Week 4 - Halo Wars Menu System

Halo Wars was recently released for the Xbox 360 system and was an attempt to spread the RTS (real time strategy) genre to consoles when they normally flourish on PC's. The biggest problem, according to various blogs and comments at video game oriented sites, that most people seemed to have with RTS's on consoles was the lack of a real mouse tool that allowed quick access to menus on different sides of the screen. While there is a joystick one can use, moving around the screen with a mouse is much easier and more natural than a joystick on a controller.

However, Halo Wars tried to change this by creating an easy-to-use/learn menu system for many of the features that take place during combat. From the screenshot about, one can see the menu is a circle that appears in the middle of the screen. As you go around the circle, there are various options you can choose from. Generally, related options stick to one side or another; for example, when training infantry, the infantry unit choices are on the right while the research opportunities to improve these units are on the left. As certain upgrades are obtained and related ones are acquired, these new potential upgrades appear in a similar location to the last, related, upgrade, so there is minimal reading and searching through longer menus.

The actual interactive controls are also intuitive. Once the menu is open, usually accomplished by clicking the proper building or shortcut key on the controller, all one has to do to choose an option is hold the control stick in the direction of the unit or research they want to purchase and then hit A. If there are further options, a new "circle menu" shows up and the same controls are used to choose a second option and show on. While controls and interface do not necessarily coincide, I believe it is important to not only have a good LOOKING interface that makes sense and is easy to learn, but also have one that is easy to use with the most commonly associated tool, in this case, the Xbox 360 controller.

All menus operate in a similar fashion and are very intuitive once you learn one or two of them. Whether you want to build a new building for your base or you want to train units or build tanks or turrets, all menus follow the same pattern and are very easy to learn and use.