I second whoever said that the broken hearts above the pigs is too much of a distraction for me, since I can't seem to pass by without petting them now, even when I'm hurrying somewhere else. I know, I'm a sucker. *grin*. But yes - having a toggle on/off for the action indicators would be vunderbar. I DON'T want them to disappear completely as I often find it frustrating to tell which of my pigs I've already fed/nibbled/petted, etc, but having an option to turn them off when I'm not in that mode would improve their usefulness and reduce clutter.
I wish there is a way to distinguish graphically if the pig is already petted once vs none. Right now each pig can be petted thrice, but after one pet I just want to nibble it. Maybe the color of broken heart lightens as the petting is increased?
I really love the clickable bubbles on the critters, tho I do think they should have an on/off option and when being on should only show up when the critter is hovered over.
But it makes my "farm" much easier to work. I don't have to spend most of my time trying to see which critter I have already taken care of.
I have noticed that sometimes, when using the click-on bubbles, it seems to cause the "focus" to change. So when I try to move somewhere else, I have to either use the mouse or the arrow key to get my avi to finally move - if one doesn't do it, you have to try the other lol
The main thing I don't like is the way the rainbow tends to knock out any other clicking that I'm trying to do. It's not always possible for me to "click" on something with the enter key and so I use the mouse - which is what it disrupts.
All in all ...this was a great test and the Devs get a STANDING O from me! Very lovely new places and a lot of fun exploring them!
+1 for a toggle and in diminishing value OR on mouseover OR get rid of them.
Also, there is ALOT of clutter on the screen. In my yard, my gardening patches are too close to a tree so it's a big pain to tend the last three patches. AND I can't read the scroll on the left (the black boxes with white type) because of other graphics overlaying. The rainbow is a good way to let you know when you get a bonus--but I think it's too big. I agree with the folks who are thinking that the some of the animation graphics might be getting a bit juvenile and are distracting from the look of the game.
Not a fan of the indicators. Like many others, I find they make the interface too cluttered, and there are still options (like "massage" for the butterflies) that don't show up. I'd at least like the option to turn them off. When I'm gardening in my house it's even more impossible to isolate a plot with the animals and their little bubbles all getting in the way. Plus, I was finding that Flash was crashing more and things were slowed way down from the previous test.
It does make things easier out in the world but in my garden it is HELL! I wish I could turn it OFF at home. I have reached AHV. the animals all come to me as if I were a magnet and those "Indicators" make it almost impossible to tend my garden. I try to click on a patch and Squeeze a chicken. I try to plant a patch and Pet a pig. I try to Harvest a tree and get milk. I have 3 pigs, 3, chickens and two butterflies. I can't see my garden for their "Indicators". The only way I can do anything is to run to the edge of the lot. When all the livestock gets there I make a dash for the garden and try to tend at least one patch before the crowd arrives. Then I run to the other side and can water the patch before they get back to me, etc. If they ever speed up I am doomed and will just have to buy ready made foods which will not count toward achievements. Sigh.
Agree with Brib about the gardening - it is very difficyult when you try to plant crops etc. Any chance the animals could be moved lower down so they do not interfere with the garden action?
Or I also thought about maybe a fence around the garden, to keep the animals out, even a gate to get in to tend the crops?
BTW, I still do not understand "FOCUS" or "FOCUS OFF". Despite your explanation, Stoot, I just don't get it. I tried clicking on it but nothing happened that i could notice. So, for me it is a useless distraction. BTW, I don't care where the FOCUS is, I just enjoy playing and have had no FOCUS problems that i can tell apart from the distraction of the indicator. Sorry.
I actually like them on the animals in my garden as I have a cave house in the heights and a garden with 2 levels. My pigs are nicely out of the way, 'penned' on the hill bit of my garden, away from my garden plots and trees.
Now with sparkling new indicators I can tend to them from further away, empty meat and milk collectors on the hill, issue cross-garden petting, etc.
So, in my case I would like to be able to select:
Butterfly indicator at my house on/off
Butterfly indicator around glitch on/off
Pig indicator at my house on/off
Pig indicator around glitch on/off
Chicken indicator at my house on/off
Chicken indicator around glitch on/off
Tree indicator at my house on/off
Tree indicator around glitch on/off
etc.
And yes, I'm also feeling the broken-hearted guilt-trip. Can't get anything done as I have to pet every broken-hearted creature on every street. Sheesh.
@ Brib...I may not totally describe this right but...you know when you have to click on the chat in order to type without throwing the log/map/rock boxes up in your face? It's coz you're having to "focus" your keyboard controls to the chat rather than your game screen...likewise in order to get your avi to move again after a chat you have to click on the game screen to "refocus" the controls back to your game play.
I think they just put that little swirly thing there just to remind us that we need to click the screen to get things moving again so we don't freak out thinking something's borked when it doesn't move :P
(ss if I just confused you more...not good with describing things lol)
@Wrendolin...I so wasn't going to admit to the guilt trip those broken hearts were laying on me :D :D :D
RE: Indicators and Focus On/Off. Indicators in garden are frustrating to say the least! Everything is on top of everything else. Also, I sent a bug report-- for the first time I have cabbage, tomatoes and a music block stuck on the ground outside the area I can pick up. I wonder if this is an " indicator" that my garden area is too busy! Hoping this can be toned down a little. The focus indicator just seems to be another distraction.
It seemed to me my game experience became more stable after the first day, and I really did have a "swell" time :)
@ sgio Thanks! That is a better explanation. Oddly, I have never had any problem with this but I see how some people might have that problem. I wonder if the swirly thing helps them. If, like me, they don't understand it, it may not.
lol Brib...it sure doesn't help me any coz I still end up with every box popping up in my face coz I've forgotten to click on the chat box...clicking on the screen after chatting is just something I do automatically...but then I've always been sorta backwards in the way I do things :P
Wow, that's what Focus is? I had NO idea. I thought it conferred some sort of advantage/disadvantage — not just that it was a signal saying "please click on this window to resume in-game activity".
Honestly, I think that's a little bit crazy. Especially when you have an object called a focusing orb that looks suspiciously similar to the spinny focus ball.
Honestly, I hate seeing these so called "action indicators". But they are helpful in some ways, maybe an option to turn them off? I get too distracted when I see action indicators, they take my eyes aways from the wonderful art of the game. I also absolutely hate the "Focus indicator", it irritates me a lot, whenever I see it I get tempted to click it. I see no point of having it in the game.
And now, because of the broken-hearted icon on the "Pet" indicator, I pet every animal on the street (mostly piggies) 'cause if I don't pet them I feel guilty and start telling myself "You are so cruel! Go back and pet that poor adorable creature!!"...
I still love the game though, it is unique and has wonderful art. GLITCH. making a world out of every player's creativity.
- I love GLITCH
I love the action indicators. so a toggle switch is the obvious choice. .
It is good for me because I can only play in short blocks of time. Indicators give me a real quick analysis of what is the state of the animals or trees. Not everyone can devote large amounts of time to playing. But those that do have time to click everyone of the trees and animals, I can see how the indicators would be annoying.
Toggle indicators for me too, please. Love them on butterflys mostly, but in my garden it is like a jungle with indicators blocking the planting area and causing me to swear a lot!
I LOVED the new indicators for the animals.
That said, having them able to be toggled off would probably be a good idea, and I don't see how having that option could be a bad thing.
Also, I am in the minority- I actually like the focus off thing.
Another vote to toggle off action indicators .
I have already got more than enough butterfly milk, grain and meats (although meat gets short at times), now i am totally distarcted by every pig hen and butterfly and it makes the game too easy as others have said almost child like.
I liked how trying to milk butterflies was a pain in the butt it made me feel like I achieved something when I was sucessful. I learnt higher animal skills to improve my success but now I feel cheated, I could have just waited and got the same result.
I dont like the idea we need to be sucessful at every attempt or else we should feel cheated, I've seen some people complaining there are too few challenges well this eliminates another one all be it a very tiny one.
I agree with the indicators getting in the way, especially in my own garden. I only have 1 chicken, and I STILL had a hard time tending my garden! I can't even imagine what a mess it would be with multiple chickens, butterflies, and piggies.
Also... I'm a mouse person. Pretty much every other game I play (or have played) requires mostly mouse clicking (except some word games similar to Boggle - those I find easier to play just by typing words). So, it took a little time to get used to this interface, and using keys to move, jump, and interact with things. Eventually I got it, and it's pretty easy now. I'm not planning to go back to trying to click on things with the mouse all the time.
I never really understood why the indicators were necessary in the first place.
As for the Focus indicator... I saw people ask about it more than anything else. As a real geek, and being married to a computer engineer, its meaning was obvious to me, but most people don't understand it until it's explained. Were people really that confused, before the indicator, about having to switch the focus back and forth? That also seems obvious to me, but I am not what you would call an 'average' player.
Okay, I see the opacity has been lowered on the Action Indicators but they're still there and still get in the way and are still annoying... to me anyway :)
I have to say the action indicators helped me the past test and this short one today. I've not played in a while, and they were a welcome sight to let me know who needed what. However, will agree, an easy to set toggle setting would be optimal. They can clutter the screen, especially at home, and when on a mission (I'm a sucker too and can get distracted quite easily). I say easy to set toggle setting because I don't want it buried somewhere under a couple options menus...since I can see using it in the world, but maybe turning it off at home.
I liked the action indicators until I read here that you can click on those to milk butterflies from afar rather than chase them down. I never realized that, and was still hopping after them like an idiot... One of the things I really liked about the game is that when I first started playing I was baffled at how hard it was to milk butterflies, and went on a personal mission to figure out how to do it. Now I'm an expert, and feel very proud of myself, and I think it's unfortunate that feeling will be robbed from new players who will have it so easy now. There has to be a challenge in something.
I like the indicator of which butterfly has milk available, as it gets really confusing when there are lots of them and they all look alike, but I'm not fond of the fact that the indicator makes it easier to milk them.
As for the focus indicator, when I first saw that I knew what it was, but instantly realized that most players (especially new ones) wouldn't. Sure enough, that was one of the main questions I saw in the chat windows. It only seemed to confuse people, so I'm not sure how helpful it is. Plus, it's distracting--it makes it more irritating for me to go into a chat window because the focus indicator makes me feel like something is wrong and needs immediate attention.
Shepherdmoon, I assume your AK level is high enough now that you don't *have* to massage a butterfly to milk anymore. When we're all reset, it won't be easy again :)
Yes, MaryLiLamb, I'm maxed out on AK. It's true it will be twice as hard to milk butterflies when the skills are reset because I'll have to catch each one twice. However, it is ALOT easier for me to catch them now that I have figured out a strategy and have had some practice. I guess none of that matters if it will be trivial to interact with them in the future.
Now that the Indicators have faded, they are still a pain in my garden. Furthermore I now have to get my nose up to the monitor to make them out because even with glasses I have poor vision especially when all the animals crowd around me.
OT: Gardening would be a lot easier if not only was there a toggle for the indicators but if I were able to catch my own animals and pen them or evict them from my garden. I was told to let the pigs die. I know they aren't real but if they cry the way trees do I could never let them die. Silly? Yes, definitely, but I have lost too many pets and am reminded of that when a virtual pet dies.
I'm pretty neutral on the indicators. They're helpful, but sometimes they should appear but don't, which makes me think I've already interacted with an animal when I haven't.
What I really don't like is the order of menu choices. I usually use the keyboard to select things. If I hit enter twice when near a pig, I pet the pig. When I've pet the pig as much as I can, pressing enter twice usually lets me rename it, which I almost never want to do. Sometimes I can't rename it, so I get the option to nibble instead. Moving the nibble choice down one space in the menu would make things faster and more consistent.
Similarly, the first choice on a butterfly is "sing to," which takes a ton of energy, and which can send you to hell if you haven't eaten in a while. "Massage" should probably be the first choice, followed by "milk."
Don't forget, though, that once you have that butterfly menu open, you can just hit "g" to massage, "k" to milk, or "n" to sing to that butterfly. So instead of hitting enter twice, you hit it once and then the letter of your action of choice. Same thing for trees and piggies.
Yes, I'm a big fan of the keyboard shortcuts, but it's very easy to accidentally press enter twice and suddenly be down a hundred energy points via singing. Some changes were made to the menus recently, but they're still a little wonky.