RPG Interface design

The interface, UI, inventory, and so on, are often the source of ire when games are discussed. So, what do you look for in a good RPG interface, and which games are particularly good examples?

Depends on a game. I mean if there is no crafting for example, there is no need for whatever crafting screen, right?

Things I don't like:
- can't stand consoley duo of menus. Something is mapped on ESC something on TAB. Keep everything under one key, please.
- Q/E or 1/3 or whatever combo emulating mushrooms in menus without mouse support? Fire whomever does it - they don't belong to games industry.
- to save game you need to click like crazy in some titles, I mean wtf. 2 clicks max please!

D:OS is an example of perfect UI that covers everything possible and some more. In my opinion.
Sadly, the sequel's UI is not as spectacular, although still good.

Haven't played D:OS2 yet, but I seem to remember quite a few people having strong criticism of the inventory in particular.

Yes, of all those, the PoE2 one at the top would be my pick. I do like an RPG interface to have a little bit of personality, and not just look a GUI in a desktop application.

Ideally some way to quickly sort the inventory by category is important (e.g. break it down into Weapon, armor, consumables, crafting materials, quest items, etc.).

But I guess part of that goes beyond how it's presented / organized… Some RPGs throw way too much junk at you (stuff that has no use other than to sell to merchants)… Just give me the gold / cash. Of course, I suppose I could just not take it but if it's in every chest / corpse you come across, that's hard to avoid. DOS's issue is that there's just too much loot (e.g., all these magic items with tiny differences between them and 10 million crafting materials) that make inventory management tedious… I don't think any tweaks to inventory / UI can really overcome boring loot.

In general, I prefer a minimalistic UI design. Just tell what I need to know and don't clutter the screen with pretty HUD, as I'd rather see more of the game world. Or options to turn some or all of it off are always nice, too.

I thought the way DOS 2 would let you mark items for selling was pretty sweet.

The whole idea of the GUI is to give the players all the information they need. The trouble comes in deep RPGs where the players need more information than fits on a screen. The more there is to know about what's going on, the more impossible it becomes to convey all that information cleanly. Especially to somebody who's displaying the information on a 1080p TV sitting 12 feet away.

The best game GUI I've ever seen is City of Heroes in its final years - that thing was awesome! The interface was divided up into little windows, each of which could be docked anywhere on your screen. Most of those windows could be resized. Some could be reshaped and even bent around! Lots of detailed stats were available and could be placed on your GUI, too, if you wanted to see them. This was particularly great for the times because many people (including me at the time of this shot) didn't have wide screen yet. And, of course, everything had tool tips because you knew everybody was using a mouse to play the game.

Originally Posted by Silver Coin

Spoiler – Good inventory screens

Spoiler – Bad inventory screens

I agree with all those. PoE2's UI manages to completely isolate all the crafting stuff so it's not in your way if you don't care about such things and just want to get on with the game, which is nice.

That Fallout 4 UI though, what a mess, I find it so bad it's actually putting me off continuing my playthrough (there are other reasons of course but the thought of dealing with crappy UI on top of everything else, meh).

Personally, I really loved the look of the UI of Sacred back then.
It reminded me of Art Nouveau (Jugendstil).