Where are tooltips needed most?

At the (small) risk of being a smartass, I say put tooltips EVERYWHERE!

dont know if they qualify as tooltips (big tooltips maybe), but elsewhere I have pointed out that it would be useful to get some info on the benefits/background of the planetary build items before clicking them into production.

Unless I am missing something, the info on which we base our decisions to build on planets has to be gleaned either from selecting the item as if to build it - seeing what it says and then deselecting it and selecting another - which seems to mess up by 'highly tuned' build sequence. Otherwise you go into the 'details screen' and page down the items and then return to the build screen

The items in the details screen info are not reporting correctly and/or are incomplete - but you probably already know that.

When you say "tool tips" what is your scope? For instance, when you add accelerator keys will you be adding hints to the popups that appear above buttons? Will the domestic policy button prompt popup include the function key that will also activate it?

If clues to accellorator keys are part of it, then I would say that all clickable actions that have accelerators should have tool tips.

Another think i meant to mension for what its worth, is that I am consstantly rt-clicking in some situations as if to get a pop-up on more compex functions explaining the concept and implications of what it will do. This is where one would expect more help output than a simple time delayed tooltip. Its a common feature and with the amount of games I play these days it has become intuitive in certain situations to rt-click for more data

"Everywhere" is a valid opinion. We would probably need to make it so that there are varying levels of tooltips shown based on whatever setting you choose, with the highest number of tooltips being turned on by default. Currently, you can't turn them off; they either have them or they don't. Maybe it's just because I'm so used to the game by now that I don't feel the need to put a tooltip on any control that doesn't already have a label on it, but that's why I posted this thread.

The Galactic Encyclopedia ought to help with the info on the different projects, techs, etc.

Umm...if we let you set the accelerator keys, then I have to modify the tooltips code so that they can be modified by the game instead of just what is read in from a file. So it would be possible, but then if we let you set the keys would you really need the tooltips anyway?

Also, I have no idea if we would be letting you set the accelerator keys or if we would hard-code them. I don't even know if they're going to be in version 1.0 or if they'll be in one of the 1.x builds.

I am pretty sure, however, that it is going to be me who ends up coding the accelerator keys whenever that happens.

Not exactly tooltips, but related. It would be GREAT to be able to see (while in the research screen) a description of what each new technology does, even if its just a mouse-over. For example in CIV 3 they used a web browser-like interface to see exactly what each new tech will yield. Or in MOO 2 you could see what each tech did by just clicking on it in a condensed research library.

That's what the Galactic Encyclopediae is going to be for. Think along the lines of Alpha Centauri.

And you can already see what social improvements, ships, and new techs to research when you select it to build. We've also added a list of starbase modules so that you can see what you need to research to get which modules.

How about something advanced and animated.
Press a key have a little dude is space suit float out.

He asks you if you have a question ?

Type in something like "What is a blue square ?"
The space dude gives you a list of anolimies.

Type in something like "How do I get Avatar Class ships ?" The space dude lists the required technoligies in order to get the Avatar.

I realize coding the space dude would not be trival but it would be really cool.

It sounds neat. A lot like the MS Wizard when you install Windows. YYEEEEKKK. :VOMIT:

I would like to note that my current nickname on IRC is Puking_Emoticon_Must_Die.

Also, Clippy should be shot.

Now that I've gotten that out of my system, I will make my response to the space dude. It would be so non-trivial to do it right that I seriously doubt that we would do it even after release. We would actually have to set up a database to query, populate the database, write code to parse the question, and that's just the stuff that I can think of right now.

You will be able to type a word into the text field in the GE and it will try to find an entry. So if you type in Avatar, it will bring up the entry on avatar and tell you what the pre-requisite techs are, among other things.

Cari,
the governor screen needs information on the social projects and ships. You can go to the planet screen to see what they do, but a pop up window if you hold the cursor over a project or ship would be much easier.

Paul.

I was thinking more in lines of "Black & White" than "clippy" the
Microsoft assistant but I also realize it will not happen.
Bill Gates has more pocket change than Stardock's total GC budget.

Here is another idea which is more in the theme of the game.
Have advisors when you are good the advisors are nice characters
and say things that nice civilizations would be expected to say.

Good Civilization may say

Minster of the interior.
Planets Earth, Orion , Torus are not happy.
Suggest you build more social programs.

here is an example

Defense Minister
Planets Micio, Newio are undefended.
Suggest mister president you build a defense for these systems.
The Empire is building a huge invasion fleet.

Science Advisor
We need to research the "Federation" or trade for the technology.
It will improve the moral of our civilization.

Alien Ambassador
Mister President the "Empire" is not happy with Humanity.
Suggest we improve relations perhaps by giving them a gift.



Evil Civilization may say

Minister of Propaganda
Leader the planet Earth is not happy suggest you built
advanced spy network, to weed out and execute the scum on this
Planet.

Fleet General
Leader we are much stronger than the Altarians and should have
not trouble exterminating the alien vermin on the worlds which buy the
order of things should be ours.


Weapons research Minister
If we get advanced Phaser we can build glorious new weapons to crush our enemies.

Chief Spy
Leader the Torion the alien scum are Spying against us we should
plant more spies and work to destabilize the Torions

By the way the Encyclopedia or Technology tree while both are helpful are not available in the game itself.

If GC was windowed and I could minmize a game in progress go to the web get the information I need. I could almost say this is acceptible.

Even still it is still a pain and not all game players have a constant high speed internet connection.

I think they mean that they WILL be putting a Galactic Encyclopedia into the game... it's just not in yet...

Also, if you want to view the tech tree that JavaScout has been providing us you can use the Alt-TAB sequence to switch to the desk top. Then JavaScout's document would be available to you (especially if you have downloaded it into your on libraries).

Of course, it would be nice if there was a hook in GC that could be activated by a key sequence that would bring up JavaScout's document directly.

On the subject of tooltips, there is nothing I find more annoying than having to wait several seconds for them to appear. Populous 3 had a nice approach to this - right click on a button, and it skipped the delay.

The idea of right clicking on a button to get help text specific to that button is quite common, and, I think, a good idea.

Yes, the GE I was referring to will be in game.

Paul, I think that someone else also has asked for more info about the projects on the governor screen. We'll have to talk about what would be the best way to do it.

We do have the advisor window, and I'm pretty sure that we're planning on doing more with that, and having status reports and things like that.