Greetings ladies and gentlemen, I am currently taking a game interface design course as part of my bachelor’s degree program. As such I need to turn to the internet community for advice/opinions/critiques/suggestions on a few interface ideas for a proposed game I am working on. The game is a first person adventure set in ancient Greece within (a fictionalized version) of the labyrinth at Crete, and would be built for the PC initially. For a good reference point, think of the gameplay style of Amnesia: The Dark Descent. That being said the interface methods I need analyzed are as follows:

• The game will rely heavily on using context sensitive areas or objects in the environment. Instead of using a pop up icon I am envisioning the character’s arm reaching out and ‘hovering’ over the object in question to indicate it can be used. The player would then hold down the left mouse button and mimic the motion needed to complete the action with the mouse. Again, think of Amnesia for the interaction style, but a replacing of the indicator icons.

• The character collects scrolls and note fragments that help piece together puzzle solutions and applicable greek myths. I wanted to increase immersion by utilizing an animation of the character pulling out a scroll case and opening it. From there you would select which parchment to retrieve. Would this animation be too tedious over time or would it work out because you would be accessing it rather infrequently?

• I would like to have two separate methods of accessing the inventory menu. The first would be the traditional key press which brings up the regular inventory screen. The other method, however, would be to allow the player to hold the right mouse button triggering a carousel style menu in the middle of the screen with all the inventory items. The player would be able to scroll through the menu by hovering the cursor over arrows on either side of the carousel. Select the object occurs by mousing over it and releasing the button. The character would then produce the selected item in his hands on screen.

That about sums it all up, thanks in advance for any feedback!