Screenshot Menu Analysis, The GameStar shot of the Menu Options

[Intestinal Chaos]

The most obviously identified features. The skill names and skill levels as well as the progress meter to the next level


The health, mana, and fatigue bar


What appears to be a compass and the fabled "Important Item/person/place Director" indicating that something important is a little north of the player.


The different menu categories represente with pictures. The first picture appears to be the magic list and the second might be inventory.


The weapon and spell currently selected by player



Overall it seems the menu has changed in very minor ways. The only interesting feature appears to be the important thing locator which like Bethesda said we didn't have to worry about. I guess the locator isn't as complicated and some thought it would be.

[HardCode]

Oh man. I would HATE it if the menu layout is only in that tabbed format. I liked the separate windows in MW. It was easy to check the map, check inventory, and check skills with everything in its own window. Tabbed like this means a lot more clicking around, and a lack of that "overall view".

[Argo]

im pretty sure, that the map will not be inside those tabbed pages! for one, i cant make out a suitable icon. then it would just make no sense, since theres no space for a good map in those little pages! i doubt that the inventory is in this tabbed structure too.

my guess would be that this is kind of characters list, each page houses another character sheet.

now we see "major skills" tab, than theres probably a "minor skills" tab, "race/class/name/reputation/bounty" tab, of course a "misc skills" tab and a "character attributes" (strength, intelligence, ecetera...) tab. this makes a total of 4 tabs "known", and theres only one more tab left, where i dont have a clue what it is on this screens.

inventory, map and characters have probably all different windows... i hope so at least


i like the compass, and how the indicator has been implemented. nice!

[Intestinal Chaos]

I figured the indicator would be much more simple than everyone belived it would be.


NEW: Well in accordance to a screenshot I "obtained" it looks like the second tab is your stats (luck,strength, etc.) Also magic, equipment and so on does indeed have a seperate menu.

This post has been edited by Intestinal Chaos: Oct 4 2005, 03:38 PM

[the-anti-neravarine]

Looks goo-goo-goo-good

[RobRendell]

Well, having seen the video of the E3 demo, we can say a few more things about the interface.

First, at the highest level, one thing that we'd overlooked in the above image was the metallic brackets around the health/fatigue/magicka bars at the bottom of the image. In fact, it appears that each of those four bottom elements of the display (the bars, the current weapon, the current spell and the compass) are live buttons that select the top-level mode of the view.

In the above pictures, the stat bars are selected, so you're looking at stats. From the E3 demo, the first tab shows your character's race, class, birthsign, level, and the actual numbers (current and max) for health, fatigue and magicka. The second tab shows your eight attributes (strength, Intelligence etc.). The third (as seen in the above screenshot) shows your skills. There are no secondary skills in Oblivion, just primary and other, so I guess you just scroll the skill-list with the slider shown on the right. The fourth and fifth tabs might be your faction alliances and reputation?


In the E3 demo, Todd clicks on the current weapon icon, and the main part of the display changes to an inventory display. The five tabs change to a bag icon (I'm guessing "show all"?), a weapon icon ("show only weapons"?), a shield icon ("show apparel"?), a potion ("show magic"?) and a key crossed with a tool ("show misc"?).

In this screenshot:
http://media.xbox360.ign.com/media/702/702...mg_3116154.html
the current spell icon has the brackets around it, so you're looking a spells. Looking at the 5 tabs in the screenshot, you've got an eye icon ("show all spells"?), a target ("show spells with ranged targets"?), a hand icon ("show touch spells"?"), a head icon ("show self-affecting spells"?) and a skull icon ("show combat spells"?)

And back in the E3 demo, we see the compass selected, changing the tabs to a different set. There seem to be only four tabs in this mode - the first is blank, the second shows a sextant (maybe the local map?), then a circular compass icon (shows a world map, which Todd refers to as the "fast travel map"), then a tab with what look like three goblets (which seems to be your quest log), and finally a tab with a single large goblet (no idea - completed quests, perhaps?)

This post has been edited by RobRendell: Oct 6 2005, 03:21 AM

[Argo]

im still not sure on how the inventory works. seeing the paperdoll in the demo, i got the impression that it works like this: you have a list where all stuff you can use is listed. weapons and armor... well you can click on the entries in that list, and the character is shown wearing those items.

i personally prefer dragging items over the body and such. im still not sure if i like the new gui or not ...

[RobRendell]

Dunno. You need to be able to use/equip/unequip things in your inventory, but you also need to be able to drop them, or move them into a container that you've currently got open.

Not sure how that aspect works... maybe you can click and drag the name, like the icon in Morrowind, but there's a shortcut: double-clicking the name will use/equip/unequip it?

[plagusthewise]

i like it.i also liked it in morrowind.