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The Game UI Database, a comprehensive reference of game interface design

• asutekku 6y ago
  In my opinion a bit better site covering the same topic: https://interfaceingame.com/ https://interfaceingame.com/
  • tenaciousDaniel 6y ago
    Wow that's a serious amount of effort someone put in to collect all of that. That's really cool. I'd love to see the same thing but delving into actual UI systems. So we have the 7 languages in 7 weeks, and 7 databases in 7 weeks. I'd like to see 7 UIs in 7 weeks.
    • dajomu 6y ago
      Wow that's a great idea.
  • homarp 6y ago
    Thanks for the pointer. I feel they kind of complement each other: https://www.gameuidatabase.com/gameData.php?id=127 https://www.gameuidatabase.com/gameData.php?id=127 and https://interfaceingame.com/games/my-friend-pedro/ https://interfaceingame.com/games/my-friend-pedro/ or https://www.gameuidatabase.com/gameData.php?id=35 https://www.gameuidatabase.com/gameData.php?id=35 vs https://interfaceingame.com/games/the-legend-of-zelda-breath-of-the-wild/ https://interfaceingame.com/games/the-legend-of-zelda-breath...
  • Neputys 6y ago
    Thank you too. Both really nice sites. At first Interfaceingame feels way better designed but after a while it becomes over designed somehow. Personally, I would choose Interfaceingame visual style and gameuidb nav and naming conventions. (edit: visual style as in clean not dark :))
  • animal531 6y ago
    Just recently I also found this one: https://videogameinterfaces.com/ https://videogameinterfaces.com/ It's a bit simpler, but I like its comparison based interface.
• studius 6y ago
  if you search, it fails to find anything, then click in the lower part of the window, you can't scroll up/down any longer.
• Minor49er 6y ago
  The amount of games and screens is impressive, but for a site calling itself a database, it should take things further. Mainly, there ought to be a lot more textual content. For example, rather than just a screenshot of the options menu for a given game, there should be tables listing all of the options and their possible settings. Rather than just an in-game screenshot, each UI element should be called out and detailed. For example, point out a health meter and explain what happens when the meter is filled, when it's low, etc. Same with the menus. What are the elements and what do they do? And so on. There are also links to general gameplay footage for any given game, but various UI elements should have their timestamps called out, or even get their own videos entirely. I really like how easy it is to navigate the site. Everything is tagged well. There's a lot of potential here.
  • Neputys 6y ago
    I'm a UI designer for almost a second decade now. In short textual content is the last thing I need from a site like this. Forgive me but that is just a load of pointless academic pedantry.
    • Minor49er 6y ago
      Textual content would be used to facilitate searching and to compare the UIs of different game interfaces. For instance, right now, I can't tell what the most common language is for UI buttons in RPGs or see what options are typically available for classic first person shooters without typing it up manually from the screenshots. This would be helpful for non-UI designers who want to make games.
    • marapuru 6y ago
      I disagree. I've been a UI / UX designer for various pieces of software and the thing I miss in all the collected screenshots online _is_ text. It makes things more easily searchable and comparable. For example, is a health bar vertically or horizontally positioned? Top right or top left? What's the used color? All these things could show me the obvious choice when designing a health bar in a specific type of game or interface. No website with screenshot (or otherwise UI based visuals) in collections has this searchable content. So for me, as a UI designer, I would definitely benefit from more textual information.
• nfin 6y ago
  Awesomely put together with great menu! Does something similar exist for AppUIs? Maybe dribbble.com, but 1) I think that dribbble it is mostly about imaginary designs (cool actually, but I don't get to see the best UIs that do actually worked / went in to "production") 2) the menu in dribbble lets you choose mobile/print/... instead of TitleScreen/LoadSave/SettingsMenu/...
  • pcen 6y ago
    There are a few still not behind a subscription model, UI pattern libraries is what you're looking for. Here are some examples: https://pttrns.com/ https://pttrns.com/ http://uigarage.net/ http://uigarage.net/ http://ui-patterns.com/ http://ui-patterns.com/
    • swyx 6y ago
      good list - added these all to my growing list here: https://github.com/sw-yx/spark-joy/blob/master/README.md#interactiondesign-inspo https://github.com/sw-yx/spark-joy/blob/master/README.md#int... hope that helps
      • nfin 6y ago
        nice list!!
    • nfin 6y ago
      thanks!!!
• gooses 6y ago
  If you press 'Player Profiles' it takes you to the same page as 'Game Totals and Progress'
• tinkrr 6y ago
  Does this not violate copyright?
  • m12k 6y ago
    IANAL but it's probably covered by fair use. Otherwise "Let's Play Videos" on YouTube would not be possible(and they actually show all the content in the game, while this shows single screenshots). Same goes for games review sites, Metacritic, game wikis etc that all have screenshots. It's definitely not in the interest of a game publisher to disallow the internet to show off their game, but they probably can't legally stop it either way.
    • xgulfie 6y ago
      Let's Play videos only exist because publishers allow them to. They aren't fair use. They could drop the DMCA hammer tomorrow but they don't because it makes them money. Edit: obviously I'm not supporting this but this is the legal reality.
      • SahAssar 6y ago
        There are differing opinions on this from what I've heard. If the let's play video competes with the experience of playing the game then it seems like it would be as you say, but for many cases that would probably not be true. This is still not decided in court though and just because someone can DMCA someone else does not mean they are in the right legally. It would also be different in different countries, the free use doctrine and DMCA are a American concepts.
    • CodeArtisan 6y ago
      Virtual youtubers had numerous copyright infringement disputes with Japanese game studios for playing video games on stream. Hololive[1], the biggest vtubers agency, had to settle agreements (and pay money) with Nintendo, Konami, and capcom. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hololive_Production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hololive_Production
  • zlsa 6y ago
• dccoolgai 6y ago
  Needs "Into the Breach".
• xipho 6y ago
  We build scientific software (http://taxonworks.org/ http://taxonworks.org/) where interfaces are notoriously bad. I feel the scientific community would benefit so much from a (sponsored?) program that paired game developers (or UI/UX specialists, or game psychologists) with teams building scientific software. For example we help describe species- while not quite the same thing, gamers do that everywhere, skinning, equiping, stat-min-maxing, etc., they are storing facts about entitites, and getting them served back to them, often in FPS time. Of course there are different considerations, but some of the ideas are identical, e.g. store, and retrieve lots of data, in as few clicks as possible. As scientists very rarely do we have the time or opportunity to think deeply about the UI/UX experience, we have to get things done, with minimal resources, for example over the course of funding for a 2 year grant. This project was a bit of an exception, and a lot of fun to be in: https://bioip.github.io/ https://bioip.github.io/
  • Neputys 6y ago
    As long as you exclude UI/UX from "getting things done" it's going to be notoriously bad. Academia, government, enterprise all the same. There's no accountability to actual users and doing UX properly would turn the whole project on it's head so guess why no one cares...
    • xipho 6y ago
      | There's no accountability to actual users and doing UX properly would turn the whole project on it's head so guess why no one cares... I don't think we're saying they don't care. It's a balance, right? I've been around long enought to see the UI/UX world emerge and become more defined, but some of that world is common sense that comes with experience. In my experience some UI/UX is hot-air, and in fact gets in the way of getting things done, but other bits/and insights are super useful. What I'm suggesting is to tease out specifics with reference to systems that others are familiar with- games.
      • Neputys 6y ago
        In that sense, personally, everyone cares. But when people have to operate in big org environments priorities change. Think about it, no one wakes up in the morning and thinks I'm going to make something terrifyingly hard to use today. No one invests or gives grants for something that "is going to be terrifyingly hard to use", right? And yet dominating majority of big org software is terrifyingly hard to use. The answer to why? I think is the point you are missing. Your suggestion is commendable, interesting but no number of references or examples are going to help make your next project better as well as that why. As far as UI/UX world goes it has a problem of becoming fashionable, popular and somewhat profitable. This always attracts certain kinds of people and hot air. I'm sure you have plenty of your own examples in academia.
• op03 6y ago
  Textbooks could really use some of these elements - skill/tech/progress trees - area maps etc.
• sh1mmer 6y ago
  I’d love to see something like this for game mechanics, although that might be harder to achieve. For example being able to find games that have certain movement mechanics and compare them would be amazing. Like “jump”, “double jump”, “sliding”, “ice surfaces”, etc
  • maxwelljoslyn 6y ago
    You might be interested in the "operational logics and playable models" section on this page: https://eis.ucsc.edu/analyses-and-approaches/ https://eis.ucsc.edu/analyses-and-approaches/
  • elefanten 6y ago
    Probably not what youre looking for (because it’s a paid service and mobile games only) but gamerefinery.com has game feature datasets.
• victor106 6y ago
  We are in the process of redesigning an enterprise application that is very information dense. Anyone know if any good resources that could help with any patterns on ui/ux for information dense screens/apps?
  • codeulike 6y ago
    The traditional ux pattern for 'enterprise' applications is "dont bother thinking about ux" Hope that helps
  • phailhaus 6y ago
    I would recommend Edward Tufte's books on data visualization, which are themselves fantastic examples of how to visually arrange information to maximize understanding. "The Visual Display of Quantitative Information" is a great place to start.
  • aasasd 6y ago
    Not quite patterns, but I think writings of Jakob Nielsen and his company Nielsen Norman Group may be considered as applying to ‘dense’ interfaces by modern standards—as he's mostly known for his work from the 90s and 2000s. Their priority for the past twenty years is web, but not just casual-user sites, and IMO the principles are universal. Also he and the company have an ongoing series of criticism specialized on corporate intranets. BTW, a persistent theme is that interfaces should be tested on users soon and often—even if just with a few users and a cheap methodology, that's better than no testing. This is the main collection of articles: https://www.nngroup.com/articles/ https://www.nngroup.com/articles/ And there's a tag for ‘design patterns’: https://www.nngroup.com/topic/design-patterns/ https://www.nngroup.com/topic/design-patterns/ I've been meaning to re-read Nielsen's classic ‘Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity’, which I have in print from mid-2000s, translated. It's likely to be a rather intense return to the past, considering how both the design space and my understanding changed over the years.
• slmjkdbtl 6y ago
  Is there a trend of video game UI going flat? I've seen some Switch games that's ditching their stylistic UI and going for generic flat UIs, e.g. Pokemon Sword/Shield, and this makes me very sad, I hope they're just bad art direction. For app UI it's reasonable to go flat to maximize content readability, but for video games, where the goal is "fun", UI should also be fun, or at lease visually consistent with the game aesthetics, or even be a part of the game itself.
  • tomtheelder 6y ago
    I'd say "sort of." I see flat UI designs in games in essentially two places. The first is games where it seems stylistically appropriate within the aesthetic of the game. I'd argue Pokemon falls into this category somewhat, but that's definitely eye of the beholder. The flat UIs feel congruent enough with the world to me. The second place you'll see flatter UIs sometimes is in the sort of "hub" UIs that many multiplayer games. They usually have a lot of functionality, are very much "out of game," and are incidentally normally built on web tech. But for regular, in-game UIs? Not really IMO, not like it has been for apps.
    • slmjkdbtl 6y ago
      Yeah it's definitely eye of the beholder. A congruent example I can think of is a lot of immersive 3D games going more minimal on the UI, using plain text overlay and no visible style, e.g. Ghost of Tsushima, where I think the UI style helped the goal of "immersive". I can see Pokemon S/S is going for a more realistic or immersive 3D world and can benefit from a more minimal UI, but to me visually it turns out to resemble too much to the typical "flat design", and my personal visual taste is stopping me from understanding what it achieved on the game design level. And I agree there're places like "hub" where it's more disconnected to the game world, and you can say it's less important for those to use a very consistent style. I would argue these places should also be fun and game-like (or, the UI interaction feedback should match with some of the in-game feedbacks), but that's more experimental and a different subject.
• mauricesvay 6y ago
  Great resource. It would be great to have the animations also. How games transitions from one screen to another, or how the UI elements are animated is what makes game UI so cool.
• Der_Einzige 6y ago
  Reminds me of one of my favorite youtubers, Design Doc: https://www.youtube.com/user/Warbot40 https://www.youtube.com/user/Warbot40 DesignDoc focuses heavily on UI/UX in video games and is one of, if not my favorite youtuber. I bet he would love this website and maybe one day will mention it.
  • dexwell 6y ago
    Thanks for recommending!
• didip 6y ago
  One sub category that needs a lot of attention is missing from the side bar: Controller HUD on mobile games. Often times the software joystick requires thumbs gymnastic, a major improvement is needed here.
• drewgill 6y ago
  I'd love to see this with virtual reality games included, that's a field where UI really matters but it's definitely harder to design it to be both intuitive and stylized
• Existenceblinks 6y ago
  I wish enterprise software users/orgs liberated themselves from formal look and feel of GUI. Usual game softwares serve massive of users, and they are working great.
• will_pseudonym 6y ago
  Does this exist but applied to industrial/aerospace/military interface design? The extreme example that always comes to mind for me is the Apollo Command Module [0], but all different kinds of more complicated/advanced interfaces exist, and I think that a joint learning effort between designers of those types of applications, and traditional software design, could yield amazing improvements for both sides, and every user of both types of systems. xipho described a similar idea between video game designers/developers, and the scientific community here in this thread. [1] [0] https://www.si.edu/sites/default/files/newsdesk/fact_sheets/commandmodule_interior.jpg https://www.si.edu/sites/default/files/newsdesk/fact_sheets/... [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25316420 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25316420
• hohohmm 6y ago
  Though useful, this website appears to exclude mobile games entirely. The amount of screen space on big screens makes it a lot easier to design UI for. The true magic of UI design mostly happens in mobile games where devs cram an incredible amount of stuff into limited space while trying to maintain sanity. A big loss, without mobile games.
• TheKarateKid 6y ago
  Games have some of the best UI designs I've ever seen, period. Not only are they beautiful and readable, but they give emotion and life to software. Apple used to do this with their skeuomorphics and animations, but it slowly disappeared almost entirely by now. When GM announced that they were going to use Epic's Unreal Engine I was so excited because it seems that someone finally gets it.