Prerelease 1.010A (Minor UI Tweaks)

[x4000]

The latest prerelease of AI War is now out:  http://www.arcengames.com/share/AIWar1010A.zip

That version is an upgrade from version 1.009, so you have to already have 1.009 (or greater) installed. Just unzip it into your game folder (usually C:\Program Files\Arcen Games\AI War\ unless you specified something else). Please make sure that your unzip process keeps the folder structure from the zip file, rather than just unpacking all of the files into the base target directory.

What's new since 1.009:
(Cumulative release notes since 1.009 are attached at the bottom)

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-The game now remembers the screen position and zoom level on each planet for the local player, so when the player is switching around between planets, the zoom level will be changed.  This is not kept between saving and loading of the game.

-The ship selections are now remembered when players switch between one planet and then back.

-Mark II Engineers now have infinite engine health, like all the other teleporting ships.

-All of the ship selection shortcuts (comma, period, B, S, etc) now support Ctrl+<key> to select all ships of that type.

-Right-clicking an icon in the planetary summary now cycles through the ships with that icon, rather than selecting them all.  Ctrl+right-clicking them selects them all.

-Space tugs and etherjet tractors can now be able to move ships with shot-out engines.

-The selection rectangle counts now only show up for 10x10px selection boxes and up. This prevents a flicker of the text when ships are just being left-clicked.

-There is a new "Show Minimap Box On Top Of Ship Blips" option in the Misc Interface Options section of the settings.

[darke]

Ow. Some of these UI changes are incredibly painful.

The zoom level being per-planet is completely disorientating; I ctrl-click to go through a wormhole on one planet zoomed in max and suddenly I'm zoomed out to view 100% of the other planet, wondering WTF the wormhole is that I just came from. Being able to stay zoomed in was really useful because you can flip from one side of the wormhole to the other to drag in ships when in a big combat, or just to pull in your science vessels; and being fully zoomed out you can't just ctrl-click on it with any precision.

Also for some reason hitting "b" now jumps you to the position of the base, which is a nightmare when you're trying to construct a wormhole defense. Or pretty much do any multitasking when in the middle of trying to watch and coordinate a defense battle. It seems the other hotkeys do the same thing. Also incredibly painful when you're trying to quickly run an advanced science base out of a system, or even micromanaging the defense of your science bases whilst raid-researching a contested system.

[x4000]

The zoom level being per-planet is completely disorientating; I ctrl-click to go through a wormhole on one planet zoomed in max and suddenly I'm zoomed out to view 100% of the other planet, wondering WTF the wormhole is that I just came from. Being able to stay zoomed in was really useful because you can flip from one side of the wormhole to the other to drag in ships when in a big combat, or just to pull in your science vessels; and being fully zoomed out you can't just ctrl-click on it with any precision.

Yeah, when flipping through wormholes, this should probably keep the existing zoom.  I've added that to my list as a change.  If you prefer, I can also make a settings option to disable this new feature of remembering the zoom, but I think it's useful except when you click through wormholes.  Let me know what you think, though.

Also for some reason hitting "b" now jumps you to the position of the base, which is a nightmare when you're trying to construct a wormhole defense. Or pretty much do any multitasking when in the middle of trying to watch and coordinate a defense battle. It seems the other hotkeys do the same thing. Also incredibly painful when you're trying to quickly run an advanced science base out of a system, or even micromanaging the defense of your science bases whilst raid-researching a contested system.

Yeah, this was an accidental change -- on my list for fixes.  I consolidated some of the code so that these would work consistently with a few other areas, and this was an unintended side effect.  Sorry about that!

[darke]

The zoom level being per-planet is completely disorientating; I ctrl-click to go through a wormhole on one planet zoomed in max and suddenly I'm zoomed out to view 100% of the other planet, wondering WTF the wormhole is that I just came from. Being able to stay zoomed in was really useful because you can flip from one side of the wormhole to the other to drag in ships when in a big combat, or just to pull in your science vessels; and being fully zoomed out you can't just ctrl-click on it with any precision.

Yeah, when flipping through wormholes, this should probably keep the existing zoom.  I've added that to my list as a change.  If you prefer, I can also make a settings option to disable this new feature of remembering the zoom, but I think it's useful except when you click through wormholes.  Let me know what you think, though.

Probably the ability to enable/disable this would be good, since I must admit I'm not sure when this feature would actually be useful myself. I can barely remember what zoom level I was on at the last planet I was on, let alone a planet 10 conquests ago. So saving it at a specific point seems to be relatively useless in the long term, unless you're literally swapping between two of three planets all the time.

I just feel it violates the principal of least surprise in UI design. It basically changed my view without me actually telling it to. All the other view actions I can think of in the game are done as a primary affect. You zoom and it zooms to where you point. You hold space and it follows the unit. You click on another planet, it focuses on that planet. You press C/M and it focuses on the crystal/metal deposit.

However in this instance, it's a side effect of your action in both this instance, and the key binding change below. I wanted to swap to another planet, yet it changed my zoom level, WTF? I wanted to select my builder unit to build some stuff, yet it centered on the unit, WTF?

That and the zoom jump from full in, to full screen is seriously visually disorientating, if it did the smooth zooming out that changing the zoom levels with the qwer keys does, it wouldn't be so bad though, though again I still think it's a non-obvious side effect.

Also for some reason hitting "b" now jumps you to the position of the base, which is a nightmare when you're trying to construct a wormhole defense. Or pretty much do any multitasking when in the middle of trying to watch and coordinate a defense battle. It seems the other hotkeys do the same thing. Also incredibly painful when you're trying to quickly run an advanced science base out of a system, or even micromanaging the defense of your science bases whilst raid-researching a contested system.

Yeah, this was an accidental change -- on my list for fixes.  I consolidated some of the code so that these would work consistently with a few other areas, and this was an unintended side effect.  Sorry about that!

No problem. I just loaded a save game where I was in the middle of an assault on a Tech IV+Ion Cannon pair of worlds leading up the the AI Tech V worlds, so it was probably nearly the worst possible time to notice a UI change.

[Admiral]

No problem. I just loaded a save game where I was in the middle of an assault on a Tech IV+Ion Cannon pair of worlds leading up the the AI Tech V worlds, so it was probably nearly the worst possible time to notice a UI change.

No, that's the best possible time to notice a UI change! You can quit, reload 1.009 Final, and continue that same save game without any replay.

Cheers!

[x4000]

New version, which should fix these issues:  http://arcengames.com/forums/index.php/topic,206.new.html#new

Let me know what you think of the new logic, darke:  basically, it just remembers your prior zoom/position when you click the planet on the galaxy map.  Every other case should now work like it did before.  In past releases (1.009 and back), it would keep your zoom but then center you on the command station when switching planets like that -- I think this is a better way to work, since if you are using the galaxy map like this, you presumably want to go back to what you were last looking at.  Or, at least this is a lot more likely than that you want to look at the command station.

If you'd like me to add a settings option to just have it keep the zoom steady and then center on the command station, let me know and I will.  But I do think that this particular feature is in keeping with (say) having multiple tabs in a web browser or something.  You want to go back to where you were last scrolled to, not where you are scrolled to on the new page. 

Of course, I think your main complaint before (if I'm understanding) was that when you were doing things like going through a wormhole by Ctrl-clicking it, activating control groups, etc, the shift in zoom was inappropriate.  I totally agree, and so that's why that now works the way it previously did.  Let me know what you think!

[darke]

Just been playing for the last hour and haven't been annoyed once at the zooming so it looks like it's a success. Thanks!

[x4000]

Excellent!  No problem.

[ZarahNeander]

Right-clicking my own units on the right panel works like a charm. Right-clicking hostile units still jumps to a undefined place.

Kind regards...Pia Kraft

[x4000]

Right-clicking my own units on the right panel works like a charm. Right-clicking hostile units still jumps to a undefined place.

Oh, great catch -- I'll take a look at that for the next prerelease.  The logic for enemy ships is necessarily a bit different, since you can't select them.  The "undefined place" is actually the center of the rectangle bounding all those ships, but of course that is pretty patently useless when looking for multiple ion cannons, etc.  Thanks!