid of them entirely. There's a better solution out there but nobody can think of one and/or nobody feels like coding/spriting it.

edit: Wew. I really need to press send before going off to cook and stuff.

[Frank_Stein]

I like idea of making it a much slower gradual transition. I'd rather the party button have a prom night vibe to it than a rave.

However, I think we should keep it unscannable. It makes the bar more unique that way

[Flourish]

There was a thread discussing the issue a while back, which is what prompted the patch: https://forum.ss13.co/showthread.php?tid=9932

I can also make the button's effects less jarring on the eyes, but I dunno if we should make it scannable again even then.

[Grek]

The problems are that the disco lights can hurt some individual's eyes and deconstructing a party button after activating it makes it completely impossible to turn the light off.

Although this is not an actual solution, you can disable the party button effect by toggling the 'environment' power setting on the room's APC off and then back on again.

[Ed Venture]

Yeah, no. I hate eye strain be it something too bright, too dim or something flashing random colors super fast.

[Frank_Stein]

I have an idea. What if the party button made all the tiles in the room have a different hue? Then the tiles shift in color to create shifting checkerboard patterns?

[Noah Buttes]

Here's an idea.

What if the party button made all lights in the room function like black light tubes you can make?

This would give it an actually purpose, keep it thematically accurate, and remove the issue of eye strain.

[poland spring]

The party button making things hard to see is kind of the point but I dont wanna hurt eyes. Maybe each light in the room turns into a different color once every couple seconds, so no epilepsy concerns?

[Vitatroll]

Could noir-mode be triggered locally on a by-user basis, or is it strictly server-wide? Not a solution, but another stopgap measure for people who actually have photosensitive epilepsy. Well, as long as the colors have the same value.

Another half-measure would be a user toggle for the effect, if possible.

I'm all about being an ass and generally don't care about people's feelings, but physical discomfort (esp. gran mals, lol) is serious business. Ideally we'll find a way to have our cake and eat it too.