[Dutch]

I'd like to take another crack at this topic before the day is out. (Too late, it's 1:45am) I don't have any real answers for you, just some things to offer up for thought. I apologize in advance if I am struggling to articulate those thoughts clearly.

1. Beauty – The beauty of FOF has always been its spreadsheet look, and quite frankly, it’s a signature that I don’t know if you ever want to abandon. I’m not sure how to describe it, FOF looks…serious…almost like working in a professional business software tool. Obviously the only way it can maintain that seriousness (and to me, that seriousness is a form of immersion) is to have a strong and well-designed underlying engine. Since you have that covered! I think it's important to keep it all linked based on that theme. I can comfortably open up FOF anywhere and it almost looks like I’m working and not playing a game. The look and feel pushes you to thinking this is a “thinking man’s game” vs something designed for the typical "gamer".

Better presentation? Maybe. Or maybe just relooking at the menu’s and windows layout will be enough. I'm thinking of a logical layout that lets the user more easily “get it” right out of the box. Right now, menus are everywhere and the current horizontal menu doesn’t tell us much other than, “Click on all of these”. Which leads me to wondering if the improvements you seek are in...

2. The menus – I don’t think a massive restructuring is in order, but I think the layout could use some tweaks to give meaning a purpose to the questions like “What’s going on here, exactly?”

With the Visual C# menu creator (just as an example of something I played around with some time ago), you can build a horizontal menu bar that could easily identify the different scopes in a linear/hierarchical structure that guides the user to an understanding of “What’s going on here, exactly?”

Obviously, the ultimate purpose of FOF is to simulate a football game so this, I would imagine is best suited for the left side of the interface (where I have it when I open the windows). The game itself is what everything is based on, it’s possibly the strongest core component of FOF, so I think it needs to be in a position of importance and the top left (next to the schedule window) seems a logical place for it. Then, starting from the left you could have these menu offerings that would expose the user to relevant sub-offerings (I’ve named them differently but they more or less correlate to FOF's basic top level categories).

SIMULATE/PLAY NEXT GAME – CURRENT SEASON – COACHING/GAME PLANS – GENERAL MANAGER/ROSTERS – ALMANAC/STATS – GAME SETTINGS

Notice that it really goes from the microscope (the game) and expands out slowly to the universe (ALMANAC and Game Settings). Laying it out in such a manner might make more sense to the new player and really, to the veteran player alike. Peeling back the layers of the onion, sort of speak...or adding layers back onto the onion, I suppose. I personally would like the menus to be dynamic as I rollover them with the mouse. For example, roll on to CURRENT SEASON and a new menu rolls out that presents the user with {“Team Summary”, “Scouting Report”, “Standings”, “Exhibition Standings”, “Schedules”, “Power Ratings”, “Film Room”} vertically.

3. The FOF Dashboard -- Which leads me to the background graphic. Which ultimately gets covered up by all the open windows of information in it's current state. Much of which we use, but not all at once. Obviously, it depends on what part of the season you are in. Click-traffic migrates around the windows as the season progresses. But, for better or for worse, all the open windows are effectively, our "FOF dashboard”. FWIW, I think the Stage Schedule window remains a relevant component of the FOF dashboard…and the relevance comes from its comforting, “You are here” notice to old and new users alike.

Meanwhile, what if we don't have all those windows opened all the time? What if all the menu items really were hidden behind those top-level horizontal menu items? The background would be void of information (beyond the Stage Schedule window). How could we optimize the use of the background screen? Well, I think you and others have all hit on it.

Back to the CURRENT SEASON example (and I wish I could help visualize this better). The mouse rollover would produce a vertical menu that presents {“Team Summary”, “Scouting Report”, “Standings”, “Exhibition Standings”, “Schedules”, “Power Ratings”, “Film Room”}. Each of those options would be your first button click in order to display each categories window. In an updated, user-friendly design, I would like to suggest that I get to build my own dashboard of windows to compliment the Stage Schedule piece on the background. These menu options (once opened) would have functionality built in that would enable me to pin them (via the pushpin icon?) on to the screen (maybe 0-4 windows could be pinned?). The screen now becomes the user’s custom dashboard of information *they* find most important. Even more powerful controls to the user? Let me "save" my layout based on what stage we are in. Free Agency...I want free agents there! Regular Season...I want my player stats there!

4. A Football Field in a Desk – I’ve probably covered what you are suggesting here already with the customized dashboard…I think the background imagery is still important to tie in with the FOF theme. The engine is serious, the look is serious, and the artwork should be fairly serious as well. I agree that the stadium in the desk identifies FOF very clearly. I like it, but I don’t know where it goes these days. Maybe not the primary graphic on the background...I do like the new one that you are using. Perhaps behind your “Enter New Career” windows. (Example: Stadium is dark, click okay on a new career and the lights come on while the data for the new career is initialized.)

5. I think you already discovered it’s hard to articulate (from us) why the interface is hated (sic). I think the answer lies buried in the overall FOF theme. FOF7 is modern (compared to FOF1). FOF is serious, compared to other football simulations. FOF, at it’s core, is a realistic, powerful, elegant text-based spreadsheet game.

The interface should somehow exude those key attributes. Modern, Serious, Realistic, Powerful, Elegant...Spreadsheets.

Again, I wish I could articulate this better. Bottom line, despite all this talk about the interface: FOF is a loooong way from broken or hated. It's an A rated game...the A+ you are striving for now is just gravy. Glad you are thinking about it though.