7th October 2004, 2:44 PM
I've just thought of how they might use the touch screen in a game like this.
One, they could have all the game menus, which you would normally have to pause the game to manage, right there on the touch screen where you would just do all your equiping on the fly.
Two, the entire game would be touch controlled. Click to move, click on an enemy to target it, click an item to select it, click an object to examine/talk/do, drag n drop menus for equipping and managing items, basically make everything much easier to manage. Since it's an RPG after all, this wouldn't hurt anything, just make it a lot easier to use, and the controls would be right there if you want to go manual. Either way, I'm sure they'll keep it 2D, which is good since nice 2D art is always great.
I like Two, but that basically leaves the top screen for... nothing. I'd rather have numbers appear above whatever character they are affecting (HP/MP Gain/Loss) than in some status bar. That makes things more intuitive. But, lots of data could still be put up there I think. Instead of showing all your character stats in the playing window, put it out of the way. HP/MP, who's turn, even stuff normall unseen in battles in these games like equipment, could all be put on the top screen, since none of that can be interacted with during battles anyway. Maybe during conversations all the text could appear up there too. It would clear up room for showing cutscenes without worrying about text windows blocking anything if they did it that way.
One, they could have all the game menus, which you would normally have to pause the game to manage, right there on the touch screen where you would just do all your equiping on the fly.
Two, the entire game would be touch controlled. Click to move, click on an enemy to target it, click an item to select it, click an object to examine/talk/do, drag n drop menus for equipping and managing items, basically make everything much easier to manage. Since it's an RPG after all, this wouldn't hurt anything, just make it a lot easier to use, and the controls would be right there if you want to go manual. Either way, I'm sure they'll keep it 2D, which is good since nice 2D art is always great.
I like Two, but that basically leaves the top screen for... nothing. I'd rather have numbers appear above whatever character they are affecting (HP/MP Gain/Loss) than in some status bar. That makes things more intuitive. But, lots of data could still be put up there I think. Instead of showing all your character stats in the playing window, put it out of the way. HP/MP, who's turn, even stuff normall unseen in battles in these games like equipment, could all be put on the top screen, since none of that can be interacted with during battles anyway. Maybe during conversations all the text could appear up there too. It would clear up room for showing cutscenes without worrying about text windows blocking anything if they did it that way.
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)