I have noticed in many games now or just recent ones about health bars and attack bars that the game designers have only designed these key features to only be 2 inches, 6 inchs or just like in Monster Hunter the health bar and attack bar now expands to the edge of the top part of the screen.
In the PC Raptor top view shooter game the health /attack bar is on one side of the screen that stretches from top to bottom.
My nephew's and my question is.
Why hasn't there been a game with a wrap around health or attack bar the exapnds along the entire monitor or screen? The only way I ever would see this style of wrap around health /attack bar would be for insane sci-fiction space game. Similar to Omega Boost from PS1.
Ideas, suggestions, concepts, any feedback would be helpful.
Health bar / Attack bar
I'm having a hard time picturing what you're describing, both for the bars you're referencing and the one you're asking about. But in general I'd say that status information (like bars), while important, are not very interesting to look at, especially compared with other stuff on the screen. As long as I can tell how close I am to dying with enough precision to do something about it before it happens, that's plenty for me. Anything more than that I would probably see as clutter on the screen, unless it had a very good reason for being there.
Author
Yes, I see what you mean.
The status bars. These bars come in different colors representing the health and abilities for the characters that are used during the game so stay alive. Or at lest show how far a character is near death so the player can use a first aid or energy boost to stay above the near death situation. This is what I was refering to.
Now for the wrap around status bar:
The status bar would only be visible unless the character was hit. With out being hit during what ever the scene was being viewed, the view of the screen would be full view. The status bar would or will wrap about the entire rim of the monitor.
For am example. in Black Ops.
There is no health status bar. Only the screen would become red since mutliple hits are being taken and the character has three to five hits till the character is down and then respawns in another location.
The status bars. These bars come in different colors representing the health and abilities for the characters that are used during the game so stay alive. Or at lest show how far a character is near death so the player can use a first aid or energy boost to stay above the near death situation. This is what I was refering to.
Now for the wrap around status bar:
The status bar would only be visible unless the character was hit. With out being hit during what ever the scene was being viewed, the view of the screen would be full view. The status bar would or will wrap about the entire rim of the monitor.
For am example. in Black Ops.
There is no health status bar. Only the screen would become red since mutliple hits are being taken and the character has three to five hits till the character is down and then respawns in another location.
Yeah, Brothers In Arms does something like that, except, instead of being health, it's danger. You're not actually getting hit by enemy fire, but bullets are whizzing by you. As soon as you get out of harms way, the 'wrap around' red danger indicators start to fade away. It works out much better than standard health, because the bad guys always miss anyways. You're always one shot away from being killed, but you have to be exposed for long enough.
That would have worked a lot better for Batman Arkham Assylum, instead of letting Batman continually get hit in the face point blank by guns.
That would have worked a lot better for Batman Arkham Assylum, instead of letting Batman continually get hit in the face point blank by guns.
Author
So would a wrap around status bar be a good idea and interesting depending on the game genre it was or just far out thinking?
It's been done a trillion times already.
So would a wrap around status bar be a good idea and interesting depending on the game genre it was or just far out thinking?
It's just a stylistic choice. It doesn't really have an effect on the actual gameplay. As for fading out the hud (wrap around or otherwise), a lot of games have started doing that for over a decade.
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