Much Better GPS Interface

William shared this feedback 2 months ago
Under Consideration

I propose the GPS screen be rebuilt to include the following:

  • Two sections: Faction and Personal.
  • A checkbox to automatically share new coordinates with Faction, placing them in the Faction section.
  • The ability for faction leadership to enable/disable members from adding/removing coordinates from the faction section
  • The ability to create folders
  • The ability to set a folder to automatically receive new GPS coordinates
  • The ability to select and move, delete, recolor, show/hide or export multiple GPS coordinates or folders at a time.
  • The ability to bulk import/export GPS coordinates/folders to and from clipboard
  • Remember whether a folder was open/closed and return it to that state the next time the UI is opened


These changes will massively improve the overall user experience and communication between teammates.

Replies (16)

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6

Drawing from this, it would be very nice to also have jump drives

1) Display GPS Folders

2) Let you save favorite locations

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5

Yes. This would be really good for mining operations: Have a faction shared GPS mining folder containing sub-directories for deep space, near planets, on planets, et cetera. Making it much easier to find existing known locations near you.

By sorting GPS points into custom folders, the GPS list would be much more organized and clean, making it much easier to locate important GPS points in your GPS list.

Something that was of minor inconvenience with the old GPS system in SE1 was the lack of description exporting. When you exported GPS points, the GPS description data was not shared, which could contain important information, such as ore depths, ore depletion estimates, et cetera. It would be nice if there was an option to also copy the description to the clipboard when exporting GPS points.

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2

Question : Would there be merit in storing shared GPS in a block that could either be broadcast to faction members, copied to/from an engineers GPS list, or would be available for capture by an enemy?

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4

I would like to see your GPS menu show the distance to the location so you can choose the closest ore, etc.

Also have stations default as "Station - XXXX" so that all of the stations are in one location alphabetically. (This is moot if there are folders)

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1

!!!

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2

I would suggest other options:

- the possibility to set a GPS marker with a disabled "distance", so basically just as a "direction"

- the possibility to target a short-term signal marker and mark it as a permanent GPS marker

- the possibility to target a visible object, such as an asteroid, and mark it as a GPS marker with an automatic addition of a label (in SE, each asteroid has its own identification number - although it is not normally visible and accessible to players) Something similar can be done by the SE plugin "Recon camera" for visible ships


Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

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1

I'm new here, I didn't play SE2 yet.

I ask if there's the possibility to create a GPS satellites constellation orbiting above a planet and a kind of ores scanner to put on the same satellites and all the data collected from the satellites could be shown on the GPS interface.

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1

In that case - welcome.

Rest assured you're not the only one who hasn't played SE2. No one has yet.


There is no such thing as LEO or GEO in SE. It's not KSP. The SE universe is static and the Sun is just an image projected on the inside wall of the box. How it will be in SE2 - we don't know yet.


The problem in SE is not positioning per se. At any time you can make a GPS marker on your position whose accuracy of position definition is better than that of most real GPS devices.

But the problem is different.

Figuratively: you have a space - 3D orthogonal / Cartesian coordinates - and in that space there is a sphere whose center is not identical to the origin of the 3D coordinates. At any time, you can easily determine the position of any point on the surface or in the volume of the sphere. But to determine, to calculate, the position of a point on the surface of a sphere in polar coordinates centered on the center of the sphere (i.e., the way latitude and longitude are determined on the globe) is a non-trivial mathematical task. And an even nastier mathematical problem is to calculate the distance of two points on the surface of a sphere along the surface of the sphere (i.e., the length of a segment of the arc of some surface circle centered on the center of the sphere). Or to show a real surface map of some region on the surface of the sphere - that is, to transform the view of the surface of the sphere into a 2D plane in a general position (or maybe more precisely, a view in the direction normal to the point at the center of the spherical surface being displayed).


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1

There was a link on hackernews a couple of weeks ago on a particle simulation with what looked like constellations formed by moving points. https://tiki.li/apps/particles.html?v=2501a. The code is available too. It might not be useful, but it looks good.

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1

How about 'world' GPS coordinates, e.g. for planets or well-known (admin-created) stations that can be configured by the server administrator, with the default being that each planet comes with a GPS marker?

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2

It would be great if admins could create a folder of preset coordinates

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3

Something on the GPS marker in the list that tells you how far away it is from you would be helpful. Was always annoying to try and figure out which marker was which.

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2

It would be interesting to limit the maximum distance of visible GPS, or perhaps limit GPS to the current planet (if you are on a planet), being able to disregard these settings if you use the "always visible" marking... it would also be interesting if in survival mode it were possible to disable the GPS system in local game, local server or dedicated server, so that people would be obliged to mark everything with grids containing beacons/antennas.

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2

all the above suggestions are great and very valid. IMHO, I do agree the GPS aspect could use some love.

If I may offer. A simplified way of organizing GPS while cleaning things up on the HUD, for both SE and SE2, would be to allow a user defined cascading grouping "tab" method. Which could be shared user to user (Faction to Faction).

Speaking of GPS love!! could there be a way to utilize the GPS markers... other than just an accumulation of points in a back tab somewhere?!!

Holographic table GPS add on - Can the holographic table be made to visualize your GPS markers? kind of a growing 3D map as you explore!!! ... which also allows the user / Faction to define which group (tab) or individual markers they want displayed. Just define your "Home" Marker and explore from there! Further this can be a good sharing / interactive point for multiple players as they individually interact with the holo-table(s)!!. (navigating, mining, exploring points of interest, accumulated lore points, Faction finds, etc, etc, etc!!)

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1

Many uses could be made of the enhanced GPS capabilities.

For example, jump engine "programming" and "treasure hunting": there are special datapads, similar to a zone map, but they can't be read normally. Each card contains one coordinate (X, Y, Z). After inserting three cards into the jump engine, the ship can move to the specified coordinates (not limited by the jump length). But -what is the correct order of the cards? What is hidden at the target coordinates?


You have destroyed a pirate ship and found a datapad containing the coordinates in its wreckage... What's in the hidden location?


Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

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2

Others have touched on the in menu aspects, but I would like to see the ability to associate a "type" to a GPS and allocate a default colour to it to make identifying things in the HUD easier. Either something on the individual GPS marker or perhaps if folders are implemented everything in the folder could share a colour. So you could have your NPC stations in blue, your bases in orange and your deposits in green. as an example.

As an alternative the ability to sort and filter the GPS markers in any folders would be nice. The current filter works well and if we could sort by distance or by name etc that would make finding the correct point easier.

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1

Great idea, I really like the idea of setting a default color for each folder that anything new in it automatically inherits. Also, sorting by distance within each folder would be huge.

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I agree wholeheartedly. I actually already made a suggestion for stellar cartography, pretty much calling for all these features but wrapped up in a new ui rather than a list of coordinates

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While The ability to organize menus is generally much needed coming from SE 1. I believe the bigger issues with GPS is the screen clutter. At some point the player won't be able to tell things apart even if color, distance or well organized menus are added.


unless!


- The Potential GPS folder structure needs to contain a hierarchy that is then represented on the HUD.

- The "Header of each group would at a player determined distance be the only visible point of the group.


"At a distance you can see a forest, but as you get closer you can then make out the individual trees and later the leaves."


This would essentially allow the players to create individual "planetary systems" with their own sets of GPS locations that are only visible when you're close enough for it to make sense - and at the same time keep the HUD free of GPS clutter.

In a structure like this, the player might have to remember or orient them selves regards in witch system they have marked certain resources, but compared to SE 1 i don't see the big issue.

To help the player remember which is where. In the menu there should be a selection of small toggleable icons; example a drill for resources, exclamation mark for point of interest and so on. These would show up next to the name of the GPS marker and would either follow the hierarchy or condense from a systems underlying makers and show up on the header marker as the player gets far enough away.


Since the distance at witch the hierarchy toggles is player determined, it would also allow the player to use the structure in other contexts like having a group for minable asteroids etc.


for GPS systems in a game like SE 1 / SE 2 the most important factor is adaptability. Both because early and late game can have two very different sizes of the playing area (traveling between planets etc.) but also space engineers offers very different playing styles.


so to summarize:


- A menu based GPS folder structure needs to contain a hierarchy that is then represented on screen.


- The "Header of each group must at a player determined distance be the only visible marker of the group.


- The group header would at a close enough distance either disappear or move to the center of the cluster.


- Every GPS marker will in the menu have toggleable small icons for easy identification.


- At a distance these markers will combine on the group header marker as the the sub markers disappear.


- when a player is within a particular system, every other system should collapse and only show the header marker as describe above. this could be toggleable though.


- Custom colors is already mentioned and a given.


- The hotkey currently used (TAB) will instead of cycling layers now cycle the systems / clusters.

- Every cluster needs a toggleable option for always visible. this would allow the player to make parallel markers to the system hierarchy.


From what I've read, this setup would theoretically counter most of the issues with the current GPS system.


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I'd like to add that my comment does not touch on the communication part - For that i support OP, i believe it could go well together.

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2

The List schould be sortabel. By alphabet, distance to player, date of creation ect.

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I give a vote because I really needed folders in SE1. By exploring several regions and register every ore node found, we got hundreds of GPS points

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I was never a fan of this GPS system, because as it was introduced into SE1 it felt like a quick and easy solution that never fit well into the game. Also why should I place a antenna when I simply can place a GPS? Especially in solo play it makes them useless and GPS feels more like I use some cheat to break a game element.

Also when you for example drive around with a vehicle on the planet and you, for a reason, you keep stuck with it. You can simply set a GPS marker to easily come back later. Ruins any survival feeling that you may lose that vehicle and never find it again.

I would prefer when GPS would be a real existing gameplay feature and not only a stupid menu which ruins other gameplay elements. Give use GPS computers and/or GPS pads like text pads in SE1, limit the way you can see GPS points while only using your suit.


P.S. the first topic where I wish a hidden downvote would be possible.

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2

It would be interesting to the player having the possibility of grouping markers into hierarchical levels (folders), in terms of organization it could be like this.


Example:

> Earth

>> North Outpost

>>> Ores

>>>> Fe 01

>>>> Si 01

>>>> Ni 01

>>>> Ni 02

>>>> Au 01

>>>> Ag 01

>>>> Mg 01

>> Desert Base

>>> Points of Interest

>>>> Crashed Ship

>>>> Dominated Base

>>>> Hidden Garage

>>> Ores

>>>> Fe 01

>>>> Au 01

>>>> Au 02

>>>> Co 01

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It would be interesting to be able to define marker types (or apply tags).


Example:

> Fe 01 (#ore)

> Si 01 (#ore)

> Ni 01 (#ore)

> Ni 02 (#ore)

> Au 01 (#ore)

> Ag 01 (#ore)

> Mg 01 (#ore)

> Crashed Ship (#pointOfInterest)

> Dominated Base (#pointOfInterest)

> Hidden Garage (#pointOfInterest)


And use the "marker types" (or tags) to be able to activate/deactivate many markers at once and perhaps program a cockpit to display only 1 or more marker types.


Example:

Fighter ships do not see markers of the #ores type.

Mining ships do not see markers of the #pointOfInterest type.

But this is a configuration according to the player's will and by default everything would be visible, being adjustable per cockpit.

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And allow players to create custom marker names

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To display or not display a group or type (tags), on the players' own HUD, when the character is on foot, would be adjustable directly on the GPS screen, in the control panel. Double-clicking on the GPS or the folder to activate/deactivate in the case of groups, in the case of types I don't know what would be the best way to do this visually.

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