After the previous week was mostly taken over by maintenance work, week 45 had me dive back into the UI redesign work.
With the navigation structure and overall requirements spelled out, I sat down to work out so-called wireframes: Low-fidelity mock-ups of the UI that are more about general layout than visual design. Given that I am no designer by trade and therefore have to learn the tools while using them, this process was a bit slower than I would have liked it to be. Nevertheless, I came up with a couple of drafts, drawing inspiration from current-generation AirlineSim, other popular business simulation games and the work that had previously gone into the UI part of the AirlineSim Technology Demonstrator. But for some reason, it didn’t feel quite right. After a brainstorming session or two with @molp, it dawned on us: While current-generation AirlineSim doesn’t look great, it certainly works alright. This is because a lot of thought has already gone into the navigation structure as it is today. After all, it’s at least the 3rd UI generation the game has seen, depending on how you count.
Long story short: At the end of the day, the overall structure likely won’t change all that much. But it will be refined in various places and will - of course - get a fresh coat of paint to make it more appealing and less dull. That said, there’s still a lot of work to be done until I get to those things, as I still need to prepare a few more wireframes for different types of page content and game states.