The concept of hue and value settings has previously been applied to palette-based GUIs through similar shade settings. Our first implementation was an editor tool in which a GUI artist would go through every image in the GUI working folder, generating a shifted image for each set of final values, visually check for quality, delete those he didn’t like, and then add the new set of settings in-game. As the project size and schedule of release increased, he saw that the iteration time for GUI moving from the editor to the game was increasing dramatically, to the point that if he kept requiring visual testing, he wouldn’t be able to deliver GUIs on time for developers to use. This resulted in requiring manual changes to the scripts and prefabs instead of editor settings. With the process being so cumbersome, the number of settings used would also decrease. Only when the artist was happy with the settings would he switch to another image.

1.1. Background and Significance

In this paper, we study five customizable HUD options implemented in the video game TEKKEN 7 and analyze how the usage patterns for those options have evolved over time. Our data reveal significant changes in how players configure the HUD according to rank, play style, and other character-specific data. This paper has implications for how developers implement customizable HUDs and what aspects they might want to look at in similar future studies.

Many video games include a HUD, or heads-up display, to provide players with information during gameplay. But HUD designs face a trade-off between providing valuable information and being aesthetically appealing, since the game world must be viewed through the HUD. The ability to personalize—or even turn off—the HUD might help in providing players an individually tailored experience in games.

1.2. Purpose and Scope of the Study

The aim of this research is to analyze HUD customization options in video games. This study focuses on 88 games released from the 1980s up to the 2010s and it is divided into three parts. In the first part, the evolution of how video game black is presented in video games is analyzed using those 88 games, and in the second part, the introduction of customizable HUD options is analyzed in general, thanks to 14 video games. Lastly, 40 games were analyzed to evaluate the generalization of video game black and to identify some usual uses. Customizing the HUD makes it possible for all of us to play in the way that we can enjoy more. The options that are evaluated in these games are: change the position of the HUD elements, change the size of the HUD elements, change the transparency of the HUD elements, and turn off or hide certain HUD elements. All together, the games analyzed were The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds, Final Fantasy XIV, DmC: Devil May Cry, The Last of Us, Metro: Last Light, Batman: Arkham Origins, Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, BIT.TRIP Presents… Runner2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien, Dead Space 3, Dead Space 2, Depth Hunter 2: Deep Dive, Need for Speed: Rivals, Far Cry 3: Blood Dragon, and Far Cry 3.

2. Historical Overview of Game Black

First-person shooters like Quake can be seen as a transition moment towards higher levels of realism in games. Quake stopped off but accelerated the development of 3D engines with potential beyond what anyone really understood at the time. Quake did not excite things, but the attention it brought to 3D technology laid the groundwork for what was to come. The Doom engine exposed me to the same phenomenon: highly popular games that were great players, zero story, and standout technical achievements as their main call. But both ‘fisting’ one’s away through level after level and the sight of ‘more realistic’ 3D visuals that these games imperviously demonstrated were huge improvements in terms of game sharpness over Pac-Man, the previous title that had absorbed my attention.

There was a point in time not so long ago when black was considered the ultimate get out already and it was cool for a game to avoid looking like a game. In the early days, players had to use their imagination to visualize what was going on in a game, but as technology improved, we could move into the photorealistic arena. Nowadays, the trend is to return to black: AAA games are making use of custom HUD options to create a more immersive experience, and many indie games look as though whole worlds were constructed out of a single color and shade. It’s interesting to note that both of the above approaches could be said to increase the difficulty of the game: in the first instance, through the reduction in visible differentiation between the various game components, making it harder to parse a complex visual scene, and in the second instance, through a decrease in the player’s ability to deliberately ignore particular visual components.

2.1. Origins and Early Development

Almost all early games that showed information in front of the player used their HUDs. None of these practical setups existed earlier because HUD was originally just another military term: Helicopter User Display or Helicopter User Display, which only saw the plane itself. However, soon, the US military saw the value of a car that could beat a car to dodge missiles, and an advanced combat attack helicopter with a HUD. At the beginning of the 1970s, in addition to the display on the forehead to display target information, the guidance radar information and the flight parameter display were also placed on the windshield in front of the pilot, which greatly improved the survival rate of the helicopter.

In the early days of digital games, the concept of «game black» was divided into two categories: either the screen was full of random values, or the overall image was almost black. Since then, HUDs have been complemented by almost all types and forms of head-up displays in early but primitive fantasy role-playing games and science fiction games. Through decades of development, games have almost the same level of flexibility as most software and many websites on their HUDs. Even as a killer feature or disadvantage, developers also develop games with extreme HUD usability.

2.2. Influence on Game Design Trends

Since recent generations of both consoles and PC have seen and seen the input of various types of feedback, it has become harder for the games of these eras to inspire and invoke the necessary imaginations of players with the temptations of response data of what is expected to happen within the recreated material world that games have built up. Results from psychological experiments and game design philosophy publications have discovered that this kind of information is integral to the enjoyment of video games. As inherent benefits of the game environment and story are already calculated to occur and a third of the game’s design equation, the game design equation no longer has balance and is lopsided, harming any of the other two parts. It is imperative then for the game not to show too much of this information as it provides evidence that weakens the illusionary transparency or direct support of game design slights it would have robustly carried otherwise.

Since the dawn of the first arcade games, each game was typically cemented into an upright cabinet hardware. These games served only one purpose, and to streamline this experience toward that end, the cabinet design rarely changed to divert focus away from the game experience unto anything else. Emergently born from the limitations of hardware and the goal of gaining the attention of the players, game designers created recognizable hallmarks and behaviors for their games that, in concert with established models of game design and controllers, demanded an active imagination to fill in the gaps of what was not explicitly spelled out or shown by the game. This blank canvas approach to physical game design established expectations for the design of the physical game and encouraged cooperation with the imagination in games to grow up to and on the current moment of the game-playing experience.

3. Importance of Customizable HUD Options

Customizable HUD options can help players understand more about game information and provide the player with the game information they need. The color, shape, and size of the HUD parts are necessary and changeable depending on the situation. In order to experience the realities of video games, gamers usually generate a variety of feelings and thoughts, such as difficulty, immersion, satisfaction, physical challenge, competition, and mastering the effects of the game. However, if games fail to take notice of both delicate and important details in the game, it can become a boring virtual world. There is a huge difference in game satisfaction between gamers with disabilities and gamers without disabilities. And the game experience is also very different.

Games are designed for as wide a group of players as possible, and it is important for a game to reach out to various players in equal measure. By providing a customizable HUD option in games, more players can actively take part in games. Video games consist of a number of modes, including single game, survival, and multiplayer modes. They are divided by game genre and are very complex. When a variety of gamers take part in playing a video game, minor problems such as color blindness, poor eyesight, or other physical handicaps can interfere with a player’s enjoyment while playing a game. In providing a customizable HUD, each player is given a game setting that can be operated according to his or her surroundings and physical conditions, and can enjoy playing the game more actively using the game setting provided to them.

3.1. Enhancing Player Immersion

Placing gameplay elements. HUD elements can appear and disappear from the screen, be minimized or activated when required, and more effectively take advantage of the full game screen when not in use. This level of customization can actually strengthen the bond between player and character and help with immersion, as the lack of a permanent HUD can increase player character connections. Information presented via HUDs that fade in and out in response to the in-game environment can present players with information in an authentic way, increasing immersion and a sense of gameplay connectedness.

Visual and UI presentation HUDs add waste to the in-game environment and negatively impact player immersion. More contemporary and realistic games strive to create an immersive experience where the player can lose themselves in their character and the world around them. Stylized or ‘black world’ HUDs in visually realistic games help alleviate the negative impact of this clutter by allowing the presentation HUD to blend into the graphic world. Additionally, minimizing HUD clutter can enhance the level of realism a game is able to create. By only presenting the player with information at specific times, developers can accelerate the character-player connection. When not in use, the gameplay area is clutter and data free, allowing the player to focus solely on the sheer beauty and graphical realism of the title. Not only does this increase the game’s overall sense of realism, but it can strengthen the bond between player and character.

3.2. Improving Accessibility and Inclusivity

Customizable HUD has become standard in many video games, and other games are being modified. As a result of the fight to make games more accessible to people with disabilities, customizable configurations are now used not only by people with disabilities but also by everyone. With customizability, games have become more accessible to people with disabilities, increasing their adherence to video games and expanding the possibility of changes. Additionally, customization can be tailored to the needs and discretion of individuals. In this way, through customization, video games can be experienced in a unique and special way by everyone, regardless of their mode of play.

Since the year 2000, there has been a significant evolution in game black options, as menus and configuration options have gained great importance for the experience of players with disabilities. The debates about game accessibility and inclusivity have also grown. Developers of games for people with disabilities and specialists in human-computer interaction and inclusive design have created several options for HUD (Heads-Up Display) configurations for different types of disabilities.

4. Technological Advancements in HUD Customization

The current technological advancements have made the gaming industry very different from its beginning. From being an entertainment tool to computer and console gamers, to a growing market that invests ever larger amounts of funds to keep the experience of the expansion public. It is normal that all this focus is not enough to serve the average player that the greater player base demands a visibility of the screens that is exactly suited or not to the facilities of play that are seeking. With that in mind, this paper seeks to point out whether requests for large specialized media players influenced the development of games or if technical advances in the area of game technology influenced the demand for individualists specializing in the experience of such equipment. It is also observed whether the increased information capacity of the panels, TVs, and projectors currently available on the market to display more and more detailed images of games is a captain of the development of technology of digital games.

The process of HUD development is directly tied to several technological advancements over the years. In this section, we highlight several key technologies that have shaped the direction and evolution of game HUD over time, thus giving us a clearer view as to why customizable HUD option as a necessity is a more recent trend on game releases. These advancements deliberately modify how games present information to its audience. We argue that game developers are aware of how HUD can have an impact on the media experience of its audience, and the decision to let the users hide certain elements of the HUD should be evaluated carefully, to avoid players from missing important interactions, aesthetic appeal, or difficulty in gaming when playing, as the need for HUD customization option varies on three points in our model’s level current popular elements (Monitors, Data, Aesthetic). As such, the current trend of customizable HUD options is tied to several technological advancements made in gaming today, which involve how HUD appears on it.

4.1. Dynamic HUD Elements

The PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds amusement has a score data feed that contrasts with seemingly arbitrary succession of bullets, text regularly out of focus; a choice that has been scrutinized in-game player forums. This should be a score data feed intention of moving details away from the player’s area of focus using a dynamic HUD component. However, it seems the feedback method is too consuming for traumatized players. Items in the game environment that are meant to catch the player’s attention in order to inform and guide the player as well as to direct and affect the player’s game actions have a different value and are labeled in specific, contextual ways. We present a study focusing on these objects, and it is a part of the back-casting process that informs the ideas and concepts about features for a future realistic HUD, i.e., a customizable game HUD enabling players to visualize the game world according to their preferences.

The original purpose of the heads-up display (HUD) in video games was to communicate information about the player’s status and level of remaining resources. Classic examples are the health bar, energy bar, and mini-map. HUD elements have over time become somewhat fixed in design, and dynamic HUD elements that take common game information out of the player’s view are implemented in a few, often high-profile video games. In light of previous research, which acknowledges the importance of understanding visual attention in the creation of HUDs, it is a surprising discovery that dynamic HUD elements appear to be largely uninvestigated in game research. This paper suggests that this can be due to the rather slow development of this design element. This paper goes on to argue that rather than only investigating dynamic HUD elements, game research should address all possible, and relevant, visual attention requirements of game objects, particularly in an attempt to provide guidelines for what we label customizable HUDs.

4.2. Personalization Features

The second kind is customization. It allows players to turn off some interface elements while the game is happening or toggle them permanently. Strategy games like XCOM 2 or Total War: Warhammer II support this. Other examples are allowing a complete redesign of the user interface, as demonstrated by The Elder Scrolls Online, or being able to change the appearance of some aspects of the interface, like the palico’s health bar in Monster Hunter: World. This is an interesting idea. Many games already allow for the personalization of their HUD. The problem is to what degree they can edit this HUD. Some games just provide settings to switch an element on or off or to change its position, scale, or transparency. Other games offer no options whatsoever.

In addition to enabling player-created options, we observed that certain games started to break parts of the game interface into layers, which could be customized by the player. We identified three main uses. The first one is for utility. This means altering the game interface with features that do not offer a competitive advantage but still make the game more understandable or enjoyable when playing. Examples include changing the color of the marker on the minimap or the size of the compass. This feature is present in games such as Assassin’s Creed Odyssey and 2016’s Doom. It is also present in the settings of games such as Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain and its precursor, Metal Gear Solid IV: Guns of the Patriots.

5. Impact of User Interface Design on Player Experience

In addition to the well-established topics of beauty and consistency as contributors to the utility of good user interfaces, a number of studies point to valuable contributions from spurring gameplay creativity with meaningful pro-filmic elements or adding challenges from complex displays where players experience difficulty parsing and managing game data. To accommodate the wide range of player skill and preference, games frequently offer adjustable gameplay settings such as the difficulty level or the number of friendly characters that follow the player throughout the experience. These evolving accessibility patterns are feeding practices that reach beyond traditional accessibility considerations, with contemporary design seeking to encourage gameplay through customizable interfaces.

In addition to the elements and principles of user interface design, previous work has identified specific ways that UI design can influence player experience in both broad and specific elements of games. In this section, we describe work that captures technical and practical concerns with creating game black from industry developers and UI designers alike.

5.1. Cognitive Load and Information Processing

Interfaces that can be customized are tailored to fit the user, for increasing usability. In this way, software becomes easier for the user to use, as features that are not useful to the individual can be removed, hiding unnecessary elements. Customizable windows in a video game have been used to determine if their visual positioning enhances gameplay and reduces mental workload. Moreover, it has been detected that visual eye fatigue in day or night maps of a driving simulator is subject to subjective judgments, as the subjective responses are not always replicated with the objective eye fatigue measures. During the experiments, no differences were found between the Fixed-Static and Floating-Dynamic HUDs; however, the only significant difference detected between the two groups of participants was with a measure of cognitive load.

The term cognitive load has been used to refer to the amount of time and effort needed to successfully learn new information. As a result, cognitive load plays an important role in information processing, attention, and memory retention. Presenting fewer elements at a time will facilitate visual search and reduce attentional demands, decreasing the temporal or processing aspects of cognitive load. The so-called magic number seven is a concept used to describe the upper limit of working memory capacity of about seven items in order to perform a cognitive task. This upper limit is significant for interface design, as a structure that goes beyond this limit will force the user to process the elements into several separate groups, thereby slowing cognitive processes. Moreover, within the scope of cognitive psychology of video games, offering different custom HUD configurations for decreasing cognitive load could play an important role in lowering frustration perception of difficult games.

5.2. Aesthetics and Visual Clarity

Unique visual customization or better graphics customization is needed in a game HUD, enabling the player to manage the HUD design and display of elements in a personalized approach. A HUD is a very important game feature with a wide range of important elements and valuable information in real time for monitoring players’ development within a game world. The visual feedback on gaming situations such as strength and time bars, speed and position indicators, and accessible abstractions and symbols enable players to comprehend the game and process the numerous reactions.

The majority of video games provide graphical options, such as brightness, field of view, HUD scale, and dynamic resolution, to ensure that players can enjoy a quality gaming experience. Notable video games allow the game world aspect and depth of field, and survivors of famous television series games would like to play more visual accessibility choices and dead or underpowered enemies. Graphical features and customization are indeed essential for some players, such as disabled or average players, to see aspects of a game that could otherwise worsen the experience or make certain games difficult to play.

6. Case Studies of Successful Implementation

Black people have historically been made into digital objects or symbolic others to act as trophies of colonialism and discrimination. However, Crystal Dynamics’ design team negotiated tension that followed after they completed research for modern-day Ya’axil characters in order to create Black Warrior Colette. They successfully implemented game black settings that disable violence specifically against «menacing…Ya’axil» people and where warriors do not make a racialized episode out of a traumatic event, particularly of being made spectacle of by the white man. Shadow Warrior’s customizable HUD augmented the inclusive experience Crystal Dynamics envisioned and also helped steer the relationship between Richard Wong as the Product Design Lead and game black, particularly Crystal Dynamics’ concerns with image-centric NGOs. The pinnacle of Crystal Dynamics’ success in navigating discrimination is the lack of outrage over the «not what I signed up for» defense by the N-Gage testing demographic.

The four case studies in this section showcase, in chronological order, video games that successfully implemented both game black settings in order to subvert hegemonic norms and the customizable HUD option to create an inclusive gaming experience. Three of the case studies focus on game developers who are considered video game activists because they have taken a stance against industry norms of presentationalism that emphasize commercially successful titles that focus only on whiteness and heteronormativity. Rumble’s concern stems from the «obsession with presentationalism in the creation of the title» that has a direct impact on projects. Epic Battle Fantasy 4’s concern is that «most AAA games are designed to cater to the needs and desires of an unimaginative audience» and Wind Waker HD’s concern is that «most video games cater to the basest instincts of the modern audience».

6.1. Game A

We specify the nature of these user requirements, focusing strictly on setting up visual elements and playback conditions to make their preferences clear, a realization of the visual capabilities and limitations of users. Crowdsourced knowledge is also utilized as a less formal source of input; the development of the threat assessment labeler is described and its input is categorized according to the visual depiction metamodel. Game players have been very active on the SpecialEffect charity blog, with many plugin hardware questions. Personalization algorithms are developed, and the impact of the visual preference model and the user interface personalized algorithms on ‘customized’ game item creation in the game HUDs is examined, as demonstrated by the results.

The visual depictions model component of the game’s user interface design goals metamodel, shown in Figure 3, encompasses researchers, disabled individuals, developers, and standard users. It considers an innate representation of visual capabilities and limitations of the users. Their interaction during the development phase, changes in the graphical and psychological representation, is mapped to and from interface design, recommendations driven by formal knowledge represented as ontologies. DVsUIGoal deals with a mapping for video games, where knowledge of relative user requirements for search visuals is needed to best represent visual knowledge in-game format.

This is an overview of a variety of topics about how to make video game information available to all players, regardless of visual conditions, and the presentation of said information in an accessible manner. These topics focus on the alternate project goal of the study: the use of formal customization.

6.2. Game B

Table fourteenth, descriptive statistics, checks storytelling or skill-related visuals. The more independent sex is storytelling specific during the experiment. Storytelling signifies players’ liking for good storytelling where their enjoyment requires telling a good story. Entertainment mostly contributes to players’ entertainment wishes. Video game protagonist emotion captures the display of the main content of the game. Game variable is noteworthy, mostly picturing options for giving priority to host data.

Dark (black) denotes the amount of analysis three hosts who like to use the dark black household customization. Bright and dark preference folks in boys (girls) are selected from the total host arrangement amount of the 46 co-question respondents. The number of diverse inhabitants who like to use the bright household customization (dark or black household customization) is assigned to the corresponding bright (dark and black) house preference of host gender. It is worth mentioning that both bright and dark represent black in the first few analysis.

Household graph color contrast in order to alleviate certain players’ unclear or blurred HDL becomes very fuzzy, it is hard to distinguish host images. Game products usually provide some customizable HUD options for giving priority of attention to host information when players are requesting more interactions. In third experiment module, forty-six descriptive statistics for gender are presented in Table 2. Boys (girls) stand for the amount of analysis three hosts, who like to use the bright-household customization.

Before entering the next four analysis types, we would like to note that apart from analyzing the light or dark customily, one can make an analysis between bright-uniform colors’ customization and dark-blue-black uniform colors’ customization. Custom varied households can greatly influence customized choices apart from host gender and player gender. Fifth analysis type diving into details states that game producers tend to adopt dark or black background as a stimulant tool to increase the host.

6.3. Game C

Visibility may be poor in some situations and not work at all in other situations unless a smaller number of selectable customization control mapping options for players that have trouble reading or viewing do not have controlled accuracy. In these cases, it can be difficult or impossible for the player to see the communication icons in the HUD because their visual quality or quantity can vary. These problems are not limited to gamers with disabilities. In online action video games, the visual clarity of the HUD is compounded by linking this sometimes critical-to-multiplayer-competition tool to the overall quality of game experience. In games with a more believable or realistic world simulation, such as flight simulation and first-person shooters, there are additional reasons why not cluttering the HUD is advisable.

Consideration 3: Use customizations of more than two answered D-button presses as buttons because experienced players are more comfortable with them and non-experienced players are less likely to accidentally press them.

Consideration 2: Offer two custom mappings for games that have a lot of actions per mission, per level, or per stage to make both combat and other action gameplay more accessible.

Consideration 1: Offer large numbers of customizable mapping slots because this offers the most flexible control capabilities.

Contextual Design Features Interface design for gameplay mapping complexity The decision to use a single or multiple gameplay mapping can impact how game control options are organized and presented – as well as how much players can exert over action on screen. With a single mapping, players can customize the controls using radial, steerable, or pop-up radial menus. With multiple mappings, customizing the control layout may only be possible from the game options screen. The added complexity of multimapping selections may make game assist mechanisms more important for player-handicap support. In some types of video games, particularly the action genre, having a huge number of game actions accessible by controller buttons greatly increases the complexity of customizing the control mapping. In these cases, a few gameplay options may have to be mapped to button combinations or designed not to be focused on in the game at hand. While it is logical to map some less frequent use actions onto buttons requiring combination pressing, it may not always be wise to customize gameplay controls to include taboo zones.

7. Challenges and Limitations in HUD Customization

A critical aspect in the game project is to be able to balance between the additional development cost and the degree of HUD customization. It is important to keep the cost of HUD customization in mind and avoid feature creep. A common approach is to specify a budget size for each customizable part at the beginning of the project and then keep track of the implementation time of HUD customization features. The assets available to invest in the consecutive iterations of application development are limited, and particularly the feature cutting will happen when something that is not crucial for the core functionalities makes the application more expensive than what could be afforded.

Currently, video games pose several challenges and limitations in the design and implementation of game HUD customizations. A design challenge is finding the right combination to make a feature intuitive and customizable without overloading the player. One example of a function that commonly gets included in the game is waypoints. While these are a crucial source of player navigation, there may be a desire among players for even greater customization. One way to handle this amount of flexibility is to allow the HUD to be placed at specific beacons or by a specific playable role. Implementing these requests leads to other potential negative consequences.

7.1. Technical Constraints

The game HUD is usually a 2D element blitted on the screen by a drawing method. Since the lowest game screen resolution (on a non-handheld game platform, at least) available in the market is 1280×720 pixels, and taking into account that an eventually supported lower resolution should keep the same aspect ratio, the mean game minimal resolution is 1024×768 pixels. The more standard game canvas (that has even been declared a de facto standard) is 16:9, and 2D elements – as the case of the HUD – must adhere to the game canvas format. It can be neglected that some games do support a wider range of screen resolutions, not keeping the HUD proportions the same. The Xbox 360 leading the shows, the companies that manufacture game platforms decided that the previous standard 4:3 was to be replaced by the 16:9, since the HDTVs sold in the market adhere to this structure.

There are not only financial and ergonomic reasons for development studios to create a game with a unique HUD since a game’s HUD is subjected to the technical constraints inherent to the game platform. If a HUD is theoretically called to be the same for a game, no matter the platform on which it is run, it is, in practice, possible for some games. These games (mostly shooters, whose HUDs are the ones most described in the academic literature) give an equal HUD display no matter if they are running on an Xbox 360 or on a PSP, as long as the game resolution is still standard.

7.2. Balancing Complexity and Simplicity

The question that arises is what are some guidelines for designing controls, beyond control fusion, for a customizable HUD that players will find intuitive and easy to use? The goal is to ensure the HUD is both complex and easily understood. We present several operational guidelines for building such a system via close collaboration with users. Although motivations may differ, these techniques can be adapted to assist in creating mods that aid both the designer and the player in generating meaningful economic and aesthetic output of any game. With these techniques available, control offered to players can actually be both maximized and balanced with simplifying complexity.

This is not unique to the problem of animating a HUD as demonstrated by the mixed reception of Apple’s QuickTime Trailer viewer which entered the uncanny valley of realism. In the continuum are purely abstracted displays which the brain interprets as representations rather than real objects. As a result, designers should always strive to reduce complexity and simplify the perceived difficulty of a task.

Players want increased control because it either helps them or provides a sense of agency in their game experience. This wanting can combine to serve many other roles when it leads to experimentation and exploration. When the presentation style is so complex that it overwhelms players, the increase in discovered options is no longer correlated with the presence of player agency and instead leads to a decrease in the sense of control.

In this ever-increasing arms race of new game mechanics, it is important to structure the social interactions surrounding games. One of the major issues that arises in contexts where the field of games experiences accelerated development is how should we deal with the growing complexity brought about by technological advances. Building a system that is simpler to design, understand, and use often points in opposite directions to one that includes the latest innovations.

Providing players with a high degree of control over the look and feel of their game can very quickly become an overwhelming task for user interface and experience designers. The balancing act in the «creation of the creation process» in mechanism design in games and custom HUD options in video games is to find ways to give players a high degree of control needed to be unique and satisfy their personal perfection goals while having an intuitive and ‘fun’ user interface that is not overwhelming.

8. Future Trends and Innovations

Recent game developments show that gamers are more interested in customizable HUD options. As part of the video game graphical user interface (GUI), head-up display (HUD) helps gamers perceive game states and control character states. It often provides important game information (e.g., health), context and graphical representations, and always makes part of gameplays, which are visible except some optional HUD (e.g., stealth). However, on behalf of the continuing evolution of gameplay and technological advancements, obtaining such information requires a trade-off of putting information elements inside and adjusting the current HUD.

There is a continuous evolution of games and a black box is developed to detect currently selected HUD items, whereas other items are shown in an automatic manner and invisible. This is based on different types of elements and rules across game genres/styles. In addition, a gaming experience model and a Dragon Spirit game prototype are developed by following identified requirements and guidelines. This chapter represents a new direction for HCI research in game black and HUD UI, and HCI research has implications for game design, and design guidelines suggest a broader specialized research area and lead to further research activities.

8.1. Augmented Reality Integration

Based on this ignorance, Birnschein has investigated the credibility of wastewater energy tracking HUDs in virtual reality and found that there are some obvious challenges that need to be addressed. Firstly, most prefer to show the data off and see something fun. Secondly, it is important to show the data in a relevant scale to make sure it is perceived to have value. Thirdly, trust is an important component that could be supported by allowing the user to influence the judgment basis of the perceived data. Future interface work could, for example, look into alternative, integrated views and could also alter the saliency and importance of individual data attributes or add in a human or personal component through social constructions or view the information visually.

Last but certainly not least in our analysis of possible future considerations of customizable game HUDs, we draw attention to the importance of understanding the psychological dimension, especially with regards to female players. Currently, the majority of studies use all-male participants. However, this may generate many biases as well as leading to the development of HUDs and game interfaces that are seen as unwelcoming to female players. Since even experienced men may display a fear of HUD usage, this would likely be much worse in this group.

Another interesting new direction for HUDs is the integration of recent augmented reality technologies in the form of real-world video feeds and sensory data being directly superimposed onto game graphics to facilitate interactions against real-world opponents in ways that could be seen as underhanded in real life. Mohan et al. have incorporated a working computer chess opponent into their chess variant.

8.2. AI-driven HUD Customization

In any case, if we want to increase or decrease the level of customizability of HUDs for a particular game or a category of games, any of the solutions described would add a cognitive load to the player. And that is the biggest obstacle towards increasing dynamic difficulty through AI-driven solutions. Today’s users (not only from the youngest generation) want and accept high levels of customization in other fields of human-computer interaction. Game users are not offered similar options and should. The best way of doing this would be to build customizable solutions from within the game that users play and engage with the most instead of trying to incorporate adjusted layers of less customizable structures independent of core game design features.

Today, video game user interfaces and the way they are being displayed to players are driven almost exclusively by human developers. While it provides a great deal of control and unsurpassed game customization for game developers, there might be new ways of improving the existing solutions using actual gameplay data without adding an excessive cognitive load to the player. Possible solutions could be using lodge learning and other similar methods to analyze gameplay videos or event logs that are automatically captured by a game. An increased amount of playtesting could also produce a greater range of suggested HUD styles. Recent advancements in the dynamic difficulty adjustment of games have shown that customization can be done in real time (an unsurpassable form of customization) for one game, but it gives no insight into the complex problems which customization can cause when the same type of customization is to be applied to two different games.

9. Conclusion

This article makes three primary contributions. As a game black standard, it reasons 70% of games could offer an accessible HUD, with 30% disabled by default. As a diversity and inclusion tool, it suggests that 10% of gamers could use GameHUD as a final design solution. If developers better designed their scripted game HUD options, they can help mitigate the aforementioned limitations of classic game black art, game black art indexing, and game black character personalization concerns yet to be addressed in scripted implementations. However, as a customizable HUD in the Game Space, it blames years of systematic craft issues and 5% of games not providing lighting color options and wonders who is benefiting in providing such few options, especially since HUDs can negatively impact how black gamers physically and mentally engage. Finally, as a determined ontological game blackness tool, it acts as a catalyst and affirmative action plan for more diverse pipelines of game designers to build GameHUD artifact sharing values into authentic video games for intersectional gamers. These are the systemic interventions needed that foster direct or content identity evaluation, validation, enhancement, and accessibility for integral impacted users and game communities.

This article presents GameHUD as a game black standard and a significant diversity and inclusion tool. As the first-stage research on game blackness, we explored scripted and customizable HUD options in 60 high-selling video games. We discovered that approximately 70% of games offered a game HUD, with 50% of games providing a scripted HUD. However, only 40% of games offered a customizable HUD, with only 5% allowing lighting color options. Because of this, we suggest future game HUD research and prototypes be designed with determined ontological game blackness characteristics: colorism, aesthetics, education, Western black cultural. Racial identity categories: AFR/African Nova Scotian, AME/African, AUC/American, CA/Cape Verdean, CAF/Central African, CAR/Caribbean, CUB/Cuban, DJ/Djiboutian, DOM/Dominican, ETH/Ethiopian, GN/Guinean, GH/Ghanaian, HAI/Haitian, JAM/Jamaican, KEN/Kenya, LIB/Liberian, MAN/Mandinka, MOR/Moroccan, NIG/Nigerian, ROC/Roches (Haitian), SA/Somali, SEN/Senegalese, SIO/Sierra Leone, SP/Spanish (European), SUD/Sudanese, TOG/Togolese, TRI/Trinidadian, UG/Ugandan, U.S./United States, VIN/Vincentian, ZIM/Zimbabwean.

9.1. Summary of Key Findings

Aesthetic customization of video games reflects a deeper experiential drive in game playing. In this paper, we have used the lenses of case study analysis to explore the evolution of customizable heads-up display options in video games. By doing so, we have gained insights into the player experience and have highlighted the important role customizability has come to play in video games. Our historical study of game black and the HUD iterations adds to our understanding of how game black and mediating information shaped early video game player experiences and provides even greater insight into the potential to shape future handheld/console match-ups where unchangeable game HUDs in handhelds are designed specifically to offer the type of engaging, visual, customizable player interfaces that now characterize other gaming platforms.

Player choice is a central concept in game design. To facilitate a degree of choice in player experiences, some games provide options for players to modify the game’s heads-up display (HUD) aesthetics to create their own or a custom medley of different HUD elements. In this paper, we utilize a historical case study methodology to analyze HUD black boxes and customizable HUD options in video games. The purpose of this paper was to provide a long lens, historical analysis of how game black came to be established as an expected feature in modern video game options and to illustrate how game designers are allowing gamers to engage in game customization in ways that engage their visual sensibility.

9.2. Implications for Game Development

Pre-releasing media includes the game concept document, game promotional video, and game poster. It is also the golden period for game developers and social media users to interact with each other. Most social media users like to know what the game looks like before it is commercially available. Game Black will let the user know whether the game HUD is customizable. The pre-releasing media is the most suitable period to gather the features that the player wants about the game. During this period, game developers can add these features to the future game UI to set up the customizable HUD. To summarize, Game Black can be considered as user requirements supporting tools. If game videos or commercials use blackouts or customizations of HUD during the pre-releasing period, players should generate strong empathy and desire.

Video game development is a constantly changing industry. Game development production can be considered to be divided into three main stages: pre-development, development, and post-release support. The next part will consider each of these three stages in turn and how Game Black data and the customizable HUD features we discussed above could imply a substantial impact on each of these three stages. Finally, we believe that games are a form of art representation. Therefore, this paper reminds game developers to pay attention to public opinion and modify the game HUD according to public feedback. This co-creation method reflects the role of games as forms of art as well as our planned co-creation conceptual framework.