First of all, I’m aware of the multiple threads that have been made regarding the poor UI design, however the more noise we make, the more change of DTG listening and taking action. Onto the post… The new UI is honestly the worst I’ve seen since the launch of TSW. It’s an accessibility nightmare, poor choice of colours (grey and orange, seriously?) and the scaling is off in so many places. First of all, why is the use of available screen space been utilised so poorly? It’s either buttons squashed together in the corner of the screen or oversized buttons taking up the whole screen. The pause menu is extremely poorly designed. Far too many sub menus to navigate to the most simplest of actions. Return to menu is hidden in the options sub menu, as one example. Also, why does it take up the whole screen? Why is there no transparency. It looks like a Windows 95 operating system. Secondly, why have the navigation bars, when customising the weather dials, been made extremely small? Talking of the weather, why has the background screen been set inside a station roof? How are we supposed to see what the weather conditions look like inside a station? The camera also points face on at the train too. What use it that? Finally, scaling is all over the place. There are far too many inconsistencies in sizes of texts and numbers throughout the game. My question is, why did DTG feel like they had to make such a significant change to the old UI? That was miles better than this one. They could’ve just worked on that one to further improve it. Hopefully DTG will take action and change this horrendous attempt of a UI and make decisions more wisely in the future.
For me, the worst change to this UI is going through the Livery/Loco filter, now the camera is angled more towards the front of the loco instead of the sides, meaning that (especially when it's dark) your custom liveries are much harder to see and is generally a nuisance.
I prefer the Route selection albeit slower to mouse scroll and get to your preferred choice. However, I don't like the options layout once you've picked your route. The 4 box layout to pick training, scenarios, timetable, etc. just looks tacky. Other than this, I'm happy with other tweaks, especially those that help my bad eyesight to read/see.
The sense I got from the stream was a mixture of "try it, you'll like it", " it'll grow on you" and " grin and bear it". I wouldn't count on it reverting back to its former state anytime soon. The strange thing is I don't remember anyone on the forum actually asking for changes in the UI. What many of us did ask for was a more useful 2d map, but we didn't get that.
If all they did was change the accent color to orange and implemented the new route selection screen, but kept everything else the same, I think we would have been much better off. Even though I play on console, I find the inconsistencies in text sizes to be bothering and sometimes hard to read at all. The flat-colored gray selection boxes also stand out as feeling like a dated design. That being said, I do appreciate the additional options that have been given to us such as more granular weather selection, filter lists on the route screens and other such additions. Everything else could just be reverted back to how it originally was.
I've seen some other posts comparing it to Win 95/98. I think that's an insult to Win95/98. Not to mention, it was even mentioned that people within the company didn't like the new UI and they still kept pushing forward with it. So yeah, regardless of how much noise we make about this, DTG's attitude doesn't give me any hope of it changing. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Though, to echo londonmidland's last statement, hopefully this puts this into perspective for future decisions - and since they're one of the more well known names on forums, that may help grab DTG's attention even more.
I don't mind the new UI. I've not yet had any issue like Yerolo!! It looks like the new update is having allergic reactions to some peoples Hardware set ups on PC. If its a Game Station I don't know its out of my league. The last time i played on a game station it was and Nintendo back in the early 90s.
I get the feeling that DTG should hire someone who knows what he's doing when designing UI. Or take an online course on it, some expertise on how to design these would go a long way!
Hire a UX specialist. They will create intuitive user journeys and a UX design guide, then co-ordinate with the design / development teams and run UX testing with your beta group. At least one person in your beta group must have a visual impairment and colour-blindness. I have both and would be happy to help. There is zero excuse for poor accessibility in 2021.
I think it all comes down to a decision to switch player focus on Official Licensing rather than the game itself. The new feel, the new UI, the Official Licensed (C) trains... Also, that is why we get the front view of the trains I think - the logo is better seen on front. I have no idea who thought this is a good idea, but do not they have a former EA guy as CEO? Strange coincidence...
I'm not a fan, especially the pause menu. The thing I use most when pausing the game is the settings. I tweak them for different routes, and now I just find it strange that it's hidden away to the left. I also think the country flags need putting back on the route selection screen. Talk about wanting to attract new players. I'm pretty certain a new player would preferentially choose a route according to which country it's in. When I was new to the game, I had no idea which companies belonged to which countries.
I got used to it while playing the EPG version - its either or for me, doesn't worry me at all. From an accessibility stand point I wear glasses, this looks better with more contrast than the previous one which varied depending on what was behind the text.
I'm not a fan either. My biggest gripe is the new diorama background in the weather/loco selection screen. Why is it set in an abandoned looking station, why can't we see the weather changing with the settings now and just why is the loco facing us from the front? The old diorama was great, as we could actually see the livery and the environment. I like the month selection and the service durations but that could have been done on the old UI as well. Pause menu is clunky too. It now takes up the entire screen which is honestly more immersion breaking. It's also a bit random... some options are hidden on the left, the save function is at the bottom and everything else is at the top. I have to make way more unnecessary clicks to get around it. The route selection screen is the only decent part of the entire UI, as it looks cleaner. But even there, I don't like that the background screenshots that used to represent the route and now blurred and hidden behind the unnecessarilly large and squares. I liked seeing the old backgrounds as they gave a better description/feel of the route. Oh and all the infinity loops when scrolling routes or locos are pretty bad as well. I prefered a closed cycle as it's less disorienting. All in all, it feels like an accessibility upgrade for consoles and an accessibility donwgrade for PC. Well, the colour combination looks bad even on consoles.
I like: The way medals are shown. You are given the AP score for each medal per scenario and service. Each service has an estimated time of completion. I dislike: The fact you have to hold L1 to access the options menu. The fact you can save a game by pressing Triangle. I accidentally saved a game and there is no way to get rid of it from what I can see. The colour scheme, whilst I initially liked it, has not aged well. I’m not liking it now. I definitely preferred the blue colour scheme. The map with place names is difficult to read due to the colours. How the trains are under a roof and angled the way they are. I preferred the old style appearance. The miles driven appears in the ‘Explore on Foot’ box in the menu. It has no reason to be there. The stuttering effect scrolling through the routes because the driver keeps popping in and out. You cannot turn the objective marker off, to remove the distance to destination marker in front of your view, without losing the indicator to buttons and other locations you have to navigate too in the cab. The larger size of the clock and distance to destination is welcome, but I don’t like how the text judders from side to side as the distance counts down. Using the shift controls on the PS5 controller still operates the non-shifted function. For example, taking a screenshot causes the reverser to move out of position. I’ve also managed to open the doors when using the camera shift function. The gradient section on the pause screen is so massive.
Really? Because I have the objective marker disabled and still see the popups when hovering over cab controls.
Ah yes, whenever objectives want you to use a specific lever or button, you need the ojbective marker, unless you know where to find the specific lever or button. That's nothing new though, this was the case pre-update too.
I wish they could be separated. I don’t like having the distance marker on screen, but like having the other prompts active.
It's mostly a problem in tutorials and maybe some scenarios. In timetable mode you don't have objectives for specific buttons/levers.
Im sure DTG Protagonist will note this down on the "ignore forever" list - feedback that doesnt fit their narrative.
I’m not expecting any significant changes until the next annual update. As per usual, DTG make changes without consulting it with the community, to which it is too late to do anything about it. It seems they just make changes, that no one asked for, for the hell of it.
They'll probably discuss the complaints. I've never seen this much backlash about a ui from both console and pc players so they'll have to adress it People didn't even ask for a ui overhaul. Sure the old ui could've been improved but it didn't need an overhaul
I encountered the new user interface for the first time this morning and have decided to give myself some time to adjust to it and learn how it works before joining the complaining crowd. Between TSW2020 and TSW2, I put 10,277.4 hours [that's 428+ weeks] into this simulator with the former interface. I don't remember how long it took me to "become accustomed to its face", but as little as a few days ago I was still perplexed at times. Beginning a review of the new baby by stating that it "sucks" just doesn't make sense to me and certainly displays a sad lack of consideration for the DTG folks who spent a lot of time designing this new wrapping. Meanwhile, I'm trying to adjust to a new, smaller keyboard on which my right hand keeps pressing / when it reaches for the next key to the left and winds up with the emergency brake engaged. Am I going to scream that the new keyboard "sucks" -- "not on your tintype granny".
Its a matter of opinion. Of course people are going to have different views and opinions on it. However given the number of posts and threads on it already, it’s certainly controversial. I may ‘learn’ to eventually get used to it, however in my opinion, it’s certainly a downgrade to the previous UI. Regarding ‘a lot of time designing it’, that’s something none of us know how long has actually been spent on it.
Id be happy to get used to it, if it wasn't for the fact its slow, unresponsive and frankly ugly. From a UX stand point i can navigate around it just fine, its not a good experience due to performance, jerky transitions ect however the overall idea is not terrible. The theming & performance on the other hand.... nope and that diorama is just ugly and is rendered at what looks like patao resolution with enough chromatic abrasions that id be taking the lens back for a refund.
The main menu and loading screen now make my fans spin at full speed, because of how poorly optimised it is. There’s no FPS lock on it (seriously?) as well as the scrolling between routes being extremely laggy, as the scene needs to refresh on each route selection. Paired with the fact that there’s an infinite scroll on the route selection, so you could endlessly keep scrolling to find your route without releasing. The whole UI really hasn’t been thought out well, or tested for more than five minutes.
I’ve noticed this too. There are instances of where it says press space to click, but it doesn’t do anything. Consequently there are instances where it doesn’t say anything at all, but space works.
I personally do not mind the color choice. My biggest gripe with the new UI has to be the route choice menu. I preferred it as a simple list like we had before. I also don't understand why we can't drag the route selection with the mouse. Filtering by railway companies is... weird. I'd rather have it filter the countries of the route location instead. The pause menu: I dislike how you gotta go into an extra menu to exit the game to the "main menu" or to the desktop. that route profile thingy also looks weird without any units. I personally don't find it useful at all, I just ignore it. I do like that one map view that now says station names. That's cool... It would be cooler if you implemented that in to the "bigger map". That and train IDs. I know you ( DTG ) might think that most of us is reacting negatively towards the new UI because it is new and people are not used to new things, but I have to say, it would be great if you listened to the feedback given on this thread and actually improve things based on the provided feedback.
This whole discussion is known as "who moved my cheese?" in system and process design circles - some people like change and embrace it and some people hate it. It is very natural and very subjective on what an individual will or will not like. People who hated the old UI but were used to it could have had everything they hated fixed but they will still hate the new one and pine for the old one. I think the pause menu could do with some work, its not intuitive having most things buried under another menu when there is so much screen real estate. Beyond that, I'm getting used to it. I played the Epic version for a couple of weeks before this update and now I find my away around it easily. Refer: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who_Moved_My_Cheese?
Funnily enough I play this game to drive trains not sit and find fault with the UI, maybe that's why the UI doesn't bother me.
I don't think many of us are sitting there just nitpicking at the UI. We're using it as normal to get into the game and how it should be used within the game (ie pause screen), and finding it unpleasant or unfriendly to use. We're simply saying what we think about it and what we don't like through normal use. If you think it's fine, then great.
I honestly prefer this UI. I at least think it works better on consoles than the last one. The only two things I dislike are the colour scheme and the occasionally small text.
Its a console focused UI that is really unpleasant to use on PC, like really unpleasant to use, I take it the devs really dont care for the PC crowd anymore - not to mention how messy it looks and how poor the filter is. It is a shoddy UI overall.
On PS4, for the manual weather selection sliders, you can’t even see which one you’ve selected as they all match the orange background
100% agree, and if it ain’t broke don’t fix it. The original UI worked, it did it’s purpose but this new one looks like a confused music program.
Finished downloading this morning, just wanted to say I too dislike the new UI. Rather than fixing what's broken, they just prefer to break what's working...
I'm not sure I get the hate. On the whole I like this UI better than the old one, except Why, in the menu screen from which you set weather, are you stuck indoors where you can't see the weather? The other complaints are aesthetic Head-on loco views. Not good. Bring back 3/4 views. No ability to search/filter by loco Lettering in the map disappears against the route. Different color needed
Oh what a pity. The UI is a slightly worse experience on PC. You still have the best version of the game, not to mention amazing mods to improve it even further (please don't attack me). Seriously though I do genuinely think it's an improvement, weather selectors and the overlay being indoors aside. I could see both of those issues getting fixed.
For me it was more of an adjustment to learn the "new" HUD and UI for original TSW2, vs. TSW2020, than it is with this newest one. I do miss the flags and navigation of the menu; but I wil get used to this one - and it has more features! I agree with the comments above that say nobody really asked for new UI, just for optimization, smooth game play and good-looking - this one fits all of that and I am quite happy. AMD Ryzen 7 / GTX 2060 Super / 32 GB RAM.
Why would you be attacked over mods? Lots of us use them, there are some very creative people making mods - they're awesome. For the people who don't try them, that is their choice. Paul
No I meant people might be offended over me saying PC players already have the best version of the game so they shouldn't complain. I probably shouldn't have posted it to be honest, but I was fed up of all the negativity on this forum lately.
That's literally no excuse not to complain or provide constructive criticism just because we have 'the best version' of TSW.
Yeah I know. Like I said I was just fed up of all the negativity. And I do genuinely think this UI is an improvement.