Inventory Screens...

If you can have more than one inventory tab then the tab buttons would go there. Do not forget to put the close button in the top right corner.

Aside from that you can have a sort button and a label to indicate the number of free slots (used/total). I'm sure not sure those would be good on top. Maybe used/total label is better on bottom and sort button + search box together on top?

I like the tab idea Dir3kt mentioned. If they can't be user set tabs, try using categorized ones, like weapons, armor, potions, etc. Definitely have that close button, whether it says close or is an x or some other creative option.

Perhaps have a hot key setup for the inventory? Something like fast equipables or usables (potions and scrolls).

If you use encumbrance, you could show how weighted the person is.

Another option is something of a value checker, showing how much worth some item has when selected or moved to a box in that open space.

Really great ideas!

I had thougth about maybe putting a box there that would let you drag and item in there, and it would tell you how much the item was worth, and what the item was made of, so you could get a general idea of what is needed to craft that same type of item.

I was also thinking of having an icon of a bag in the middle with a small ring aroudn it, and some design work. Nothing too fancy but enough to where it would take up some space up there. And instead of having a close icon in the upper right, i would make the bag icon clickable to close it. Thoughts?

As long as you have something that allows you to close it, and if it isn't purely known that this is a close icon (the classic X or a button that says "Close"), then place it in a known location for such an icon. The bag should be fine since that represents the inventory. Perhaps having the button to open it look identical.

I like the idea of having the item's components shown. Maybe have tabs at the very top for different features. One for worth and components, one for hot keyed items, and other options depending on the features you have. The tabs could change your currently empty area into a sort of sub menu. Maybe a combine menu (since you mentioned crafting).

Well we have a crafting menu that is 100% separate. This really meant to be for bags and other things related to inventory sorting, and use. I added the search bar function so you can type the name of something and a small highlight will show up on the items that have what you have typed. This will let you find quest items, or hard to pick out ore for later use with crafting and quest turn in.

I could, get rid of the space entirely, but I didnt feel like wasting it if I could put some useful information there. I wanted to see what people/players thought should be part of the inventory screen. Maybe a feature they always desired but that was never present in any games? Somebody had mentioned afflictions or positive buffs. I debated that idea but figure that would be best for the character screen.

As for the tabs idea, i dont mind it but honestly i had not planned on having more than the 60+ slots available. 60+ slots seems a bit crazy for a player and what they could really hold anyway. However, I could see the tabs being used to sort items based off of their type.

If you don't have stats (assuming this is an rpg) on the other portion of the inventory screen, I would put those somewhere. People like to be able to see the immediate results of equipping/unequipping items.

put cursor over item in inventory put description and stats in the upper space.

Would be good to have an enlarged picture of the item and then have some description of the item next to it when you hover over it.

All great ideas, I will play with some today and update this topic. thanks guys! Keep them coming if you have them. I will also show you the crafting screen and see what you guys think on the order/layout of it.

I had thougth about maybe putting a box there that would let you drag and item in there, and it would tell you how much the item was worth, and what the item was made of, so you could get a general idea of what is needed to craft that same type of item.

That's a good Idea except for the dragging part, don't overcomplicate things. Like KenjiSenpai said, leave it at hovering. An even better approach would be to toggle a floating box with the item info when hovered. But then the empty area is still empty.

Do you mind if I ask why you need that area at all? Usually you put areas, boxes, whatever because you have a use for it. What you're doing is trying to find a use for an allready existing box. What's the point?
Some kind of optimal size for the window? I would say the best thing would be to just remove the upper part, since it will look empty and misplaced when neutral, and showing item information has better solutions.

How about when you select an item, the top space provides more detail. Such as a bigger picture, all it's stats, options (such as equip, drop, bind, whatever).

Do you mind if I ask why you need that area at all? Usually you put areas, boxes, whatever because you have a use for it. What you're doing is trying to find a use for an already existing box. What's the point?

Well, i wanted to see if I was missing something that others might not want. I had originally designed it for a specific height but later found out that i didnt need that much room. If you guys provided me with some insight as to what could go there I would make it work, if not I would just cut it off.

Ultimately, after looking at the size of the inventory and the size of the crafting combined ( which you need both open to work ) the screen on the 1024x768 resolution was FULL... so i need to rethink how i want it to work anyway. I want the size of the icons to be big enough to recognize them but i want to have 40+ for their inventory... a tough choice on how to make that all work. Thanks for the information though. I should have a rework posted shortly.

Going off of that, why not make the inventory system with a smaller width, moving the boxes up? This makes sure you have more room for the rest of your system.

Going off of that, why not make the inventory system with a smaller width, moving the boxes up? This makes sure you have more room for the rest of your system.

hm... that is so simple.. why didnt i just think of that, Ill see how that looks. Thanks for the suggestions!

Depending on what sort of game this is, I always thought it would be nice to have a quick way to get rid of "vendor trash". Like the pets in Torchlight where you can just drag items into their inventory and have them go off to sell it all in one go.

In this case, maybe have a way to flag various things as "junk" like older obsolete equipment or general animal parts or whatever. Then when you open your crafting window then those items are given priority to find a use for, or when selling stuff they are given priority to sell. Though if you are having multiple windows open at a time, it might make sense to just have another spot to put things lik give them to a pet or a minion and have buttons to send them off to either sell or melt the stuff down into crafting materials as needed.

Other than that, I'd recommend having a big spot where you can see the items stats and some sort buttons (or alternatly have the items stats appear in a text-box when you mouse over the top and only the sort buttons on the menu proper). Since you have multiple windows on screen at a time, try to make them as small as possible so there is empty space between the menus when they are all onscreen.

Okay, to save myself the headache of having to do the fine details without a solid layout i have simplified it all and will post it here for you guys to discuss. I appreciate the help in the mean time.



Craft Screen:
1) Category Bar
2) Crafted Item ( based off of the category )
3) Item Name ( modifier objects will let you make a custom name )
4) Materials ( place them to craft Item )
5) Recipe List
6) Craft Button

Inventory Screen:
6) Sort Icons ( so you can sort your items based off of those things )
7) Inventory Slots ( where the items go )
8) Search bar ( helps you find items by highlighting them with a glow )
9) trash bin ( drag and drop an item to destroy it )
10) Gold Bar

What are your thoughts about this layout?

When you are messing with the recipe list, where does it list components? I'm assuming that area is for the recipes you know of (as in the names).

When you are messing with the recipe list, where does it list components? I'm assuming that area is for the recipes you know of (as in the names).

Yeah, without going into too much detail, you learn recipes from actually crafting or from books. Once you learn a recipe you can save it. You can even create your own recipes, and from doing so you will see a list of them on the right.

What I mean is, where do you see the actual recipe, not just the name? I would need to know what ingredients to use to make what I want to make.