UI/Aesthetics + How We Would Fix it

[Layell]

This is an offshoot of Mekkah's competitive design thread to speak about some of the other really awful user interface choices in the Pokemon games.

First this is required reading: http://me.veekun.com/blog/2013/10/17/xy-ui-nitpicks/

Some of my biggest peeves right now are how horrible the box interface is on both XY and Pokemon Bank. I don't even know why the computer has Withdraw/Deposit when all you need is right in move. It's also amazing how much faster the XY computer is compared to past games, and I still think it could be improved by a mile. Currently in Bank nothing can be touched with the stylus. Bank has a lot of things wrong with it such as transfer being a separate app, and the fact I can only transfer one box at a time. This might be a technical limitation but it's still tedious as hell. The fact that the Pokemon Bank gift has to be collected each time means I've really stopped caring about however few points I get because once again it's really tedious.

My proposed changes would of course to be allow more touch screen, and keep the interfaces relatively the same for the XY computer and Bank.

What other awful user interfaces can you think of?

 

[atsync]

Pretty much agree with everything you said about Bank. I was moving hundreds of Pokemon from my Y game to Bank and it was so tedious not being able to use the stylus. Another thing that bugs me is when you try to move multiple Pokemon and it won't let you place them in a box unless the free stops are arranged in exactly the same way as the Pokemon being held. For example, if I try to move 9 Pokemon arranged in a 3x3 square to another box with 9 free slots, but the free slots aren't also arranged in a 3x3 square, it won't let me. So then I have to move them one at a time, which is lame when you can't use the stylus (and there doesn't appear to be a "move to box x" option so if the boxes are really far apart...)

The item bag could be organised better too. The current system of Key Items/Berries/Medicine/TMs/EVERYTHING ELSE is stupid and could easily be organised further. Alternatively, they could give us more freedom to organise our bag in the way WE want to arrange it. Why not make the bag similar to storing Pokemon on the PC, where WE decide which pocket stuff goes in?

 

[ErynCerise]

+1 on the PC stuff for sure. Withdraw/Deposit may be slightly faster individual options, but not fast or precise enough to justify them being full top menu options. That jazz needs to be dropped like a rock already.

As for one of my personal peeves: it's always been an option to turn off battle animations for moves, but I would also love to have the option to turn off intro battle animations (i.e.: trainer appears, you both throw Pokeballs, the Pokemon leaps out, etc.), especially since it feels like these animations keep getting ever so slightly longer in every generation. Just briefly show me the trainer and their name if there is one, and then otherwise just have the Pokemon I'm fighting appear instantly. That would make grinding, going through tall grass without a Repel, and fighting swaths of scrub trainers so much less annoying.

 

[cant say]

if I try to move 9 Pokemon arranged in a 3x3 square to another box with 9 free slots, but the free slots aren't also arranged in a 3x3 square, it won't let me. So then I have to move them one at a time

This so much. Surely the game should be able to recognise how many Pokemon are being moved and slot them into whatever free spot is in a box accordingly, instead of needing the exact same square/shape you are trying to move. What would be cool if they added onto the individual 'move' option (the blue tab) so you could select and highlight multiple Pokemon in a box (so they don't have to be sitting next to each other/in a square) then you pick them up and dump them in the box you want. Kinda like a mass withdraw-deposit thing...

The item bag could be organised better too. The current system of Key Items/Berries/Medicine/TMs/EVERYTHING ELSE is stupid and could easily be organised further

'EVERYTHING ELSE' is the worst thing to happen to the bag. What happened the the pokeball pocket? Held items and 'other items' need to be separated too. I know they have different icons in the bag but it still doesn't make sense to have them in the same pocket.

One minor thing was that it was kinda annoying when choosing what background I wanted on the battle screen, it just gave you the names but didn't preview them so I had to go fight bunnelby to figure out which one I wanted. Sure I could have just googled it but whatever...

 

[BaffleBlend]

The big, ugly, gray error screen whenever you return from pressing the Home button while online. Why can't the PSS just quietly disconnect while inactive? Like every other 3DS app? It makes arranging trades (especially on Miiverse) a nightmare, and checking Bulbapedia real quick for info on a moveset isn't much better.

 

[DHR-107]

The item bag could be organised better too. The current system of Key Items/Berries/Medicine/TMs/EVERYTHING ELSE is stupid and could easily be organised further. Alternatively, they could give us more freedom to organise our bag in the way WE want to arrange it. Why not make the bag similar to storing Pokemon on the PC, where WE decide which pocket stuff goes in?

HOLY GOD THIS. I was so infuriated that they put the balls back into the standard bag. What was wrong with keeping them seperate? Its a nightmare finding things in the bag now. If anything, we could do with PC boxes for the bag which only allow certain Items. Or at least a customizable bag... So you could have Pokemon Equipable/Selling Stuff/Balls/Evo Items/Mega Stones/Healing/TMs/Key etc. Lets be honest, they introduced infinite bags in Diamond and Pearl and its been downhill from there really. I think my diamond bag has 483957475983754973985 items in it, and it takes me *minutes* to scroll down the list looking for something important.

I have to totally disagree with the first point on Layell's link though. Most of the time you see the Pokemon's stats directly after a level up (I dont think this is the case with the XP Share) so you see the Pokemons stats literally moments before it asks about a new move. If you can't deduce from that what you want then I don't know what you are doing playing Pokemon. Either way, At least in Gen 6 with Super Training you can sort of see the distribution of a Pokemons stats when its in your party (if you dont already have the majority of them memorised like we do).

I liked the change where it changed the colour of natures on stats (red for "hot" stats and blue for "cold"). The other great thing that the DS introduced was having the whole of the bottom screen for moves and the upper for combat. You've got wonderfully chunky buttons down there. The other big annoyance I have is the "Last Used Item" button. Why is it there? It literally (in most cases) saves you ONE selection. It's a time saving feature that saves you almost no time at all...

Don't even get me started on Bank/Computer usage. I could probably write an essay on little changes that would make it so much more user friendly. I also fell into the same trap atsync did with the green selection box not "fitting" unless the gap was the same shape. I was like "Whats the point, you can see Im holding 5 mons, there are more than 5 slots, just ram them anywhere...."

 

[hard]

You can transfer 3x3 Pokemon to a 9-free slot box. So this point is moot.

The mix-item bag is horrible, I have to admit.

 

[Layell]

You can transfer 3x3 Pokemon to a 9-free slot box. So this point is moot.

The point isn't moot but because the system isn't flexible doing it if you aren't perfectly organized just makes it hard.

Another thing that always bothered me is the completely silly team preview mechanic where you HAVE to pick the order of all six mons rather than just picking the first (or two/three in dubs/trips). Your lead is your lead the rest don't matter. Unless you are intentionally limiting the number of Pokemon you are running which is also really.

Also how in doubles if you are sending your last mon after a 2HKO for some reason you have to pick what side, which also hasn't mattered since the switch in mechanics of gen 4 but they still force you to decide left/right in doubles. It honestly just works to confuse players new to in-game doubles (aka the ones who will find themselves sending their last mon out at the 2HKO).

 

[/TenKen/]

Another thing that always bothered me is the completely silly team preview mechanic where you HAVE to pick the order of all six mons rather than just picking the first (or two/three in dubs/trips). Your lead is your lead the rest don't matter. Unless you are intentionally limiting the number of Pokemon you are running which is also really.

Actually if you have zoroark it matters a lot being able to select your last pokemon.

 

[xfix]

Actually if you have zoroark it matters a lot being able to select your last pokemon.

Zorua/Zoroark may be fine reason to ask for this (and actually Pokémon Showdown asks for order in this case, and only in this case). But there is no reason to ask the player for the order when the team doesn't have anything with Illusion.

 

[chaostothemax]

Zorua/Zoroark may be fine reason to ask for this (and actually Pokémon Showdown asks for order in this case, and only in this case). But there is no reason to ask the player for the order when the team doesn't have anything with Illusion.

They wouldn't put in an entire clause just for a single ability on a single Pokemon. It's much simpler to just have you select your order all of the time, even if it's slightly inconvenient.
Honestly, I don't feel like there's anything too obnoxious about any of the UIs in the games. Sure, there's a few things with like Bank and the boxes that could use cleaning up, but in general, I tend to have little problem with finding things. Then again, maybe I'm just accustomed to the system.
One thing I DO find myself annoyed with is the search function in the boxes. When skimming through boxes, it's really easy to miss the indicator for the Pokemon you're looking for. I feel like they should make it more like the Find function in a browser, where it brings you to the Pokemon and you can hit left-right to scroll through multiple of the same species.

 

[Age of Kings]

Most of my nitpicks about the UI have been mentioned already but I also have several gripes about competitive battle. tl;dr: the stats screen doesn't give you all the information you need

You still cannot view exact EVs in-game. You have to be very careful but I see no point in the little pie chart/meter in Super Training if you can't see the exact values. I see no reason why numerical values cannot be attached to them.

IVs are also a thing that Gamefreak wants to tell us about but stops short of telling us about it. The IV check guy has been a thing since Emerald, but he can only tell you about 0s or 31s. Why don't they just give us nice, convenient IV numbers in the stats screen, or if they don't want to confuse little kids, just have the guy tell us the numerical values? I actually think that this is more damaging to more casual players, who might think "well, 20+ is ok with me" but you have no way of knowing unless you have Rare Candies and manually input values into Metalkid. It's a pain in the ass having to check for flawless Hidden Power as well.

It was only until HGSS where the effects of each nature is shown in the stats screen, but it's too subtle for my liking. The highlighting should be more noticeable.

It would be nice to have exact damage percentages and stat buffs/debuffs in battle like the simulator does.

I think these are responsible for a divide in the community because casual players take out their frustrations on competitive players because of Gamefreak's resistance to being transparent about their own game mechanics. Players see EVs and IVs as "unfair" instead of optimizing values just like mastery or skill points in other games.

 

[hard]

The point isn't moot but because the system isn't flexible doing it if you aren't perfectly organized just makes it hard.

Mark the 3*3 Pokemon. "Grab" them. Drag them to the lower menu. Choose the new box with at least 9 free slots. Victory.

Please stop bashing aspects of the game that have majorly improved, before checking all possible ways. I would in fact be very happy if Pokemon Bank got the very same handling than the current box menu.

 

[DHR-107]

Most of my nitpicks about the UI have been mentioned already but I also have several gripes about competitive battle. tl;dr: the stats screen doesn't give you all the information you need

You still cannot view exact EVs in-game. You have to be very careful but I see no point in the little pie chart/meter in Super Training if you can't see the exact values. I see no reason why numerical values cannot be attached to them.

The best way I've figured to get past this is saving, using a reset bag and then resetting if you need too and writing down what appears. Yeah, its hot all that helpful but at least its a little bit closer to the mark.

I dont know why they removed the cool lower menu screen either :/ I know its to access all the "cool new stuff". But it sucks to actually have to now press a button to open a window :( HGSS menu was so nice. OH (I know its not really for this thread), but having automatically on running shoes is the best thing ever.

 

[Krul]

Most of my nitpicks about the UI have been mentioned already but I also have several gripes about competitive battle. tl;dr: the stats screen doesn't give you all the information you need

You still cannot view exact EVs in-game. You have to be very careful but I see no point in the little pie chart/meter in Super Training if you can't see the exact values. I see no reason why numerical values cannot be attached to them.

IVs are also a thing that Gamefreak wants to tell us about but stops short of telling us about it. The IV check guy has been a thing since Emerald, but he can only tell you about 0s or 31s. Why don't they just give us nice, convenient IV numbers in the stats screen, or if they don't want to confuse little kids, just have the guy tell us the numerical values? I actually think that this is more damaging to more casual players, who might think "well, 20+ is ok with me" but you have no way of knowing unless you have Rare Candies and manually input values into Metalkid. It's a pain in the ass having to check for flawless Hidden Power as well.

It was only until HGSS where the effects of each nature is shown in the stats screen, but it's too subtle for my liking. The highlighting should be more noticeable.

It would be nice to have exact damage percentages and stat buffs/debuffs in battle like the simulator does.

I think these are responsible for a divide in the community because casual players take out their frustrations on competitive players because of Gamefreak's resistance to being transparent about their own game mechanics. Players see EVs and IVs as "unfair" instead of optimizing values just like mastery or skill points in other games.

Maybe the IV checker could be a psychic or something, and when you show a Pokemon they could say something like

"I'm getting these numbers. 31,27,16,30,8,31. I wonder what they refer to?"

Although really, it should just be something included in the summary screen, along with EV's.

 

[cant say]

Something that keeps getting me that I forgot to mention in my previous post is when someone requests to trade/battle etc over PSS, and the game asks you 'don't turn on gamechat?' or something like that because the person requesting obviously selected to not use it. The problem I have is every time I see it my brain thinks 'do I want game chat? not at all' so I click no, which contradicts with what the other person wants so then we have to start the request again. Like come on, don't make it an option. If the person requesting it has selected 'no' it should just tell you 'game chat will not be used at your friends request' or something...

 

[nitrox116]

The other big annoyance I have is the "Last Used Item" button. Why is it there? It literally (in most cases) saves you ONE selection. It's a time saving feature that saves you almost no time at all...

To tell the truth, I like the Last Used Item button... it helps when catching Pokémon with a low catch rate like legendaries and can also be useful for healing items. It's fairly small as well, so most of the time you won't select it accidentally.

Bank gets better once you use it more, but I agree that transferring lots of Pokémon is a nightmare. Keep in mind that not only can you only transfer one box, it has to be Box 1 in your generation V game. In Pokémon Black or White 1 there's no way to select a group of Pokémon, so that means that you have to move the Pokémon you want to transfer one by one into the correct box. That's a little bit crazy. You also have to change your cartridge to XY to move the Pokémon out of the Transport Box and then back to BW(2) to bring more Pokémon into Box 1 and transfer them... why can't it just automatically move the Transport Box Pokémon into a free box in Bank?

 

[Flareon]

I just want them to bring back the A button and Auto run toggle on the touch screen like in HG/SS, and where when giving selection options, have those appear on the touch screen too.

HG/SS had the best UI in my opinion. I was so upset that they removed Autorun, A on touchscreen, and the two registers key items being on the touchscreen.

 

[cant say]

^yeah I agree 100%

I think if they still had auto-run in XY, the 'auto' option would be to either have running or rollerskating while using the joystick. I much prefer using the joystick to move but I don't always like rollerskating. Actually I kinda think they should have just replaced the bike entirely with the rollerskates, or have both as key items so you can only chose one at a time...

Also seconding what you said about moving yes/no etc options from the touch screen. You can still tap the touch screen to scroll through text, but then when yes/no comes up you have to swap your stylus for your finger and actually chose yes (or no...) which doesn't make a whole lot of sense imo

 

[MetalMario]

The box system slowed down a ton in HGSS and became extremely awkward to use. They've been slowly improving it since with each new game but it's still inferior in some ways. For starters, when you're moving around single Pokémon, in Platinum, if you place the Pokémon on top of another one, the one in the box would move into the hand. As of HGSS, the Pokémon in the box is sent way far away to the distant box the Pokémon you're carrying came from. This is extremely annoying and it can be hard to tell where it went.

Deposit/Withdraw have occasional use but should be one of the options in the Select rotation. (Yes, one, not two.) Deposit and Withdraw can be merged together into one mode. Give the player access to both the box and party (like in Move), and if they pick a Pokémon in the party, send it to the active box, and if they pick a Pokémon in a box, send it to the party.

Likewise, Select One mode (blue) and Select Many mode (yellow or green, depending on the game) can be merged into a single mode, as it was in FRLG through to Platinum.

I would love to have a list view mode in the PC. (like Stadium and, heck, even GSC had it) Show the entire box in a single directional list and allow inserting between slots. Inserting between when there's no free slots nearby is so tedious with the current box system.

I agree, bring back the Pokéballs pocket, which had been there since GSC through to HGSS. Also add one each for evolution and held items.

And for heaven's sake, fix the lags!

 

[Karxrida]

Not being able to customize the rules for PVP games really blows. You can't have level 100 battles without "everything goes" rules, no way to implement clauses like in the Gen III/IV games, and the lack of an auto-level 100 rule is really dumb.

 

[cant say]

bumping this because complaining about the games is fun...

So when you're taking stuff out of the daycare they ask you which pokemon you want to take out, which makes sense when you have two sitting in there, but is it really necessary when you only have one? A simple change but it would streamline it much better if it just skipped that and after asking 'do you want to take back your pokemon?' (and you say yes ofc) then they just say 'your ______ has grown by __ and will cost __ , OK?' would be nice. Also, if you do have two pokemon in there, the options should be; pokemon 1, pokemon 2 and BOTH. Depositing two at the same time would also be good but I don't wanna get greedy lol

 

[Celever]

bumping this because complaining about the games is fun...

So when you're taking stuff out of the daycare they ask you which pokemon you want to take out, which makes sense when you have two sitting in there, but is it really necessary when you only have one? A simple change but it would streamline it much better if it just skipped that and after asking 'do you want to take back your pokemon?' (and you say yes ofc) then they just say 'your ______ has grown by __ and will cost __ , OK?' would be nice. Also, if you do have two pokemon in there, the options should be; pokemon 1, pokemon 2 and BOTH. Depositing two at the same time would also be good but I don't wanna get greedy lol

Wouldn't the Day Care have more than 1 Pokémon there at a time, though? From all sorts of different trainers. I can see it as a security measure, because if you know which Pokémon you put in there, you're probably trying to not steal it. There'll be some other safety measure too, it's just that one got into the game!

Or GF was just saving time over a really pointless thing to take out of the game. Either works lol.

 

[cant say]

Wouldn't the Day Care have more than 1 Pokémon there at a time, though? From all sorts of different trainers. I can see it as a security measure, because if you know which Pokémon you put in there, you're probably trying to not steal it. There'll be some other safety measure too, it's just that one got into the game!

Or GF was just saving time over a really pointless thing to take out of the game. Either works lol.

Haha that obviously isn't the reason why they have it but now that's all I'm going to think about when I do it. What about all the pokemon you deposit that don't have your OT? lol

 

[Celever]

Haha that obviously isn't the reason why they have it but now that's all I'm going to think about when I do it. What about all the pokemon you deposit that don't have your OT? lol

You learn your Pokémon's OT that you put in there off by heart, or write it down. Easy! ^_^