Progress Report

Just dropping in quickly to let you know where I'm at. Essentially, work on Day 18 Chapter 5 began a few days ago, but between one calamity (a leaking roof) and another (computer issues) and even more besides (internet outages), progress has not been ideal. There's also the consideration that I'm just not quite happy with what I've produced so far and I'm feeling as though my best option might be to approach it from an entirely different angle. So when it comes out, if the flow seems kinda weird, you know I've gone and tried some shit!

I'm meaning to get stuck into that this morning, but earlier this morning I decided to finally put some ideas down for the new user interface we've been saying we're going to do forever now but simply haven't gotten that far as yet. One thing led to another and I wound up with a conceptual UI I'm actually fairly hpapy with! 

The key idea behind this new user interface is to replace the existing one with a more dynamic and feature rich interface that works well on both touch platforms and PC's alike. I would be hoping to provide one unified user interface across all platforms, meaning it's all about striking a sort of happy medium in terms of font and button sizes. 

What you see below is my current prototype - this isn't in engine, just mocked up in photoshop, but many of the parts can be directly exported into the engine. That being said, with the current concept and it's features like  how all the buttons are skinned based on the speaker (may be something we disable if it's too distracting which it probably will be, though offering the user a selection of colors is not infeasible if it doesn't wind up being confusing) are things that require extra code not currently implemented. Some things will be easy, other things... well, let's just say I'm definitely looking forward to that. Yay.

Note that the Quick Menu in the top right is collapsed by default and is shown here in it's expanded form. When collapsed, it'll simply be a button reading 'Quick Menu' or similar.

Naturally, the above was assembled over the course of a few hours of interation and is a very early prototype at this stage. Any final product resulting from this exercise may wind up being quite different, though I'm very pleased with how good it's looking so early in the process. Whatever UI is used will form a design language which will subsequently be rolled out throughout the entire game. What's being used right now is essentially a refreshed version of the UI Sileo had in it's early prototype stages with certain design elements like the chatbox dating all the way back to 2013! Suffice it to say, what's in vogue in terms of UI design has changed a lot since then and it's something I know I have a knack for despite having no actual experience in doing it outside of sileo, so I'm definitely keen to rise to the challenge and give Sileo one of the best damn UI's of any VN out there!

I wouldn't expect to see this UI implemented next update, let alone any time in the immediate future. Certain things might take some time to get working as Ren'Py can be obtuse at times, so our priority for now will remain completing Tai's route, and once that's done, we still have that Patreon goal to deliver on. Still, when we've settled on a design and we're as prepared to tackle the implementation as we can be, a fancy new UI will be coming your way (and apologies for the wait, Android users! A proper UI for touchscreens has been a long time coming, I know.)

PS: A rough mock up containing a concept for the collapsed menu.