Which shop interface do you like best?

[Emberstorm]

I'd love to hear the community's opinion on this. Would you prefer:


a. Standard shop interface. You get a list of all items the shop has to sell, for easy comparison.


b. You can visually see every item on the tables in the store. However, you have to move and interact with each to see details, cost, and to buy. Additionally, you would sell items to a pawn vendor, not to any store you visit.


   ii. Same as above, but every item in the store has a text label floating above it, so you can get basic information. However that's a lot of disruptive text on one screen.

I personally would like to implement b. in my game, I think it looks great and it's a bit less common then a, however I want to make sure players don't find it frustrating and more time consuming.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Cadh20000]

The only place I've seen "b." implemented was in Legend of Zelda shops. I never minded it but the assortment of items for sale wasn't too large either. I personally think it works fine as long as the amount of things for sale isn't too large, but if the assortment is large then it would get annoying.

 

[Arisa]

b. I like that style

 

[Emberstorm]

The only place I've seen "b." implemented was in Legend of Zelda shops. I never minded it but the assortment of items for sale wasn't too large either. I personally think it works fine as long as the amount of things for sale isn't too large, but if the assortment is large then it would get annoying.

Thank you, so maybe no more than 12 items per shop? Do you like medium sized cities in game which have say 5 or so different shops? Armor, weapons, jeweler, skills/spells and potions? This of course is presuming they are all reasonably close and easy to find, like a market district.

 

[Cadh20000]

How you have the store organized would also make a big difference on how many items is too many for one shop.

 

[LaFlibuste]

The only place I've seen "b." implemented was in Legend of Zelda shops. I never minded it but the assortment of items for sale wasn't too large either. I personally think it works fine as long as the amount of things for sale isn't too large, but if the assortment is large then it would get annoying.

Agreed with Cadh20000 on this. To expand on what he said, I think it's not only about the number of items the shop boasts, but the item diversity in your game. In Zelda games there are only so many different kind of items and you continually see their representation in your menu and as you use them, so it's easy to spot what is what at first sight and you don't really need to compare stats. How many buyable/usable items are there in you average zelda game? About a dozen, tops? But this would be hell for most classic JRPGs, final fantasy styled items lists, where there are dozens of different weapons and armors and you have to carefully compare stats, dozens of relics or spells or whatnot and all kinds of items that can cure X status effect or boost X stats or heal X amount of Y stat... If you have to run continuously between item A, B and C and maybe take notes to compare them before making a choice, your shop will be a crushing failure. Maybe it will look nice, but it won't make up for how unpractical it is.

So yeah, I think "b"-styled shops mostly only work if you have very instinctive, simplistic item lists. And I mean not only on a "per-shop" basis, on the whole game's scale.

 

[Emberstorm]

Thanks LaFlibuste, that's great advice I'll take onboard.