Faster Horses | A podcast about UI design, user experience, UX design, product and technology

The UX of Video Games

• Faster Horses • Season 4 • Episode 4

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In this episode, we look at the UX of video games.

We all know the most important part of a video game is the gameplay. But what about the UX? In this podcast, we talk about video game user experience better by improving your UI and UX design.

The frustrations of pressing that button, that accidentally drops all of your inventory.

We talk about Elden Ring and why players and reviewers are praising the game, despite its difficulty.

What about the all-important menu experiences, accessibility and how to re-engage users when they take a break from your game.

All this, plus UX Tombola – what will it be – how will Mark Steeler sell this one?

All these questions, and even ones you didn't want to know, ANSWERED!

Plus the off-topic tangents you love.💎 Sign up for exclusive content: https://jubb.ly/ba4a52

🎥 Watch: https://youtu.be/GYjaKrOt1VE

#Podcast #Design #Code

PEACE!

Produced by:
Paul Wilshaw
Nick Tomlinson
Mark Sutcliffe
James Medd
Anthony Jones
Chris Sutcliffe

Title music: James MeddSound effects from https://www.zapsplat.com

Support the show

All this and more are answered in this episode of Faster Horses, a podcast about UX, UXR, UI design, products and technology (sometimes!)

🐎 80% comedy, 20% UX, 0% filler

👕 Get stickers and tees at https://www.paulwilshaw.com/shop/

The show is hosted by:
Paul Wilshaw
https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulwilshaw/
and
Mark Sutcliffe
https://www.linkedin.com/in/sutcliffemark/

If you want to suggest an idea, or join us on the show, send us a message 👆.

SPEAKER_03:

I like it. I like it. Woo! Let's go. Hello and welcome to Faster Horses. I'm one of your hosts, Paul Wilshaw. I've led design and development teams at Barclays and other well-known brands, won lots of awards and a few hackathons.

SPEAKER_01:

I'm Nick Tomlinson. I'm a digital illustrator and lead UX designer at a Manchester-based investment company.

SPEAKER_04:

And I'm Mark Succliffe, lead UX designer in the digital automation sphere.

SPEAKER_03:

Coming up, we'll be talking about design, user experience and technology, followed by US Tombola, where we pick apart the experience of a random product, object, service, or place. And a special advert from Mark Steeler from Bolton Arcade.

SPEAKER_04:

Hello, thank you. I'm with the show.

SPEAKER_03:

If you want to be part of the show, you can send us questions on Twitter with the hashtag FasterHorsesPodcast. Now onto the show.

SPEAKER_01:

Immortalized forever on the internet. Oh yes.

SPEAKER_04:

Just uh lovely tantalizing um adult viewing now uh available to our premium pasta horses subscribers.

SPEAKER_01:

Just anyone on YouTube for free. Or anyone on YouTube for free, yeah. Let's be fair, not that many people use YouTube either, so I'm sick. Just the context, I was very warm and I took my jumper off. But as does happen in these occasions, my t-shirt partially came with it as well. But you know, I was I was live on video, so there's that.

SPEAKER_04:

You you do have a um a couple of videos on your own YouTube channel anyway, in which you are not wearing a shirt.

SPEAKER_01:

That's true, but the the footage is 15 years old and therefore very pixelated. Right, I see. I'm also very far away from the camera.

SPEAKER_03:

So I see. Okay. I like it. I think this is this is us dipping our tones into only fans.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, we always do.

SPEAKER_04:

We've been I don't know if you noticed this, we've been dipping our toes into these waters like tentatively. There's a real subtext going on here that that we don't want to be a UX podcast at all.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, it's uh yeah, the the Freudian in us comes out um just like testing the waters to see the audience uh appetite for lack of a better word for uh oh yeah there is a term appetite.

SPEAKER_04:

That's a flavour.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, cheese and onion. Anyway, sorry, well should should go around should go around Sean Ryder's house and uh I'm sure that'll boost the late. Sorry, shh, sorry.

SPEAKER_04:

I hope I hope Mr. Ryder doesn't have his internet anywhere. Internet his address posted anywhere online because that means everyone could find Nick then. Yeah. I'll either move into his basement, haven't you?

SPEAKER_01:

I'll either get Sean Ryder's crazy fans turning up at his doorstep or my fans turning up at mine. Oh, I like how how Right, what does that mean?

SPEAKER_04:

Ryder's fans are defined as crazy fans, yours are just fans. So are yours by people expected to be crazy, or is it that Mr. Ryder has a particular kind of delinquent following in the road?

SPEAKER_01:

So uh maybe another Freudian slip there. I think by almost by default, if you turn up at someone that you don't know's house uninvited, you are a Mormon.

SPEAKER_03:

A burglar.

SPEAKER_01:

Jehovah's Witness. A postman? I mean you could be any number of things. I guess I guess if you're turning up expecting like a warm welcome and Yeah, I think there's a there's a thing. You've got your own hair in a jar that you want to offer as a gift. There might be there might be an issue there. If you if it's your profession, like you're a postman or you're delivering those bags that you put clothes into recycle, probably alright. Yeah, that's probably all right, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Probably mentally stable, at least. Generally, I think the the common thought is that the fewer people who arrive at my doorstep in general, the better.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, I mean, given that you live on like the sixth floor in the back end of an apartment.

SPEAKER_04:

You say that, but we've had two uh such guests in two days. I had a flat inspection. Um, you know, it was thoroughly inspected and phoned fair. So Really? Right.

SPEAKER_01:

Was it going to be with Stevie Wonder by any chance? Thank you. Thank you, you prick. Just given the fact that like there's a nail through a fucking fire door as soon as you can.

SPEAKER_04:

Oh, yeah, that is true, yeah. And we have a cat. And and I haven't I haven't told the the landlord, um, who I I hope isn't a listener of Master Horses, that'll be a real turn-up. Um I haven't told the landlord that we have a cat, but in the report we got it says um client has a cat or has a pet. We were aware of this beforehand. And it's my my next question is how they listen to the show.

SPEAKER_03:

That's what I think. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Actually, that's that's a possible that's a possible, you know. I thought they might have said something, but this was the first flat inspection we had in nearly three years. So um I think basically the poor gentleman, who's a lovely chap called Joe, who um inspected the apartment. Yeah, there you go. Be sure to forward it to him um when we're asking him to fix our other things. Um he he had like nine or eleven or twelve or thirty uh uh a substantial number of other part apartments to inspect. So I think I wonder with whether in that process essentially the bar is set by the worst apartment you go into.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I'm gonna say if he's checking anyone else's, the bar will be very low. Yours was probably the first one of the day where he didn't see like human excrement on the wall. Ah, this isn't a crack then.

SPEAKER_04:

Excellent. That's a turn up for the books. Uh and little does does he know that we have a substantial um crack operation on the goal, but we're just professional about it, so we keep the place clean.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Um that was the first kind of unannounced visit. It was announced to do it in an email, so but still unwanted guess. Read it before. I was in my dressing gown, put it that way. Um which I think is why he didn't stick around. Um what time of day was this? Oh, it was oh, well into the afternoon.

SPEAKER_01:

Well into the afternoon of a weekday. Answering the door like some femme fatale in a fucking Raymond Chandler novel.

SPEAKER_00:

My husband.

SPEAKER_04:

I wasn't expecting guests today.

SPEAKER_01:

I've only got my second best negliger on.

SPEAKER_04:

And then the uh to continue on a theme, the next day, uh the chap who was coming to repair the washing machine came over. Um so that really does a proper anthology going on.

SPEAKER_01:

And he had to get your stepbrother to come round and see how.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, you know, that's it.

SPEAKER_01:

Um and he got to use insisting on pushing me in rather than trying to pull me out.

SPEAKER_04:

He had to use, I overheard him say, the last of his red converter fans or something like that. And he was on the phone and he was saying, he was saying, uh, can you order me some more? And I just I wondered what constitutes some red converter fans. Are we is it two, three, is that a lot, or are we talking about bulk 300? And uh, so this is kind of a question I've been concerning myself with recently.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, let's dive into that because just so happens that the the the subject of today is oh video games is what I wasn't gonna be what I thought we were doing.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, I was not washing machine part.

SPEAKER_01:

No, no, don't washing machine parts. It was a it was a a terrible segue. So bad that it was.

SPEAKER_03:

I like it, I like it. So the UX of video games.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, where do we start? So I studied video games at the university. I did an interactive um entertainment digital art was the name of my degree. Um and so we did a lot on user interface with a few modules on UI design. Uh and I think it's very particular because uh the theory of the way we were taught anyway, the theory of UI design is that essentially it's kind of the the vehicle that gets you from uh your side of the screen immersed into uh the other side of the screen uh into the game itself, and that's why it needs to be basically invisible for the most part.

SPEAKER_03:

Um so the UI exercise are we are we specifically talking about kind of like menus and the the GUI or the the which is I think so. The GUI, yeah. Is it a general user interface? Is it graphical user interface? Graphical interface.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, yeah. There are four types of UI. Um and I'm gonna have to Google this because spatial, diegetic, non-chart diegetic, and I have a fourth one, which I can't remember.

SPEAKER_01:

Um I remember last time we played video games, I think we talked about this. Yeah. I and I looked at the same image. My my issue with video game UX is like is everything apart from the visual, because the pretty much like in terms of like UI design, like it being stylistic or or looking good, the pr like most games these days sort of nail that, but that's because that's the only thing they're really concerned with. Whereas the UX, the actual real UX of most games is pretty fucking bad.

SPEAKER_04:

Yes. I agree. Um one of the biggest uh kind of gaps in the industry, even even now, so I finished Uni now quite a few years ago. Um and still um even in the games industry, which is considered a fast moving market, there is still a lack of UI designers uh and UI devs um around. It was meta was the last type of um UI design.

SPEAKER_01:

So you can space uh like um Mark Sugar Mountain's new company.

SPEAKER_04:

Uh yeah, well, similarly named, yes. Um but I imagine meta UI design has a better does a better job of trying to convey meaning than whatever the fuck meta Mr. Sugar Mountain is trying to do.

SPEAKER_01:

So m my favourite one of my favourite facts is that Zuckerberg in German means sugar mountain. So I now drop that knowledge at every available opportunity. Even if it derails a podcast.

SPEAKER_03:

Sorry, go ahead. I was trying to think of some rhetorical kind of like you know, is there is there somebody else we can align that with, but there just isn't so so I've killed that bit as well.

SPEAKER_04:

So we're not just floundering in the waters of dead space.

SPEAKER_03:

Let's get us back on track quickly, yeah. Mark, you've been playing Alden Ring. Yeah. So tell tell us a bit about because I've I've not played that, I've heard so much about it.

SPEAKER_04:

So I have um I haven't played many from software games before, but I've watched playthroughs of them all. I tend to be the kind of person who's too tired after work to play games, but not too tired to sit and watch someone else do it. So I've seen um Dark Souls 1, 2, and 3, Sakiro and uh Bloodborne, which is the vast there's another by From Software, the very first called Demon Souls. This is the latest installed. I believe so, yeah. It's um I'm gonna have to double check double check now, but um I believe so.

SPEAKER_01:

I know it's very supposed to be very good. I didn't realize it is from software, yeah. Is it? Oh, I didn't realise that.

SPEAKER_04:

They are all very variants on a very similar theme, which is essentially very difficult um enemies, very difficult bosses. Um but they all have slight differences. And um so of course your Dark Souls tends to be your core contingent. Um they uh I there is a very hardcore fan base behind all this, so I'm gonna get slaughtered by this group of people based on my you know lack of utter unquestioning reverence for these titles. You need to keep good, Mark. That's it, that's it. But generally, I think it's it's appreciated the Dark Souls titles are good for character customisation and very variants in the gameplay. Bloodborne's um combat was a lot quicker. And um Sakiro uh introduced a lot more kind of free moving around the map as well as sneaking mechanics and uh just beautiful, beautiful landscapes. This latest one seems to be a command uh kind of amalgamation of a lot of those ideas, and uh and that's why it's so widely acclaimed in my eyes now, so being so well received, is because it is because it's an open world um game as well, it's kind of very similar to an experience me and Nick had when we were playing No Man's Sky, which was this was a kind of game we dreamed of when we were children, and we're now coming into uh a time where it's actually possible to have those experiences with that level of realization. The re the reason I talk about all of the games is because substantially the UI in all of them is identical.

SPEAKER_03:

Almost, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, yeah, there are very, very few differences which are basically based on differences in the nuance of the mechanics, and that means that I'd say Elden Ring makes the same kind of mistakes, and we're talking quality of life things that can really fuck you up, um such as um and and some of it can be seen as mechanics just uh uh to add to the the increased difficulty, but there are certain things which just bring you out the gameplay. So one of the biggest problems, and it's the tiniest, tiniest thing, is you open your map with one button, but you close it with a different button.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh my god. What?

SPEAKER_04:

Yes, and and the thing is that same button, so you press uh the map button to open up the map. When you're in the map, you press the same button again and it opens another menu, a help menu.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh so if you don't accidentally double tap it, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Um or as I do, you try you press the map button, you press the map button again to close the menu, you accidentally open another menu, you have to then leave two menus via a different button to to Cyberpunk does that.

SPEAKER_01:

So like by by standard to get in and out of a car, I think you press you press circle to get in. Or you press circle to get out, definitely. But sometimes so squ in the whole game, square is like the action button. So if you want to interact with something or you want to reply to someone, you press square. But sometimes the action is say something and sort of get out of the car at the same time, so then get out of the car becomes the action button and not the get out of the car button. And that is enough. That is enough to just make my brain like grind to a halt when I'm playing a game, especially a game like Cyberpunk when I'm like just teetering on the edge of over stimulation at all times, anyway. That's that's very true.

SPEAKER_04:

And I think that's that comes down though, that you hit a nail the nail on the head though, as you very often do with these things, Nick, is um the these game worlds are now incredibly stimulating, incredibly immersive places that you can sink reasonably. My longest video game instance, 21 hours straight. Fuck me. Um and I wasn't pissing the pot or anything. I did it break for food and you know toilets. Um but that was it. And um, but that time passes like 10 minutes, yeah. Um and that's because of how stimulating and immersive these things are. But and that necessitates a really strong user experience so that when you're switching from one context to another, it's very, very fluid. And going back to graphical user interfaces, I think it's the biggest place where these things fall down. Yeah. And that becomes increasingly glaring when the rest of a game is so polished.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, I I I think that there's some basics that I mean, some some of the user the the beautiful and the the animations on them are amazing, you know the how they fit into the style of the game are brilliant, but then they ruin all of that by putting a tiny font.

SPEAKER_02:

Always, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, that if if if you're looking on less than an 80-inch TV, you know, is is fucking hard. It's a really I mean and and for some reason they used light fonts all the time as well. There's loads and loads of like light or thin fonts.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

And like when you put that over animations and stuff like that, I know it's like my favourite example of that is um Death Stranding, which is honestly like you you can see some screen grabs from that game, and it's literally like a joke. It's like someone's done it like to the nth degree to post on Reddit as a joke to take the piss out of it. But it's just a real screen grab. Like there's tiny, tiny text, and sometimes it fills like the entirety of the screen. So like every time you pick like an uh um an item up or something, it fills the screen with writing, and then you've got like tight like titles or area titles of where you are, it's absolutely ridiculous. It's all tiny on the screen, it's all like um really inappropriate colours for the backdrop that it's on. Yeah, in fact, it was so bad that I think during the update that. They released did it release like a director's cut of it, didn't they? They added an option to increase the font size, so it must have been complained about so much that they actually like patched it.

SPEAKER_04:

Well, I remember seeing some um incredibly kind of there were sped-up videos of like interactions for inventory management and scrapping stuff and selling stuff and completing quests, which for some reason in Death Stranding took five or ten minutes. It was just panning from one thing, pressing a button, panning from another, and it becomes a chore. It's another job.

SPEAKER_01:

It's insane. I don't I don't understand why you did that. Like you you will have to go to a menu and then you'll have to select what you want, and you sometimes in a menu you have to confirm the same thing like two or three times via different presses, uh like length presses of buttons, and then there's like a cutscene for no absolutely no reason, and then you have to confirm something else, and then there's another cutscene for no real reason, and then confirm something else, and then probably watch another cutscene, and then it's done, and that's literally like selling one. So the other thing is that like when you use when you've finished using a gun or something, you can't refill the gun, you've just got to scrap it and then make another one. So every time you've finished firing a gun, you've got to recycle it and go through that process every single time, but it's just completely unnecessary. Just let me like drop it or just give me one button press to recycle it. It's a bloody manufacturer problem that they've put in.

SPEAKER_04:

Goody could be environmentally friendly uh I mean that's that sort of stuff is an example of um I think I suppose you'd say it's a it's a type of UI, probably meta. Because it's the stuff that exists in the game world. Uh it's either spatial spatial or meta, and if there's men um menus it becomes diegetic. But um it exists in the game world and you're panning from thing to thing. A good example of this, um, and this is another example of bad uh UX was in Outriders. Um Outriders, big um who who was it? Um who published that now? Is it People Can Fly? No, it's like People Can Fly or something like that. Um very compelling core gameplay loop, like excellent mechanic mechanical gameplay, um, shit narrative, uninspiring art to be honest, um, but really good core, sort of solid core gameplay. And then there's this thing where you pass through certain areas and there's a loading screen. But there isn't one loading screen, there's three loading screens. Because it fades to black. Yeah, it fades to black, then there's an animation cutscene, and then it fades to black again. Now, what that reads as to me is that the developers had this stretch goal or this nice to have where that when you're passing from A to B, from a zone A to B, you do an animation and the loading would take place whilst that animation was going. Clearly, that didn't happen, so they introduced the fade to black on either side for some reason. So there was obviously, I don't know what's going on here, and it just feels like this piled one thing on top of another, on top of another. You could have had it fade to black and no one would have minded. You could have had it um pass through and there'd be a nice slick animation, and someone someone would have gone, ooh. You could have even had it where it faded to black, and then the animation, and then released you into the world without uh seamlessly, and people wouldn't even notice that you were loading in, they would just read the animation as the start of their experience. Um, but that's not what happened. You had a segregation point, a five-second animation, and then another segregation point. And the reason I raise that as an example of user interface, because it that is the interface through through which you're receiving information that the explosion moving out or experience, yeah. Uh, and it completely drags you out. Completely drags you out. Um, and I think it's just an excellent example of of um user experience that isn't isn't GUI-led, but is responsible for the same level of immersion or lack thereof in this case as a good or bad UI.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Did you ever get into sorry Paul? Oh just no, did you did you ever make your point about Elden Ring? Um it's UI.

SPEAKER_04:

I didn't really have I I think the core point is that there's a lot of really good UI um and and user experience points in there. So for example, uh I'd say the menus are alright. The menus are fine, that they follow pretty universal design language that does need updating, but I think the place you'd turn for that kind of update would be um modders because they tend to know how to fix very specific problems. Um but the thing so the the the menus are fine, but the um from software games have a thing where when you open a menu um you're still able to move around and there's still going stuff going on in the game world at the same time, which is an excellent example of of diegetic um UI because it means that you can't go around changing your weapons and and fucking about in menus when you're in an encounter. You've got to make sure you're relatively safe. Um and it can become a kind of emergent gameplay where you take calculated risks if you can to change things to your advantage. Um but uh I think that that all makes makes for great uh user interface design. But then there are again, there's these quality of life things that just haven't been considered. Like you have to check, you have to switch between your um health portion and your mana portion, and that's a button click. Which again can be seen as a tactical thing, but when you're in the middle of trying to pull off quite complicated movesets and you've got to do that as well, it sometimes reads as as if the game's just fucking you over. Um and it can just really crank you out.

SPEAKER_01:

It should be difficult because you've got to master the controls and exploit the movements of the enemies, not because the menu is difficult to navigate.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. Otherwise, you and there's there's probably a game idea in this. You should you're just playing difficult menu simulator. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

I think there is a game.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, I think most games are probably accidental with this, but I can imagine a game where you've got a very simple encounter every single time where you've got to defeat an enemy, it could just be like space invaders. You've got to fire a laser at one enemy approaching very slowly. And then as the levels increase, it's not that you get more enemies or they approach faster. The menu and the controls via that attack get increasingly more complicated.

SPEAKER_01:

That's fucking brilliant. Or or you have like a new weapon, but it's in so many subcategories, and so like Yeah, yeah. I think Ryanair have already built it.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, came back together.

SPEAKER_04:

But I believe um so there's there's uh some interesting stuff around for Elden Ring around where the user experience is actually causing people to miss out a lot. So from software haven't done open world before, not on this scale. They they kind of have semi semi-linear worlds where um you you unlock shortcuts and and eventually kind of procedurally unlock the map. Um, this is a first open world one, and what they found is because they've populated the world with mini quests, side missions, um what they call um untracked quests, um but because there's no um mini-map that shows you where NPCs are or what our objectives are and stuff like this to to encourage that kind of exploration, then people are just missing out. People are missing out on swaths of content because um they're just you know poodling about and they'll hear someone say, Hey, over here, miss it, and they just go over to the next.

SPEAKER_01:

So Breath of the Wild did that a bit, but it it seems people didn't miss it. Like there's a lot of stuff basically it's it kind of rewards um like snoo what's the what's the word I'm thinking of? Like rewards investigation and like yeah, yeah, sorry, go ahead.

SPEAKER_03:

But no, I mean like Breath of the Wild did it there's no limit on that, and I think on on Elden Ring, and what I've been hearing about Elden Ring is like if you go past a certain point in the story, you can never go back and do that.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh I think it like locks locks the content out.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, yeah. So once you've gone past a certain thing, you could miss out a swath of kind of like um requests and things like that.

SPEAKER_04:

I tried not to look things up because I get to I mean I was playing I was playing it, and my friend next to me um who's played it to a certain point, was essentially systematically ruining the game for me because he wasn't telling me what was gonna happen, he'd just tell me, oh, something big's gonna happen now, and then something big was happening, and it was like, oh well, I was completely expecting not exactly that, but something of magnitude, and it's completely destroyed the illusion. Um, so I've been avoiding that kind of thing. But one thing that uh Chris said to me was that he's heard that um what happens is you'll do a mission for someone, and the impact of that mission you'll find out as you proceed through the game later on. Like there's another place where you'll encounter them. Now, of course, if you don't do that, then you don't encounter them. Now, a few other games do this. I believe Cyberpunk 2077 did it with certain missions. Oh yeah. Um and Dragon's Dogma also does this as well. And I have to say, the I've got this real like completionist element about me. I never achieved that completion. I just like the idea of having the option.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

And on those two instances, when I found out I'd missed out on content, I stopped playing. I just stopped playing, and I've not been back to Cyberpunk in two years, I've not been back on Dragon Sogma in a year or so.

SPEAKER_03:

This it's really interesting because you I was thinking about this when you were talking earlier, and kind of like it's that I love playing games, but if I take a break, even if it's for a week from those games, because and and one thing uh kind of like on the UI and the UX that games do really well is the onboarding. But if you happen to offboard and then onboard exactly the same place you come in at, it's it's like you start at level 99 then, yeah. From zero to ninety-nine, and it becomes kind of then frustrating and beyond a good experience, then.

SPEAKER_01:

I so I actually add weirdly my first thought upon waking up this morning was uh literally like one of the first things I thought when I woke up this morning, and I remember it because I was like, why the hell am I thinking about that? Was that I got um I got Sifu like two or three weeks ago, and I played it a lot, and I managed to get to the second level, second or third level, with like a relatively low age, which is kind of the you know, you you're supposed to die as few times as possible, and now I've not played it in three weeks, and I've got to jump back into it on level three of a very difficult game and remember like and get up to speed of how good I was when I stopped playing it, and I just felt like I'm like, I'm gonna have to start this again, aren't I? Yeah, because I've had a break, I've had the audacity to have a break from playing.

SPEAKER_04:

I had this exact feeling when I started on Cyberpunk again. I'd not played it in several months, and in my magnanimous wisdom, I'd save the game in the middle of a you know quite a hot situation. Yeah, you know, I was sneaking around this um facility in the mid I didn't even remember the button to fire my gun. Never mind use my axe or how to sneak or where I was or what the fuck I was doing. And I just thought I'd put 40 hours in this game in maybe even 60 hours like within the space of a week. And now I'm gonna have to do that again with the new character.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I had a sim a really similar thought, but they just re they just released the PS5 upgrade for it, you know, like the next gen uh graphical polish and a load of patches and stuff. And uh I had a similar thought. I was like, I've no idea really what was going on when I left this, and it's quite a complicated game anyway. But I I think my final decision was that to start again was just the fact that it's it looks pretty now, so I'm gonna start again. And well, like I I had it on PS4 at launch, so it was the most bugged out, atrocious thing as well.

SPEAKER_04:

I've been playing with two dolls made out of mashed potato. I might have uh off the things on acid, like yeah, probably waiting 20 minutes between scenes for it to load in. Um so I think we actually hit on a really interesting kind of discussion point because I agree, and uh again when I was at university we did modules on um tutorials and stuff like that. Um and one of the most iconic introductions and tutorials in video games is the first level of um Mario. Because it's one of the best like the original. The original Mario. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um Super Mario, I think it I think it is. Uh I can never remember the names of them. But um, yeah, essentially what it does is it manages to introduce to you all of the and there's breakdowns of this on YouTube, so I encourage you just to to look at um Mario Level 1 breakdown. Um and in the first five seconds or ten seconds, certainly in the first minute, um you're explained all the mechanics. So, for example, you start and you've got a spit a spate where you're able to just run, and it it it there's the space between that and your next interaction demonstrates how quickly you move and how quickly the run-up is. Then there's two, I think uh there's three blocks, and I think one is a coin block between two bricks, and that encourages you to jump, that's intuitively enough, that teaches that mechanic. You then pick up the coin, and then that's when your first enemy comes through, I think, and you're either then in a perfect position to jump on its head, and you do all that in the space of about ten seconds, and all of a sudden, 90% of the mechanics are explained to you, and then you're able to continue the level, and it other other elements are introduced more procedurally. Um, but that is the most iconic um kind of introduction. There's a bit of trivia for you.

SPEAKER_01:

Um that kind of sums up how video games have progressed, done it. You like you have you had absolute at the start of like when video games were a thing, you had absolute famine where you had to make the most out of every pixel. Like they gave Mario a mustache so that you could tell that he had a nose and therefore that he had a face. And right that's why that's why they did it. And that was a conscious decision they had to make based on like very few pixels, and and also like had to explain the game mechanics as quickly as possible, like using as little memory as possible, like no text on the screen, like not losing any of the memory on the cartridge to like the tutorial when they had to get the rest of the game on there, and now like we arrive where we are now, like decades later, where you've got all this technology and all this graphical capability and all this space on the hard drive, and you don't even have to finish a game for launch day because you can just patch it, and it's almost like all the care has gone out of creating the game, and it's just well, I mean, it is just an industry like ruled over by executives now, innit?

SPEAKER_04:

Oh, yeah, yeah. Um, that is a podcast in and of itself, and probably not a UX podcast. Um, but uh there are good examples of of tutorial zones, you get tutorial levels and tutorial zones, um they tend to take a bit too long, I find, um because of the complexity.

SPEAKER_01:

Um the amount of times in a computer game I've had to um I've had to like calibrate my suit's headset and look up, down, and left and right as well. Like they're always they're always the same thing, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, yeah. I remember the very start of Portal 2 was excellent because they started that they brought the tutorial into the narrative exposition of what was going on, and you had Wheatley, who was voiced by oh, what's his name now? Steve Merchant. Steve Merchant. Yeah, he says, Um, yes, uh, press that button to talk. Oh, why no, no, he said say something to me. It wasn't that meta. And um you press the Y button to say something, and your character jumps up and down. And uh the Wheatley just says, Well, that that's jumping, but that's good, you can move, that's that's that's fine, and then it proceeds kind of along that line, setting up the tone for you being perceived as this insane person uh who's been locked in a facility for goodness knows how long. Um, and and it just that was really, really cute basically.

SPEAKER_03:

Um that's definitely one of my fondest memories. Now one of my fondest memories of onboarding onto a game is that whole experience, and I think the there's a point to that and kind of thought is it getting a bit samey? Then it flips it and changes it and stuff like that, and it's really nice, kind of like it must have been. It's weird, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01:

Like when when that happens, so when like the the twist expectation on you, I remember like almost every time thinking, oh fucking hell, not this again. Isn't it weird how every time they do that you like you actually think before before they flip it on you that oh god I can't believe they're doing this again, and then they flip it and you're like, oh, oh, it's like almost it's like they've almost done it like so well on purpose to then like pull the rug out from under you.

SPEAKER_04:

So the question I have then is can we um three UX designers now consider that problem of okay, so you've not played a game, let's say you've not not for let's say in more than a couple of weeks, less than a couple of years. So you've not played it for a month, maybe a month and a half. You kind of you remember the the core idea, you remember the mechanics, you've still you know where you are in the story roughly. But your the finer finesse there is gone. And that the bar of the the level to entry, or no, not the entry, the level to resuming is suddenly incredibly high. How do we solve that problem?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, quite a lot of games now that I've I've definitely I can't think of the actual example now, but just have like tutorial on the main menu now, and you can do the tutorial as like a separate thing. I've definitely seen that. I just can't I can't remember what game it is. And also going back to CFU actually, they might have um preempted this problem, but there is like a practice area in the dojo where you can just go and fight so you know that'd probably help you get up to speed again as well.

SPEAKER_03:

I I'd say Netflix have nailed this but for serious so if you watch So if you watch uh binge watcher series, they skip the recap. But if you watch it if you um stop watching it and then kind of like go back a couple of days later, gives you an option to recap the storyline. And I think uh that yeah, yeah, yeah. And then you kind of like you know, kind of like they used to do on or they still do it on serialized TV, you know. Hollyoge last week, or kind of yeah, in in you know, this this was yeah, in Hollyogs. You know, this this is what happened last time, and you know, this is this is an intro into this this episode, and or they'll give you some I think I I was watching Star Trek Discovery and they even did uh a recap of the first ever episode of Star Trek the original series, because it introduced some characters from that from that episode, and I thought that's really nice because it doesn't make it this exclusive fan base thing, and it opens up to loads of people. I think that that's quite nice. So kind of like if you know you've left a game for a week, it could kind of say this is a recap of the story, because I think that's probably a game that does that.

SPEAKER_00:

What is that?

SPEAKER_01:

I can't remember, but I know there is on the loading screen. It it literally on the loading screen recaps the story up until that point, and again I remember specifically seeing it and going, Oh, that's really good, and like not seeing that.

SPEAKER_04:

We did ages ago about uses for loading.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh like loading, yeah, yeah, loading screens, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Never really thought of that back then. But I remember thinking like, how many of these screens have they written? Because I could leave this game at any point. Any point, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, I think well, I I had an interesting idea actually. You know how Netflix is has now got um has managed to automate their thumbnail generation.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Do you think that we'll get to a point of AI sophistication where we could automate your uh recaps? So your your um your AI would be able to pick out the key narrative points without necessarily being told. And requesting that. I'd love to see the tests of them, like just people like entering rooms going yes and then closing doors.

SPEAKER_01:

Um That's that's really interesting because I'd love to know Netflix's appetite for spending time developing that because their business structure seems to be based on like binge watching. Like I could, you know, obviously they could be wrong, they keep like all the figures and stuff quite secret, don't they, at Netflix, but they release everything at once for a reason, presumably, and a lot of people, particularly people I know, and from what I see on on social media and stuff, just binge watch series entirely and and probably don't wait a week to like come back and watch the second half of the series or whatever.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. Netflix did a bit of research, uh it was either the end of last year or the beginning of this year, and they found a lot of people were signing up for like the three months trial or and binge watching everything. Yeah, I did that on the last week. And then just like ditch the burn her email address. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Um yeah, and it's so I don't know if that's a detriment, and that's one of the reasons kind of like why I think Apple of Disney Plus especially released weekly.

SPEAKER_01:

So it's the kind of I I think like n like nerd culture and like office culture or whatever ties into the weekly episodic way of doing it because you talk about it the next day at work, like the the water cooler moment that they used to call it back when people actually went into the office.

SPEAKER_04:

And I remember I I never watched The Mandalorian, but I remember being immersed in that conversation for weeks and weeks. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because everyone I know fucking loves Star Wars. And I I'm one of those unique individuals who thinks Star Wars is fine. In fact, it's better than fine, it's good, it's good, and that's kind of where the book stops with me.

SPEAKER_01:

Every Thursday morning you just wake up to a flood of the bits. But why it was good and why it was bad. I I find it as interesting as watching the show sometimes, sometimes more so when it's like that something like Boba Fett.

SPEAKER_04:

I'd say arguably where where the format's helped along, though, where the format helps along the conversation is everyone's at the same point. I realize at least people can only get to a certain you know, um, it's all very well.

SPEAKER_01:

But in terms of like marketing and success of the show, it drags that conversation out for like a month or two. Whereas if you binge watch it over the weekend, there's probably going to be quite a bit of buzz over the weekend, and then nothing.

SPEAKER_04:

Then people catching up, essentially, yeah. People who haven't got time to watch more than a couple of episodes a night.

SPEAKER_03:

And and I think what you find it now, I mean, I think Strange Stranger Things 4 is a prime example because they're so well produced uh and kind of like rely on so many special effects. The time between the the series is gets longer so much longer now that again this goes back to kind of like you know, kind of remembering that story of kind of like, you know, do do they Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

Like I don't remember anything that happened in the last series of Stranger Things.

SPEAKER_03:

No, I thought yeah, I've pumpkins, that's what I remember, and a big thing Oh, is that that series where there was like the the field of rotten pumpkins or something? Yeah, yeah, I think so. But it could have merged into two.

SPEAKER_01:

So But I only I only remember I only remember that because um I made Drew watch series one, which is great, and then it it just ran on and in the background, and I remember seeing a field full of rotten pumpkins and going, Oh, I don't remember that from series three, probably because it was trash and I put it out on it.

SPEAKER_04:

I've only ever watched the first series. Yeah, I really enjoyed that and I fully intended to watch the second and then just never fucking got around to it. Uh and I think that's kinda you kind of get that with with all these things, and I think it going back to the uh video game conversation, you uh let's Well, I was just gonna say, do we need to actually segue to UX Tombola, but let's let's wrap it up.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, to finally finish it.

SPEAKER_04:

I think the expectation of the the expectation of to play a video game now where you have to spend 40 hours to get eve sometimes even the main story, and one of the biggest selling points is getting uh you know the the amount of hours of gameplay you'll get from it, um to not then have um an experience that brings you up to speed mechanically, um narratively, I think he's very remiss and I I think there needs to be a a lot more done in this area, I think. Sandbox modes, um arenas, practice modes, practice videos, tutorial assistance, I think, are a big part of that.

SPEAKER_01:

Or definitely bring back the instruction booklet.

SPEAKER_04:

I'd like to see this, but then again, that that leads on to a big that means you'd have to bring back awning the game.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Or you buy it online and they post you out in an instruction book. I I I had the rude reminder of this when I was playing Elden Ring, and it was uh I think it was ten to four in the morning. So uh on a weekday, so you know, all very well and good, but uh I'm basically on a nocturnal cycle at the second. Um and it booted me out of the game, single-player game, with online mechanics, but by and large single player, certainly how I'm playing it. Uh, because it had been patched, it'd been updated, it was updating. And I wasn't able to decide myself when I wanted to update. Which just reminded me that one of the things. But you want PC. Yeah, yeah. But it logged me out to the servers, and that's the point. One of these days those servers will be turned off. And this is for any online experience um or or an online curated experience. Um and and it'll all dissolve into the ether, and all those hundreds of hours you spent will dissolve with it. So there's an important reminder that it's often about the journey and not the destination.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. Stop wasting your time on video games, kids.

SPEAKER_01:

What a beautiful point to wrap the conversation up. Thank you. So uh yeah, that was really good. So what's what's next? Is it um thingy? It is. Take it away.

SPEAKER_03:

Punch it.

SPEAKER_00:

That sound means it's time for UX Tombola.

SPEAKER_01:

The segment of the show where we pick a random product, object, service, or place from the Tombola machine and discuss its terrible or great UX.

SPEAKER_03:

Spin the wheel, Nick.

SPEAKER_01:

Nice. You really need to do something about that horrific I I love it.

SPEAKER_00:

Just don't just I scream so loud that the microphone failed.

SPEAKER_04:

It's so, so contrived. Um piecemeal, it is perfect. I love it.

SPEAKER_01:

I completely forgot even edited to death. It was uh the right a bit of background on that intro is that I was doing it and I don't for some reason my voice sounds really husky on that. I wonder if I was just putting up the back of the coverings from COVID, yeah. Is that what it was? And uh yeah, so I was I was reading I was reading the script and Paul, I did it like twice, and then Paul's like, can you can you do it with a bit more energy, so that that you've heard was my like super sarcastic response to Paul with a bit more energy, which was so much Ainsley Harriet energy that I basically broke my microphone. Oh yeah, absolutely. That's brilliant.

SPEAKER_03:

Hi chill. It was it was my design brief, make it pop.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, literally, yeah, make it made my microphone pop. Right.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, so uh I mean wow, we need a thing, we need a song. Oh yeah, yeah. Can we have a song? I mean have I got any music? Let's uh I'm not even clicking through oh didn't want that.

SPEAKER_00:

You know, that's like that's like yeah, it was one humble X Factor The Club That's my uh that's my X Factor guy.

SPEAKER_01:

There you go.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh, yeah, UX Dumboler, baby. I'm gonna take you to a night on the town, UX Dumboler. I wanna see what's underneath your clothes, UX Dumboler. Give me all your holes.

SPEAKER_01:

That you reach into the holes that you reach into to get the piece of paper. I was gonna finish I was gonna finish that, but um holes. Um there's a hole in the front of the of the barrel thing. Yeah, yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_04:

Part of Nick's latest album, Tom Bowler and shit.

SPEAKER_01:

Sixteen songs about a Tom Bowler machine. Um get it this Father's Day for your father's so uh today's today's um piece of actual real paper that I've pulled from a real Tom Bowler machine is uh the UX of a bow tie. Mark, I feel you are uniquely placed to talk about this.

SPEAKER_04:

Yes, um yeah, there are two main types of bow tie out there at the minute, uh, and that is the um the bow tie called the self-tying bow tie, which is just you know, it's a tie you tie yourself, it's a bow tie. And then it's not self-that's somewhat misleading, isn't it? Yeah, exactly. So I had this conversation in about three babadasheries, and none of them knew. I said, Have you got a self-tying bow tie? And they'd look at me a minute as if to say, You mean a bow tie, you fuck. And of course I meant a bow tie, but I didn't want I wanted I needed to explicitly say that I'm not gonna degrade myself to wearing a pre-tied bow tie because I'm not a child.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh, I feel like this is the best possible thing we could have picked for a UX dumbbell. That, right off the bat, I have serious problems with. Anyway, go on, what's the next? What's the second type?

SPEAKER_04:

The second is the pre-tied bow tie, which comes pre-tied, it is essentially um glued together or stitched together, and it comes on a band which is adjustable, and you essentially just clip it round and you're ready to go. Um interestingly, this has led to a quite interesting divergence when it comes to the fashion of tying your bow tie, which is now, and and this is actually I say no, it's actually always really been the case because of how a tort a bow tie is tied, but the asymmetry of your bore is actually part of the bore itself. Now, I'm sorry to use this person as an example, but if you look at Winston Churchill, who always very often wore a bow tie, he was a good example of a a snappy dresser, shall we say, who um who was always wore a particularly asymmetrical bow tie and um has has had a particular influence over the way of wearing it.

SPEAKER_03:

I'd love to know that we're keeping this on trend.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, oh yeah, yeah. Bloody elf. We're talking about bought eyes, and I've mentioned Churchill, bloody elf.

SPEAKER_03:

God I'm confused.

SPEAKER_04:

It's just it's just meaningless, isn't it? No one's gonna relate to any of that.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh right, okay. Uh right.

SPEAKER_04:

Both eyes are worn commonly, and Churchill is a genocidal maniac.

SPEAKER_01:

So the uh the very we're keeping it very contemporary with our reference to antiquated clothing and long long dead British prime ministers. Uh yeah, what the hell was I gonna say then? Bow ties, bow ties, bow ties.

SPEAKER_03:

Bow ties. Yeah, yeah. There was something I was gonna say, Mark, about the way you tie a bow tie.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh yeah, that's it, asymmetry. Is that not regarded as like untidy then?

SPEAKER_04:

So no, it's not actually. There will be an element of there's a fine balance, a goldilocks zone of asymmetry, if you will. Um but yeah, it's meant to it's it's almost like a bit of sprezzatura, which you don't get in certainly not in British suits very often. It's more all the consonants that that kind of stuff is um celebrated. That spreadura is um the kind of the effort of making it look like you haven't made an effort.

SPEAKER_01:

Which is a word I didn't realise sums up my entire life to the point where I heard it like two years ago from Mark.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Um and and it it's actually quite the Hell Murray in a way, because tying a bow tie is really fucking awkward. You know, it took me at least four times to learn. Um so four ties four ties. Um to learn how to tie my bow tie. And yeah, because you have to, you know, you have to hold it vertically and then horizontally and then wrap it around, you know. Um and I remember I was using a YouTube tutorial to um because I'm Victorian in certain ways, but I've still got an inquiring mind. I was watching a YouTube, and there was one where Bill Nye was supposed to teach you how to do it, and it was the hammiest shit I'd ever I've ever seen. Because he basically said, I like to wear bow ties because I think they're cool. Um and then he said, This is how you tie a bow tie, tied it, and then said, That's how you tie a bow tie. Absolutely zero instructional value whatsoever.

SPEAKER_01:

So I want to get I wanna I I really want to dive into the self-tying bow tie and yeah and and the absolute horoscape of that that name because Yeah, I know, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

That's what it sounds like you pull on a string.

SPEAKER_03:

Pull on two strings and it bundles up. Oh that'd be the dream.

SPEAKER_04:

And it makes some kind of like pipe whistle noise as it goes up.

SPEAKER_01:

Like I think you know those you know those metal bands that kids have and they like slap them on the wrist and it's like it's that kind of thing. Or like you say, like you pull a drink, you pull a drawstring. It's like it looks like an opera scarf. There's a fucking contemporary reference thing. It looks like an opera scarf. You pull like a cord and it just goes like the scarf for any the tie for any occasion.

SPEAKER_04:

Bow tie, opera scarf.

SPEAKER_01:

Imagine me like the uh the layman that I am rocking up to like uh uh what's the what like a tailor's? Is that the is that the correct word for somewhere that you buy your bow tie from? And going in buy them from you?

SPEAKER_04:

Haberdasheries will sell bow ties as well.

SPEAKER_01:

So Mark said so I've picture this. I've I've text Mark, I'm like, Mark, I'm in the market for a new bow tie. What are you recommending, Mark? And just it just it just texts me, just text me back, oh just go into so-and-so habadasheries and just ask them for a self tying bow tie. Don't you dare get a pre tied one. So I'm like, alright, okay. And then all night long I'm having um beautiful dreams about the the mechanics involved in this self tying bow tie that I'm gonna be I'm gonna be introduced to tomorrow and and thinking of all the wonderful ways that it's it this could possibly work. And then again. Get there and ask for a cell tying bow tie and uh come crashing back down to earth and realise it just means that I tie it myself. Yeah, you're handing a strip of fabric every single five bones, thank you. At which point I have to be tackled to the floor um as not to trash the entire because you're dangerous yourself and others.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. But there is a good point, because like if you if you go and you don't ask for sulfine bow tie, you'll get a bow tie with a piece of elastic.

SPEAKER_04:

It t they tend to gear towards the pre-dar. And I I got that for a New Year's dinner I was at, uh, which it was a black tie event, apparently. Um and uh I was very keenly observing to see if anyone else was it's very easy to spot a a pre-tied bore tie because they are incredibly symmetrical. Um yeah, and there's and and so there's not it kind of lacks that bit of individuality. Um when you're wearing a um uh an evening suit, there isn't much room for individuality, so it all depends on the small details, the devil's in the detail. Um and I didn't find one. I think it's more common now just to wear a self-time one because it's easier, but it kind of kind of defeats the objective. You know um if you meant you're meant to make an effort, and then it's interesting to me that certain certain um signals are spotted now to see whether you've made the effort or not in in when it comes to what what about the what makes it asymmetrical?

SPEAKER_01:

Is it that one side of the thing is like a bigger loop than the other? Essentially, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, yeah, because that's the way that it's tied.

SPEAKER_01:

Um essentially is like the excess you've got a longer excess, because you have a bit more.

SPEAKER_04:

Well, no, in fact, that that's there as well. So it's it's either, and it's again it's just about getting that balance right. Um when I tied my tie, I tried to have um the both ends behind both tails of the fish, as it were, um, as opposed to the the the loops out from slightly longer than the loops, and so it gave this tiered effect, which I was going for.

SPEAKER_01:

And that is that also a sign that it's definitely a self-tied one as well, because I'm assuming it probably doesn't have so much.

SPEAKER_04:

It doesn't have tails like that. No, no, no. Um so you can there's again, it's one of those things where you have to be essentially a dandy like I am to notice, but you do get a lot of satisfaction out of it.

SPEAKER_01:

You say that, I don't think I've ever actually seen you in the bow tie. You know, I know you wear um you wear I've seen you in an opera scarf, I've seen you in a cravat, which I believe you wear in now.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

I feel like I've probably seen you in a tie.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, I don't think I've ever seen I don't think I've ever seen you in a bow tie. I very rarely wear bow ties for fear of looking like a waiter. Yeah, well that's under thought I feel like so it's only at black tie events, really I wear bow ties. That's just a personal preference thing. Um so that was yeah, that was the last time I wore a bow tie. I do, I mean, I do like bow ties by and large, it's just not for me. So you know sorry, Borgo.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, when when you were learning to tie your bow tie, did what I found um that all the YouTube videos I watched did it like you were standing somebody was standing by behind you in front of you, yeah, doing it. But actually, in reality, when you tie bow tie, you're in a mirror and everything is fucking black.

SPEAKER_04:

So I found I found a video, and if I remember correctly, it actually did it both way around for one guy, this guy did it one way around, which was what was intuitive to him, and then he flipped it around so that it would be what would he or he flipped his camera. I think he flipped the camera around. But um so it would be your right, but it would be his left that he was doing it on, so that it could be so those reasons that problem does exist, and people who again Bill Nye just kind of said, uh wrap it round your neck, pull it through, there you go, you've got a bore tie. Really? If I did a slip up there, I've made a noose. So why am I actually doing this? And for such a pioneer of the scientific process, I felt a bit left out. So I went elsewhere for me tutorial room.

SPEAKER_01:

I feel like the UX of uh the bow tie is quite a tricky thing, then, right? Because so I guess it's one of those things, like a lot of things, where if you know how to do it, it's probably not that difficult. It's probably the learning that's the difficult thing rather than the actual doing, because a lot gets made on like films and TV shows about how people don't know how to tie a tie, and then there's a scene where someone helps them out and it's like a bonding moment or whatever. I can fucking tie a tie and look at certain e. So it's not like it's not that difficult to tie a tie. I'm assuming it's equally as as difficult or not difficult to tie a bow tie once you know I'm gonna be able to do it.

SPEAKER_04:

It's slightly trickier. It's slightly trickier, but um but I think but it's not like beyond the average. It's not beyond the bail, no. You know, it's not it's not rocket scientists, neurosurgeons, bow tie tyres on the scale of knowledge.

SPEAKER_01:

So but but if you were to fix the UX of a bow tie, it would be a self-discussion. It would have to be pre-pre-tied. But then I think that's interesting then that the that that fixing the problem like quote problem of tying a bow tie makes it a lesser product in people's eyes.

SPEAKER_04:

That's because, and this is an interesting UX point, I think, it gives you one solution. And that one solution, it's a one-size-fits-all solution for I mean you've got different widths of neck, but when it comes to personalisation, customisation, you've got what the factory of the line produces, which is something very symmetrical, um, stylistically identical, and again lacks a particular polish because it's just been churned out. Trying to find a silk bow tie in um 2022.

SPEAKER_01:

It's almost as if the the bow tie is an elitist piece of clothing, isn't it? That like looking down upon the pre-tied bow tie is quite a bit.

SPEAKER_04:

I think it definitely is, but it's just a higher quality garment. There's someone generated to that. I mean, yeah, still just just getting a lot of things. I imagine where oh my braces just slipped down, excuse me, sir.

SPEAKER_03:

Not that kind of establishment tied up to our old show with a bit of a bit of uh only fans content.

SPEAKER_00:

Um I think for the gentleman's only fans account. Look at my ankles. Ooh, ooh, my garden just slipped down.

SPEAKER_04:

Not last cleave will be of any length. Um yeah, I think what I'd like to see though, uh see if I think if you were to teach someone to tie a bow tie, then um they'll never go hungry, question mark.

SPEAKER_03:

Maybe the maybe the UX maybe I disagree with that.

SPEAKER_01:

Maybe the UX solution is designed in a good way to explain how to tie the the bow tie rather than the bow tie.

SPEAKER_04:

Because it means you don't have to compromise on your own personal influence, and when it comes to fashion statements, garments uh garments like that of any kind, especially accessories, being able to tie it in a way that is individualistic actually becomes far more important. You know, you there are you can get books on different ways to tie a scarf.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, I was just gonna say so.

SPEAKER_04:

Are there different ways to do a bow tie like there are a tie then? There are a couple of ways that achieve slightly different effects, but by and large, it is just the variance of around you know tail lengths and stuff like that. Um I don't know, I've not looked into it. I was again, I don't really wear them.

SPEAKER_03:

I think there is, I think there is a different knot, yeah, you can do like a double one or a single one.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I feel like I've seen a bow tie with a double bow, or is that just a different type of tie?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, there is one. We could do two pieces of cloth together to make like a uh two-tone a super bow tie. Yeah, super bow tie. Yeah, I I'd I'd like to put it out there that when you were talking about um tying bow ties, my instant 80s uh reference came in to Back to the Future, where we have Marty that flies self-type trainers.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Which are real now, they're a real thing.

SPEAKER_03:

Well real thing, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Could we get like uh as long as on the fine print it says we're not responsible for any garrottings? Oh god, yeah, that's a very dangerous.

SPEAKER_01:

In the movie here's a here's a in the movie uh uh is it ordinary No, it's not Ordinary Decent Criminal, because that's uh a movie star in He who shall not be named. There's a movie, a Gerard Butler film where he's in prison but he's killing people, and it turns out that he used he's like a a CIA engineer who was hired to like kill people. Anyway, there's a there's a story in that where he puts like a a ratchet in a in a bow tie and they somehow managed to get it to a Colombian drug lord and he was found like garotted in his bedroom the next day. So so none of that, basically. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

It operates on a very thin bit of piano wire. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's on a very fast spool, and you just press a button and oh yeah, decapitated by your own bow tie.

SPEAKER_01:

I think I think there needs to be a lot of like user trust involved in putting what is essentially an an automatic garotte around your own neck.

SPEAKER_04:

It's like exploding collar, isn't it?

SPEAKER_03:

Just yeah. Oh, I would have loved to be on the kind of like the the fly on the wall when the script writers were thinking like how do you think you could get it out? And they were kind of like, yeah, someone's already done that, somebody's already done that. I know bow ties. Bow tie. Bow ties. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

I have to say all the shit out of bow ties. Bill Nye, your collar's looking a bit wonky. I've got it.

SPEAKER_01:

Cut to Bill Nye swinging from uh a line. So have we got a product then? Are we uh I'm assuming it's like a handbook or like an IKEA style like pamphlet how to tie the bow tie.

SPEAKER_03:

I think it's a micro video course that people can subscribe to.

SPEAKER_01:

Like uh it's um it's a QR code on the on the box.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, point your phone to it and then uh I tell you what, that's it.

SPEAKER_01:

It's Bill Nye showing you how to tie a bow tie.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh, then to the solve that.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah, that'd be good, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Because you can tie it and then it'd give you the kind of like your perfect what to do next.

SPEAKER_01:

What was the Bill Nye video? I can't believe I've just twigged that what you were talking about. So you've got Bill Nye tying a bow tie while at the same time going, the oceans are rising, kids. Now what you want to do is on so on this side you'll be running out of uh fabric, just like we're running out of time to reverse the changes of climate. How did he tie that into whatever it was that he was talking about?

SPEAKER_04:

Well, he didn't. I think it was for GQ magazine or some tribe. You know, I the ironically name Gentleman's Quarterly because it sells the same Rolex over the s over you know 60 pages, you know. And almost exclusively features anything other than gentle people. So, you know. Swats. Yeah. It's basically loaded for people who wear ties on GQ magazine. If you are looking for a an actual Gentleman's Quarterly, I recommend Chap magazine.

unknown:

Is that a real thing?

SPEAKER_01:

That's a real that's a real dandy mag. Oh, is it oh that's disappointing because I wanted to hear Mark Steelers advert for Chap Magazine.

SPEAKER_04:

No, Mark Steelers example would spell it sell a very specific type of denim that went over your trousers.

SPEAKER_01:

Oh well on that note, taking away Mark Steelers. Have we got an intro?

SPEAKER_03:

Oh, is it no?

SPEAKER_01:

We've only got two intro now, haven't we? This is how the sausage gets made.

SPEAKER_04:

Here again from my vacation to um the haberdasheries and gentlemen's outfitters of Itali. It was lovely. Not as good as the ones in I'm trying to think of somewhere that wouldn't have any haberdasheries. Not as good as the one in Slough. So go with uh well I feel like I want the product I've got for you today isn't so much a product as a complementary product. You buy one of our self-tying bow ties and we'll give you the instructions to go along with it. You scan the QR code and we'll take you through step by step, but make sure you scan the other one because you don't scan the other QR code because it will decapitate you with piano line. We are not responsible for any dismemberment. Love you, thanks.

SPEAKER_03:

Well, if that doesn't shift from the game with flying out that door, ratcheting themselves out of the door.

SPEAKER_04:

A strip of fact it's definitely not Mark Steeler's attempt to take over Bolton via the booming bow tie economy. Oh yeah. They just just all the screams in Bolton, Mark Steele going, LO customers and loyal as I shall now refer to you, loyal subjects. You're all wearing your bow ties. If I press this button, you lose your heads. Literally.

SPEAKER_01:

That sounds like fucking the the plot to uh Kingsman or something. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Nicolas Cage B movie. All of them. All of them. Any Nicholas Cage movie.

SPEAKER_01:

Apart from the one that he won an Oscar for.

SPEAKER_04:

I remember I remember I watched um what is it, Rapture or Gone to the Rapture? It was essentially everyone had gone to the Rapture, um, apart from him and a few other people, and he was a pilot. I just remember one point, you know, apocalyptic scenario, they get they need a compass. So they use an app on your phone. And it's like, where the fuck are you getting the service for that? You're the last four people on Earth. How is that not the first system to have imploded? Why are you not using a needle in some water or something like you learned of the boy skates? Anyway. Just a thought.

SPEAKER_01:

Who the fuck carries a needle round with a phone chance of getting satellite service?

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, I I'm more likely to have a compass app on my phone. You know, not Google Maps. Because, you know, if I'm going to the cafe, I always go via the north. You know. I'll go to the cafe of the north of the city.

SPEAKER_03:

Oh god. Yeah. Anyway. Anyway on that note. Yeah. Good chat.

SPEAKER_01:

It was it was good fun. Yeah. Do we do we have we got an outro? Do we need to do the outro?

SPEAKER_03:

We have got an outro, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Are we is that we repping the UX uh video games iceberg, so we'll probably have to come back and be more specific about things, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, yeah, definitely. Okay. Retro games, yeah, yeah, tutorials, menus, maybe a Patreon special at Patreon forward slash Fasterhorses. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If anyone's got any good um UX or bad UX examples in video games, uh drop us a message at uh Fasterhorses UX on Twitter. Uh or find us uh just sitting outside Nick's house.

SPEAKER_04:

Yep. We are accepting our mail via Mr. Ryder at the second. He's our act our our standing PO box.

unknown:

Yep.

SPEAKER_03:

Um if he's not yeah, investigating uh UFOs he'll be around. Thanks. Yeah, yeah, don't you see him on his buddy massive telescope outside your window?

SPEAKER_01:

I don't know.

SPEAKER_02:

I'm surprised your first neck. Yeah, yeah. I do know it's a real Mr.

SPEAKER_04:

Ryder. Anyway, that's right. There you go Not with a bang, but with a whimper. Well that's it for this episode of Faster Horses. If you like the show, please like, subscribe, and leave a review. It really does help. You can join us on patreon.com forward slash faster horses from one pound a month for more chat, UX Tombola, and the hossest new products from Boltman Arcade's own Mark Steeler. Special thanks to James Med for our theme shooting. I'm Mark Suckcliff. I'm Nick Tomlinson. I'm Paul Shaw. Follow us on Twitter at Fasterhorses UX, and we'll catch you in two weeks for more Faster Horses. I think I could have done with being a bit more enthusiastic in that one.

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Paul Wilshaw

Host