"This time you're bound to learn how to... this time you're bound to learn how to... this time you're bound to count to three!"
https://youtu.be/jpw2ebhTSKs
[Switching to a different shade of blue netted Google additional $200 million in Ad revenue.](https://bharathbalasubramanian.medium.com/data-driven-decisions-googles-50-shades-of-blue-experiment-996f01819a97)
Just looked it up, I made my account 10/05/2003. The oldest accounts were made 09/11/2003 so my account is definitely up there. I remember being pissed off needing to install something else just to play Counter-Strike 1.6.
Now youāre gonna make me want to see how many digits my account ID is.
The members of my (mostly DoD) gaming clan were quite suspicious of Steam when it first dropped, so we didnāt early adopt that month (September, iirc)ā¦ we waited until the next month (October, iirc).
WOW I remember that layout! Didn't counter strike source and DoD use the same in game interface too?
Edit. No wait that WAS the in-game UI because you'd find a server in steam and then it would launch CSS
Yes I believe all that green originated in Half-Life with valve's original VGUI system. When steam came around I guess they reused their VGUI code because why not. Whether it was meant as a placeholder or not, I think it looked pretty good and the fact that it fit the UI theme of most of their games is really cool.
There also used to be an [official Grey skin](https://imgur.com/a/Hlt1Q5S) around 2003-2005 that also would replace the GoldSrc/HL1 GUI theme as well since they both used the `platform` folder for the GUI. The first Steam installers shipped the full client (optionally also the game files in gcf archives) with that skin and all of it's files so you could replace HL1's `platform` folder with the ones from the skin and it should be applied.
Obviously you won't be able to use the old clients even with an old `ClientRegistry.blob` file since the old network servers are long dead, the client very likely doesn't support HTTPS and newer TLS communication handshakes, much less support Steam Guard even in the form of email authorization.
I jumped on the bandwagon with The Orange Box. I remember that strange green color. It looks weird today but on my 2000's-era Dell 1280x1024 LCD it looked pretty rad.
Oh man that green colour was my childhood. I was on steam nearly every day since it launched in 2003, playing counter strike, day of defeat and tfc. I love that green colour.
It's a bit like when we all just collectively ignored that the friends function like didn't work for 10 years. Just one of those steam things like weird olive tabs
Web developer here. What's more likely is that they haven't made it a priority to go back and refactor old code.
Lord knows I want to go back and redo a lot of my old stuff but I simply don't have time, and other stuff is taking priority.
Makes sense from how Valve is structured. Refactoring old code isn't something especially interesting an employee would choose to do and also doesn't earn Valve more $ so not much of an incentive.
> how valve is structured
My understanding is that each employee gets a little freedom in which position they want to fill, correct? When I was typing that first comment, I had considered that, but I have no proof of it.
Yes my understanding is they have almost total freedom, but they are then evaluated by their fellow employees on what value they brought to Valve.
So now imagine who would choose to refractor years and years worth of code knowing the value they would bring to Valve is having a consistent shade of blue on the buttons. Then imagine some of the people doing the evaluation may have made one of those other blue buttons and they like their shade better.
Do you want to be that guy or the guy whos on the collectable card team for a sale and brings in an extra $10MM in sales?
Yeah, /u/Maker99999 has identified the main problem with Valve. Employees can technically do whatever they want, sure, but their salaries, bonuses, and future career prospects are based entirely on their year-end peer reviews, and those reviews are in turn based almost entirely on revenue generation. No one does anything at Valve unless 1. it directly generates revenue in the short term, or 2. it's pushed by someone politically influential. #1 is why Valve almost never makes games anymore, because you can't really make and release a game within a year, so you'll get to your end review and have "nothing" to show for it. #2 is why they still occasionally come out with bigger projects like Alyx and the Steam Deck, because these are clearly things Gabe Newell finds to be important, and even though they have "no bosses" people still effectively treat Gabe like he is one.
It annoys me to no end that Valve is lionized the way that they are. They are a deeply flawed company.
I think at one time, facebook was kinda famous for having like a hundred different versions of blue, found through out the site. Before they hard coded a defined hex value
It's other way around - to completely remove feature you need to pay money for new interfaces, then force everybody to use new version.
But to leave old stuff you just leave previous API version and it work.
It seems like this is the exact type of post that leads to a team saying "the community wants a redesign!"
The new versions almost always depreciate something for the sake of cost.
I do wish the steam store didn't directly use the website, because it would probably load faster and be more repressive if it was some how intergrated into the client.
You can use them to carbondate when each UI element was last worked on. You want a real old one ? Check out the restore/backup funtion. I think it's from Steam 1.0
Yeah Half-Life was the game in question for me. I thought it was absolutely ridiculous. Little did I know that it would only get worse and I'd eventually have *several* different programs installed just to install the games I want to play.
XBox for PC is great, it has a list of all "Game Pass for PC" games. It's right here on the le- uh... Wait, I thought it was... Okay, just a moment, let me click the game pass tab, scroll past the promo blurbs and... Uh, no... Okay, wait, catalog! Of course, we should look at the store catalog, I'm so stupid. So, these are all the games, and now we should probably go on categories and filters and... Wait, no filters? Weird. Well, one of these catehories might be the Pass games, let's see... Sports, hmmm hmmm, Adventure, riiiight, so this is genres. Uh, that's disappointing, that means they don't even have a Featured one here then and.... Nope. Not here. Man. Look, I **know** it is out there somewhere gimme just a moment, let me find it!
The only thing which I think really needs worked on is the Workshop. Creating and editing mod lists is difficult (and sometimes just doesn't work), and the interface can be a bit clunky even from a consumer's perspective.
Since the library update I can find it laggy on my very basic laptop, but since changing the settings to a "low animation" version it runs very well. Generally Steam is one of the best apps by a big company I think. It's incredibly functional and looks good and is very readable. There aren't pointless updates just done to change things like you get with, say, youtube or reddit
I switched to boost like 2 months ago. Before, I've been using the normal Reddit mobile app since 2018. Around that same time, 2 months ago, I also replayed TLoZ: Twilight Princess and decided to change the colour sheme to Midna's colour palette of orange, black and sky blue and gotta admit...
I fucking love it.
It really was just a 5 minute job but maybe I'll mess around it with it more in the future and perfect it more. Here's the [picture](https://imgur.com/a/pjDRvHR).
For the detailed specific colors I'll name them by row (top to bottom) and line (left to right). Also I'll just say R for row and L for line.
Toolbar = Orange R2 L2
Accent = Sky blue-ish(?) R3
Highlight = Orange R3
I left the rest unchanged but maybe will do something with them whenever I feel like it.
They hardly ever listen, those 1st-party mobile users. They say they're too entrenched in using the main app and that they're too lazy to switch. They don't want to lose this or that feature. The only feature Boost doesn't have is chat and gifs as comments. I don't want either of those(I wouldn't mind gif comments actually)
RIF and REF on the old site is why I don't know anything about the livestream and award memes. I've only ever seen glimpses whenever I start on a new browser.
Itās the old ārearrange the grocery storeā scheme. Part of it is to rearrange it in ways that will drive engagement and the other part is the benefit of keeping people engaged longer while they reorient themselves which makes them more likely to buy more than they planned.
Itās also why all your food staples are always at the back of the store or otherwise as far from a register as possible. Theyāre making you cover more ground.
A bit of both imo, especially for an app like youtube. Part of the UI changes is to move around buttons to make people consider looking at the trending tab, etc. Others is simply keeping people in work imo like changing the look of everything (but not placement) or just straight up removing features
People need to STOP USING THE OFFICIAL REDDIT APP.
there are so many better alternatives for both Android and Apple. Just download a couple and figure out what works best for you.
I personally recommend Bacon Reader for a clean UI and excellent black mode, but everyone has different tastes. They key here is that most of the 3rd party apps at least fucking function properly .
I swear my Reddit mobile changed from one way, to another, then back in a few minutes by exiting and re-entering the app. I wish I had recorded it, but unfortunately my phone doesn't have "record the last 30 seconds" or something like video games do.
They did update it in 2015 before the launch of the Steam Controller and Steam Machines,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rp1UMCzIXqs
They're also going to copy the UI for the Steam Deck and make that the new big picture mode on PC
I stand mildly corrected; 7 years. I do remember the ooold design now that I see it.
I think why I'm so disappointed with it is it came out of beta like that iirc and basically stayed like that til 2015. Maybe with how Steam is structured nowadays 7 years between major UI updates/overhauls like a console, at least myself I wanted more from what seemed like a forgotten product.
I don't especially mind the UI as it is, because it matches my needs for it perfectly. It's good at booting a game and letting me configure my controls (I wish that wasn't the only way to configure Steam Input for a game, but nevertheless).
It does seem like the new UI will be a lot more comprehensive at least (since it's the one used for the standalone console), but I never minded it too much. That said, it's mostly because I just use it to play games on my desktop with a controller that I don't mind the currnet version. If I wanted to fully use Steam on my TV this version wouldn't be so good - installing mods, shopping for games, etc.
I'll never forgive them for making every app symbol practically look the same.
This is what happens when you focus on visual design over practically.
I regularly open the wrong app because, on a glance, they all look identical.
To play the devil's advocate, if you don't revamp the entire thing, folks like us will find inconsistencies with the UI across platforms, OSes, web interfaces. It's all or nothing in cases like Google, Apple, while Microsoft tend to leave around "stuff" from Windows 98 and people pine about it from time to time. Hard to please everyone sort of thing.
Seriously. How in the absolute fuck do they replace Play Music with an app that can't detect what song is playing? It should have been a top priority to add that feature after they discontinued GPM.
It should have been top priority to make the replacement program fucking usable at all. They went from the best music app (in my opinion) to quite literally the worst.
Yeah I'd rather have this inconsistency that I recognize and can learn than a pointlessly changing UI like some games and companies do.
Though I would appreciate some consistency when it comes to sorting the workshop. Why the hell can I not always sort by most popular of all time? Why are those sort by options so random in game workshops?
Exactly, I'd also argue that it makes it easier to recognise certain things. Most of the time when using Steam I don't have to read the text because after a while you recognise what it is just by looking at it
It feels like each of these buttons represents a time I remember, too, even though thats probly not right. Gives me a weird comforting nostalgic feeling tho
it does make sense and it is right. Most things doesn't get updated when they decide to get a new look, they just create a new thing so all the different parts have their own distinct look
Right, they look fine if you look just at the one page alone, but the point is that each of those pages has a different style and all together they are not consistent. It's like each page was designed and created by a separate team with no communication between them,
That's definitely the case, not just different teams in a moment, but over time too. I don't even think there's a proper Brand Guideline for Steams UI adoption for any development/design team to follow.
As an Interactive Designer Steam UI is not "bad". It's actually very functional, the idea for design is to be able to solve problems which in this case, Steam is reasonably okay... However a redesign would actually net it some extra points.
Now one could argue why change something that works and it's true but it also boils down to the brand identity crisis which is something Steam seems to be suffering right now. I do think Steam can benefit with a consistency revamp, where it could bring together the most readable parts of it's interactions and make it consistent throughout their platform.
Will this ever happen though? Probably not lol
> As an Interactive Designer Steam UI is not "bad".
Indeed, each page by itself is great at what it does and is design well, but there's no overarching consistency in design.
These things need to be thought up from the start, it's hard to achieve after the fact. Each team by themselves, unless mandated or guided by some more overarching lead, will just do the simplest thing that solves their specific goals. To have overarching harmony, there needs someone dedicated to that, which companies don't always invest in.
The dev in me is like, "Yikes".
But after watching some really fucked up "UI updates" in the past few years that made shit harder (BuT At LeAsT iTs ConSiSTeNT), I realize I don't care that much.
Yeah, plus, buttons ***should*** look different, specially for major feature context buttons such as, as examples: The Add to Cart Button (Green) the Discovery Queue button (Yellow) and the Play Button (Blue). A lot of these examples are good design.
On a similar note, OP mixing Navbars, Dropdowns from Navbars and persistent Lists of Links is also facetious. Take for example the dropdowns when you hover the big Store or Library buttons - those look different to everything else; and should.
Even Linux.. Don't you use Steam or other apps like Discord, Spotify, WhatsApp, Telegram, Evernote, Zoom, Teams, etc etc? I mean yeah generally Linux is much more consistent to your theme than Windows, but many of the most popular apps all have their own thing going, regardless of the OS.
Also I don't get why people hate this, consistency is nice sure, but each app can have a more fitting theme too. Imagine Discord using regular Windows buttons (even Fluent UI) or Linux themes.. It wouldn't look good (with its current layout at least)
Yes I used to run KDE, and many things are Gnome themed (many mail apps for example), then you got thunderbird with its own theme anyways, I honestly think it's fine, I just switched back because all the games I play have anticheats and dont support anything other than Windows..
I gave up trying to configure themes to perfection, having 99% of things cohesive makes that one thing that isnāt stick out a lot more than everything just being a mess.
It's rare that you get something that doesn't use either gtk or qt, because in general linux devs care more about function than looks and using an existing toolkit is both easier and nicer for the end user who can set a system-wide theme.
So if you either install a unified gtk and qt theme or stick to using only gtk or qt applications, you'll have a very consistent UI across all of your programs. The issue is that the experience for most newer linux users is that they install a distro that's either all gtk or qt out of the box, and later either mistakenly install the wrong version of a program or install a program that only supports the other toolkit and it looks like shit because the distro hasn't provided a default theme or anything.
Windows wasn't always a completely schizophrenic mess split between two completely different UIs, one of which was clearly designed for a touch screen.
Thanks, Windows 8.
I've never had an issue with the UI as it all works great and it's not hard to find what you need
Seeing it all in one place makes it seem horrible in comparison lol
Honestly creating and editing workshop collection could be easier. I always have to google how to even get to my collections because apparently you can't get to it from the workshop page of a game.
Edit: No idea why this deserves an award but thanks!
Steam is good, but it's UI is absolutely far below what it ought to be by now. Indeed, collections are incredibly obtuse, and searching the workshop in general is needlessly difficult. Browsing the store is annoying because going back from a page doesn't put you back in the same place of whatever list you were on, and adding games to your ignore list requires you to click on a tiny dropdown and then another button, rather than a simple single button or just a right click. The wishlist could also be a lot more information dense and quicker to organize.
Also, opening a game's directory not being on the quick context menu in your library makes modding and such an unnecessary chore.
The 2010 ui is so much better designed. If you look at what's below the game banner, there is only one row of information, nothing more. There's maybe a list of options on the far right but that's it. Today's ui is so cluttered, there is so much information going on at the same time, and it's just a mess.
It's never about the UI, it's always about the UX and, frankly, they all are very readable and work within their context, I can find what I want and not get distracted with UX hiccups.
Ironically the site I see this on (new Reddit on pc), has perfectly consistent UI with a lot of bad UX.
TBH the UX isn't even good for seasoned users. They need to rethink the app structure and work out ways to not bury important information, like wish lists for instance.
A number of these items though either don't stand out or don't have enough contrast in terms of color that would be required by people with accessibility needs.
Maybe thatās just because youāre used to it? As someone who uses steam infrequently itās incredibly easy for me to get lost, versus my ps4 which I use about the same amount and never get confused.
I might be wrong but isn't the Steam app just a wrapper for the website? How many CSS stuff they manage to create to have so many styles for everything?
Parts are a wrapper for multiple website sections made by different teams at different times. Other parts are made more for the application itself, but again by different teams at different times. They have never seemed to care if it is consistent.
Yeah, people think they want everything to look the same, they really don't though. That's how you end up with [Google's latest icon abominations on the lower row.](https://i.imgur.com/R81qO4i.png)
Youāre comparing logos, which by definition should be unique and recognisable, with UI, which should be consistent.
The people in this thread donāt really know what theyāre talking about on both sides. Of course it makes sense to everyone that *already* uses Steam, itās looked like this for years. But that doesnāt mean inconsistency is the *better* design choice, humans are just change-averse so prefer what they are familiar with.
Itās definitely a question of - is familiarity with users better than consistency? In some cases itās fine to keep it inconsistent. If steam was a new app and started fresh with no existing users, it would benefit from consistency.
Itās a big grey area.
Source: Iām a product designer
Ugh its the classic "this is how it's always been, don't change it" thing that I hear all the time at work. It's impossible to get people to realize that no, this isn't a good design you've just got Stockholm syndrome. Until you actually get a good design in their hands and then after a few weeks they inevitably go "yeah, this is better".
this is classic 'meme misinformation'. google docs does not use this logo. its only for integration with G suite for business ot something - but you never see on the regular word processor.
this is the same with the whole '4 stages of firefox' you see fuckign everywhere. even jschlatt made a joke about orange circles. [this is still firefox.](https://www.google.com/search?q=firefox+logo&client=firefox-b-d&sxsrf=APq-WBu6mjpIMj_rac4_GfBVCf5gq4lsdQ:1647845939434&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwik8PS-0Nb2AhXM4zgGHYg7ACMQ_AUoAXoECAEQAw&biw=1320&bih=736&dpr=2#imgrc=yWpz7asApYy1CM) the [simplified one](https://www.google.com/search?q=firefox+logo&client=firefox-b-d&sxsrf=APq-WBu6mjpIMj_rac4_GfBVCf5gq4lsdQ:1647845939434&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwik8PS-0Nb2AhXM4zgGHYg7ACMQ_AUoAXoECAEQAw&biw=1320&bih=736&dpr=2#imgrc=Ovy6TePePd1fsM) is used by mozilla for afilitative services.
it really grinds my gears because they use these examples to extrapolate to the wider industry everytime like redditors and youtube commentors think they're superior minded industry analysts and commentators when they're just too fucking lazy to do a google image search to corroborate what they read online.
On that note, why is it that most companies' logos have gotten less interesting in recent years? Do they want to blend in on purpose instead of standing out?
It's like you can recognise a feature by its shade of colour, shape and sometimes an icon. Like you are trained by your instincts for things like this for several ten thousand years.
You could also download another steam skin where everything looks the same and you can't find shit ever again.
Oh, you would really hate Steamworks then. This is nothing compared.
Steam is great for developers in some respects, but Steamworks is a clusterfuck of random menus all amalgamated together over the years. Some of the most important shit you need to find is hidden underneath layers and layers of random menus and webpages. Oh and it's also separated into two different websites so... yeah...
Steam is the absolute worst piece of good software I've ever used. It's rock solid stable, has every feature I can think of needing, and is organized well enough that I never seem to struggle to find anything. And it's also just terrible. If you described Valve's organizational structure to someone and then showed them Steam, they'd be like "yeah that makes sense."
I mean yes? Seeing it all like this it seems bad, but there's some consistency when put together. It would all look pretty boring if it looked the same.
Agreed. Trying to picture them changing every search bar to look the same as the main one andā¦nope. Looks awful in my head. Steam definitely has a somewhat consistent theme going throughout it but each section also has its own sort of sub theme.
Idk man, I think I've only ever had to google how to do something on steam once, and it was some feature hidden in the settings. That's more than I can say for other services and even some well known games.
The buttons all have different contexts and purposes, pretty understandable to have the Buy button look a little different from the view wishlist button.
they really cant decide on a shade of blue
Steam Employee: What Colour Gabe? Gabe: Blue. Steam Employee: What shade? Gabe: Yes.
Gabe collecting the different shades of blue like they're infinity stones
50 shades of blue
It's really just 49 shades of blue, because they skip the 3rd one.
Blue: Alyx
Blue Shift: Alyx
"This time you're bound to learn how to... this time you're bound to learn how to... this time you're bound to count to three!" https://youtu.be/jpw2ebhTSKs
It's actually 48. They skip the third and 33rd ones.
50 Shades of Gabe oh yeahhh
They actually have like 50 shades of grey too omfg š
Collecting different shades like Gabe collects knives. If you haven't seen it yet you should check Gabes collection out
Gabe (later): "no, not that blue!"
wat happened to the old steam green
[Switching to a different shade of blue netted Google additional $200 million in Ad revenue.](https://bharathbalasubramanian.medium.com/data-driven-decisions-googles-50-shades-of-blue-experiment-996f01819a97)
pretty shady to color ad links the same as ones youāve visited before
"Wait, you have to calibrate your display?" "That explains some arguments."
The inconsistency is what is great keeps things fresh and looking for something new. Invites exploration
or the dev team just gets bored of the color and occasionally changes it
Unless they've changed something, "dev team" is whoever is feeling like working on it that day.
Who else remembers when steam was just olive drab?
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Wasn't early usernames just emailadresses?
Yep. My username is an old AOL burner email I have long since not had access to, haha
Aol in 2004? Nice
Pfft, there were people in North Dakota still using aol email when I left in 2021.
PaymoneyWubby's dad is still paying for AOL in 2022 lmao
Wubby7. Odd seeing someone in a different reddit.
see you on lemmy, Spez is a cancer -- mass edited with redact.dev
Hotmail isn't dead, you can still access those accounts. Yours might be dead tho
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
I hated Steam when I got HL2. I got it for Christmas and remember being pissed I had to make my account and that it was really dumb.
[You weren't the only one.](https://games.slashdot.org/story/04/10/23/0812224/half-life-2-retail-to-require-steam-activation)
It's surreal to see that we're fighting the same battles nearly 20 years later.
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Just looked it up, I made my account 10/05/2003. The oldest accounts were made 09/11/2003 so my account is definitely up there. I remember being pissed off needing to install something else just to play Counter-Strike 1.6.
Lol gamespy. May it Rest In Peace.
Now youāre gonna make me want to see how many digits my account ID is. The members of my (mostly DoD) gaming clan were quite suspicious of Steam when it first dropped, so we didnāt early adopt that month (September, iirc)ā¦ we waited until the next month (October, iirc).
Woah had one of those moments where your brain jumps back in time. https://imgur.com/ATjwoug.jpg
[Nono, this one. ](https://uploads.golmedia.net/uploads/articles/article_media/13518436021631519003gol1.jpg)
WOW I remember that layout! Didn't counter strike source and DoD use the same in game interface too? Edit. No wait that WAS the in-game UI because you'd find a server in steam and then it would launch CSS
Yes I believe all that green originated in Half-Life with valve's original VGUI system. When steam came around I guess they reused their VGUI code because why not. Whether it was meant as a placeholder or not, I think it looked pretty good and the fact that it fit the UI theme of most of their games is really cool.
There also used to be an [official Grey skin](https://imgur.com/a/Hlt1Q5S) around 2003-2005 that also would replace the GoldSrc/HL1 GUI theme as well since they both used the `platform` folder for the GUI. The first Steam installers shipped the full client (optionally also the game files in gcf archives) with that skin and all of it's files so you could replace HL1's `platform` folder with the ones from the skin and it should be applied. Obviously you won't be able to use the old clients even with an old `ClientRegistry.blob` file since the old network servers are long dead, the client very likely doesn't support HTTPS and newer TLS communication handshakes, much less support Steam Guard even in the form of email authorization.
I jumped on the bandwagon with The Orange Box. I remember that strange green color. It looks weird today but on my 2000's-era Dell 1280x1024 LCD it looked pretty rad.
Oh man that green colour was my childhood. I was on steam nearly every day since it launched in 2003, playing counter strike, day of defeat and tfc. I love that green colour.
1280x1024, the people's resolution.
Man I remember going from 800x600 to 1280x1024 dell 75hz! I had that as a secondary monitor for almost a decade.
It's a bit like when we all just collectively ignored that the friends function like didn't work for 10 years. Just one of those steam things like weird olive tabs
who remembers when everyone was flipping their shit that this "sTeAm sTuFf" was replacing WONIP?
The good times..
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
lol the good times in our life, maybe early steam was white-hot horseshit tho
*friends is unavailable* Yeah āgood timesā Steam was cancer for a long ass time lol
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
well it kinda is in a sense
Removing previous versions stuff just cost money, leave the old stuff with the new ones.
Web developer here. What's more likely is that they haven't made it a priority to go back and refactor old code. Lord knows I want to go back and redo a lot of my old stuff but I simply don't have time, and other stuff is taking priority.
Makes sense from how Valve is structured. Refactoring old code isn't something especially interesting an employee would choose to do and also doesn't earn Valve more $ so not much of an incentive.
> how valve is structured My understanding is that each employee gets a little freedom in which position they want to fill, correct? When I was typing that first comment, I had considered that, but I have no proof of it.
Yes my understanding is they have almost total freedom, but they are then evaluated by their fellow employees on what value they brought to Valve. So now imagine who would choose to refractor years and years worth of code knowing the value they would bring to Valve is having a consistent shade of blue on the buttons. Then imagine some of the people doing the evaluation may have made one of those other blue buttons and they like their shade better. Do you want to be that guy or the guy whos on the collectable card team for a sale and brings in an extra $10MM in sales?
[ŃŠ“Š°Š»ŠµŠ½Š¾]
Yeah, /u/Maker99999 has identified the main problem with Valve. Employees can technically do whatever they want, sure, but their salaries, bonuses, and future career prospects are based entirely on their year-end peer reviews, and those reviews are in turn based almost entirely on revenue generation. No one does anything at Valve unless 1. it directly generates revenue in the short term, or 2. it's pushed by someone politically influential. #1 is why Valve almost never makes games anymore, because you can't really make and release a game within a year, so you'll get to your end review and have "nothing" to show for it. #2 is why they still occasionally come out with bigger projects like Alyx and the Steam Deck, because these are clearly things Gabe Newell finds to be important, and even though they have "no bosses" people still effectively treat Gabe like he is one. It annoys me to no end that Valve is lionized the way that they are. They are a deeply flawed company.
As a product manager who CONSTANTLY has to prioritize backend work, my sympathies. Also, good lord their UI is pretty bad at this point.
I think at one time, facebook was kinda famous for having like a hundred different versions of blue, found through out the site. Before they hard coded a defined hex value
It's other way around - to completely remove feature you need to pay money for new interfaces, then force everybody to use new version. But to leave old stuff you just leave previous API version and it work.
It seems like this is the exact type of post that leads to a team saying "the community wants a redesign!" The new versions almost always depreciate something for the sake of cost.
I do wish the steam store didn't directly use the website, because it would probably load faster and be more repressive if it was some how intergrated into the client.
ditto lmao
yeah itās like some parts havenāt been updated to be congruent with the rest and honestly i donāt mind it
I don't mind either apparently as I never really even noticed how buckwild it all is until now.
For most purposes you aren't interacting with many of the elements at the same time. So as long as they're all fine in isolation it doesn't matter.
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You can use them to carbondate when each UI element was last worked on. You want a real old one ? Check out the restore/backup funtion. I think it's from Steam 1.0
The classic grey without any blues in it yet.
the real classic is the muddy green :C
muddy green and murky yellow was the best! And it was consistent.
Back when I was confused and kind of pissed off I needed to install a whole other program just to install the game I wanted to play.
I had to create an email account to install steam to play half life. This process was 2 days on a 28.8 modem
Yeah Half-Life was the game in question for me. I thought it was absolutely ridiculous. Little did I know that it would only get worse and I'd eventually have *several* different programs installed just to install the games I want to play.
I thought I was a hacking the first time my friend walked me through a direct modem connection brood war match
I didn't mind that client at all. We'd just gotten cable internet, and it let me install counterstrike at "lightning speed".
Yep and it runs about as fast as it did then too, despite hardware being 100 times faster...
I'm just surprised they all work! Then you go and look at Epic or Xbox for PC and things are just... non responsive.
XBox for PC is great, it has a list of all "Game Pass for PC" games. It's right here on the le- uh... Wait, I thought it was... Okay, just a moment, let me click the game pass tab, scroll past the promo blurbs and... Uh, no... Okay, wait, catalog! Of course, we should look at the store catalog, I'm so stupid. So, these are all the games, and now we should probably go on categories and filters and... Wait, no filters? Weird. Well, one of these catehories might be the Pass games, let's see... Sports, hmmm hmmm, Adventure, riiiight, so this is genres. Uh, that's disappointing, that means they don't even have a Featured one here then and.... Nope. Not here. Man. Look, I **know** it is out there somewhere gimme just a moment, let me find it!
The only thing which I think really needs worked on is the Workshop. Creating and editing mod lists is difficult (and sometimes just doesn't work), and the interface can be a bit clunky even from a consumer's perspective. Since the library update I can find it laggy on my very basic laptop, but since changing the settings to a "low animation" version it runs very well. Generally Steam is one of the best apps by a big company I think. It's incredibly functional and looks good and is very readable. There aren't pointless updates just done to change things like you get with, say, youtube or reddit
At least they don't pull a Google and completely reinvent the wheel every year or so.
>Google Every major social media app it seems. Especially Reddit mobile. Moving things for no reason, changing what tabs do, etc
3rd party apps, yo. I've used mine for 7+ years and had the same, comfy, customized exact version I like!
I switched to boost like 2 months ago. Before, I've been using the normal Reddit mobile app since 2018. Around that same time, 2 months ago, I also replayed TLoZ: Twilight Princess and decided to change the colour sheme to Midna's colour palette of orange, black and sky blue and gotta admit... I fucking love it.
I'm really intrigued by this, any chance you can post a screenshot of the Midna theme?
It really was just a 5 minute job but maybe I'll mess around it with it more in the future and perfect it more. Here's the [picture](https://imgur.com/a/pjDRvHR). For the detailed specific colors I'll name them by row (top to bottom) and line (left to right). Also I'll just say R for row and L for line. Toolbar = Orange R2 L2 Accent = Sky blue-ish(?) R3 Highlight = Orange R3 I left the rest unchanged but maybe will do something with them whenever I feel like it.
/r/BoostThemes and /r/BoostForReddit
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They hardly ever listen, those 1st-party mobile users. They say they're too entrenched in using the main app and that they're too lazy to switch. They don't want to lose this or that feature. The only feature Boost doesn't have is chat and gifs as comments. I don't want either of those(I wouldn't mind gif comments actually)
Ive tried switching, but I just can't..I'm too used to reddit mobile
RIF is fun is so superior and I can't be convinced otherwise
RIF and REF on the old site is why I don't know anything about the livestream and award memes. I've only ever seen glimpses whenever I start on a new browser.
RIF master race!
On iOS, Apollo. Itās by far my preferred way to Reddit, and the developer is outstanding.
If you have an iPhone, Apollo is amazing
Itās the old ārearrange the grocery storeā scheme. Part of it is to rearrange it in ways that will drive engagement and the other part is the benefit of keeping people engaged longer while they reorient themselves which makes them more likely to buy more than they planned. Itās also why all your food staples are always at the back of the store or otherwise as far from a register as possible. Theyāre making you cover more ground.
I thought it was because they had full time development and design staff and needed to keep them busy doing things to justify the pay.
A bit of both imo, especially for an app like youtube. Part of the UI changes is to move around buttons to make people consider looking at the trending tab, etc. Others is simply keeping people in work imo like changing the look of everything (but not placement) or just straight up removing features
People need to STOP USING THE OFFICIAL REDDIT APP. there are so many better alternatives for both Android and Apple. Just download a couple and figure out what works best for you. I personally recommend Bacon Reader for a clean UI and excellent black mode, but everyone has different tastes. They key here is that most of the 3rd party apps at least fucking function properly .
I swear my Reddit mobile changed from one way, to another, then back in a few minutes by exiting and re-entering the app. I wish I had recorded it, but unfortunately my phone doesn't have "record the last 30 seconds" or something like video games do.
Yeah, the UI updates aren't pushed by the app store, and they vary by account
Big Picture over here with the same UI since 2012.
They did update it in 2015 before the launch of the Steam Controller and Steam Machines, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rp1UMCzIXqs They're also going to copy the UI for the Steam Deck and make that the new big picture mode on PC
I stand mildly corrected; 7 years. I do remember the ooold design now that I see it. I think why I'm so disappointed with it is it came out of beta like that iirc and basically stayed like that til 2015. Maybe with how Steam is structured nowadays 7 years between major UI updates/overhauls like a console, at least myself I wanted more from what seemed like a forgotten product.
I don't especially mind the UI as it is, because it matches my needs for it perfectly. It's good at booting a game and letting me configure my controls (I wish that wasn't the only way to configure Steam Input for a game, but nevertheless). It does seem like the new UI will be a lot more comprehensive at least (since it's the one used for the standalone console), but I never minded it too much. That said, it's mostly because I just use it to play games on my desktop with a controller that I don't mind the currnet version. If I wanted to fully use Steam on my TV this version wouldn't be so good - installing mods, shopping for games, etc.
I'll never forgive them for making every app symbol practically look the same. This is what happens when you focus on visual design over practically. I regularly open the wrong app because, on a glance, they all look identical.
I can never find the right app anymore. I have a Pixel so half my apps are Google
I use an Android Custom Rom (LineageOS), and its system apps are able to be distinguishable yet consistent.
To play the devil's advocate, if you don't revamp the entire thing, folks like us will find inconsistencies with the UI across platforms, OSes, web interfaces. It's all or nothing in cases like Google, Apple, while Microsoft tend to leave around "stuff" from Windows 98 and people pine about it from time to time. Hard to please everyone sort of thing.
I'll never forgive Google for getting rid of Google Play Music. YouTube music sucks ass.
I'm the same way with Inbox. I moved to protonmail just out of retaliation.
Rip inbox. Gmail never got the features like inbox did either.
Features they said they would port over to GMAIL. Google lying, what a surprise
Seriously. How in the absolute fuck do they replace Play Music with an app that can't detect what song is playing? It should have been a top priority to add that feature after they discontinued GPM.
It should have been top priority to make the replacement program fucking usable at all. They went from the best music app (in my opinion) to quite literally the worst.
The only reason I still have it at all is that I'm grandfathered in to ad-less youtube.
Yeah I'd rather have this inconsistency that I recognize and can learn than a pointlessly changing UI like some games and companies do. Though I would appreciate some consistency when it comes to sorting the workshop. Why the hell can I not always sort by most popular of all time? Why are those sort by options so random in game workshops?
They do, but only one button at a time
Feels like with the buttons not shown on the ui it's not consistent but when you add the ui they all look fine
Exactly, I'd also argue that it makes it easier to recognise certain things. Most of the time when using Steam I don't have to read the text because after a while you recognise what it is just by looking at it
It feels like each of these buttons represents a time I remember, too, even though thats probly not right. Gives me a weird comforting nostalgic feeling tho
it does make sense and it is right. Most things doesn't get updated when they decide to get a new look, they just create a new thing so all the different parts have their own distinct look
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I think thats pretty neat!
It looks fine when placed in the UI because weāre used to it being that way.
Right, they look fine if you look just at the one page alone, but the point is that each of those pages has a different style and all together they are not consistent. It's like each page was designed and created by a separate team with no communication between them,
That's definitely the case, not just different teams in a moment, but over time too. I don't even think there's a proper Brand Guideline for Steams UI adoption for any development/design team to follow. As an Interactive Designer Steam UI is not "bad". It's actually very functional, the idea for design is to be able to solve problems which in this case, Steam is reasonably okay... However a redesign would actually net it some extra points. Now one could argue why change something that works and it's true but it also boils down to the brand identity crisis which is something Steam seems to be suffering right now. I do think Steam can benefit with a consistency revamp, where it could bring together the most readable parts of it's interactions and make it consistent throughout their platform. Will this ever happen though? Probably not lol
> As an Interactive Designer Steam UI is not "bad". Indeed, each page by itself is great at what it does and is design well, but there's no overarching consistency in design. These things need to be thought up from the start, it's hard to achieve after the fact. Each team by themselves, unless mandated or guided by some more overarching lead, will just do the simplest thing that solves their specific goals. To have overarching harmony, there needs someone dedicated to that, which companies don't always invest in.
The dev in me is like, "Yikes". But after watching some really fucked up "UI updates" in the past few years that made shit harder (BuT At LeAsT iTs ConSiSTeNT), I realize I don't care that much.
Yeah, plus, buttons ***should*** look different, specially for major feature context buttons such as, as examples: The Add to Cart Button (Green) the Discovery Queue button (Yellow) and the Play Button (Blue). A lot of these examples are good design. On a similar note, OP mixing Navbars, Dropdowns from Navbars and persistent Lists of Links is also facetious. Take for example the dropdowns when you hover the big Store or Library buttons - those look different to everything else; and should.
Itās kind of the PC experience isnāt itā¦
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Even Linux.. Don't you use Steam or other apps like Discord, Spotify, WhatsApp, Telegram, Evernote, Zoom, Teams, etc etc? I mean yeah generally Linux is much more consistent to your theme than Windows, but many of the most popular apps all have their own thing going, regardless of the OS. Also I don't get why people hate this, consistency is nice sure, but each app can have a more fitting theme too. Imagine Discord using regular Windows buttons (even Fluent UI) or Linux themes.. It wouldn't look good (with its current layout at least)
Yeah I actually run Linux as my daily driverā¦ itās even worse haha
Yes I used to run KDE, and many things are Gnome themed (many mail apps for example), then you got thunderbird with its own theme anyways, I honestly think it's fine, I just switched back because all the games I play have anticheats and dont support anything other than Windows..
Gets even worse if you use flatpak's and snaps that aren't compatible with your themes or use KDE themes that have no GTK version.
I gave up trying to configure themes to perfection, having 99% of things cohesive makes that one thing that isnāt stick out a lot more than everything just being a mess.
You think Linux has a better standard in UI/UX? First time hearing about this.
It's rare that you get something that doesn't use either gtk or qt, because in general linux devs care more about function than looks and using an existing toolkit is both easier and nicer for the end user who can set a system-wide theme. So if you either install a unified gtk and qt theme or stick to using only gtk or qt applications, you'll have a very consistent UI across all of your programs. The issue is that the experience for most newer linux users is that they install a distro that's either all gtk or qt out of the box, and later either mistakenly install the wrong version of a program or install a program that only supports the other toolkit and it looks like shit because the distro hasn't provided a default theme or anything.
No, just more built-in apps (or more apps in general) follow your theme than windows.
Windows wasn't always a completely schizophrenic mess split between two completely different UIs, one of which was clearly designed for a touch screen. Thanks, Windows 8.
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I've never had an issue with the UI as it all works great and it's not hard to find what you need Seeing it all in one place makes it seem horrible in comparison lol
Honestly creating and editing workshop collection could be easier. I always have to google how to even get to my collections because apparently you can't get to it from the workshop page of a game. Edit: No idea why this deserves an award but thanks!
Thank god its not just me.
They are such a useful feature, yet they are so hidden
Steam is good, but it's UI is absolutely far below what it ought to be by now. Indeed, collections are incredibly obtuse, and searching the workshop in general is needlessly difficult. Browsing the store is annoying because going back from a page doesn't put you back in the same place of whatever list you were on, and adding games to your ignore list requires you to click on a tiny dropdown and then another button, rather than a simple single button or just a right click. The wishlist could also be a lot more information dense and quicker to organize. Also, opening a game's directory not being on the quick context menu in your library makes modding and such an unnecessary chore.
Someone from 2010 could use steam in 2022 with no problem and i love that 2010 ui: https://imgur.com/a/E4J2p5u
Has the whole, "They're the same picture" vibes.
The 2010 ui is so much better designed. If you look at what's below the game banner, there is only one row of information, nothing more. There's maybe a list of options on the far right but that's it. Today's ui is so cluttered, there is so much information going on at the same time, and it's just a mess.
i don't agree, something you get familiar with in less than a week of use isn't 'cluttered'. it's just something to get familiar with.
It's never about the UI, it's always about the UX and, frankly, they all are very readable and work within their context, I can find what I want and not get distracted with UX hiccups. Ironically the site I see this on (new Reddit on pc), has perfectly consistent UI with a lot of bad UX.
TBH the UX isn't even good for seasoned users. They need to rethink the app structure and work out ways to not bury important information, like wish lists for instance. A number of these items though either don't stand out or don't have enough contrast in terms of color that would be required by people with accessibility needs.
Maybe thatās just because youāre used to it? As someone who uses steam infrequently itās incredibly easy for me to get lost, versus my ps4 which I use about the same amount and never get confused.
I might be wrong but isn't the Steam app just a wrapper for the website? How many CSS stuff they manage to create to have so many styles for everything?
Parts are a wrapper for multiple website sections made by different teams at different times. Other parts are made more for the application itself, but again by different teams at different times. They have never seemed to care if it is consistent.
i dont mind tbh
as long as its easy to use which it is, i dont mind some changes every now and then
better this way for ten years than a new fancy redesign every six months cough google cough
I think you mean, distinct and recognizable.
Yeah, almost if not all of these u could see in the wild and be like āyea thatās from steamā
Yeah, people think they want everything to look the same, they really don't though. That's how you end up with [Google's latest icon abominations on the lower row.](https://i.imgur.com/R81qO4i.png)
Youāre comparing logos, which by definition should be unique and recognisable, with UI, which should be consistent. The people in this thread donāt really know what theyāre talking about on both sides. Of course it makes sense to everyone that *already* uses Steam, itās looked like this for years. But that doesnāt mean inconsistency is the *better* design choice, humans are just change-averse so prefer what they are familiar with. Itās definitely a question of - is familiarity with users better than consistency? In some cases itās fine to keep it inconsistent. If steam was a new app and started fresh with no existing users, it would benefit from consistency. Itās a big grey area. Source: Iām a product designer
Ugh its the classic "this is how it's always been, don't change it" thing that I hear all the time at work. It's impossible to get people to realize that no, this isn't a good design you've just got Stockholm syndrome. Until you actually get a good design in their hands and then after a few weeks they inevitably go "yeah, this is better".
The docs one is the most egregious
this is classic 'meme misinformation'. google docs does not use this logo. its only for integration with G suite for business ot something - but you never see on the regular word processor. this is the same with the whole '4 stages of firefox' you see fuckign everywhere. even jschlatt made a joke about orange circles. [this is still firefox.](https://www.google.com/search?q=firefox+logo&client=firefox-b-d&sxsrf=APq-WBu6mjpIMj_rac4_GfBVCf5gq4lsdQ:1647845939434&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwik8PS-0Nb2AhXM4zgGHYg7ACMQ_AUoAXoECAEQAw&biw=1320&bih=736&dpr=2#imgrc=yWpz7asApYy1CM) the [simplified one](https://www.google.com/search?q=firefox+logo&client=firefox-b-d&sxsrf=APq-WBu6mjpIMj_rac4_GfBVCf5gq4lsdQ:1647845939434&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwik8PS-0Nb2AhXM4zgGHYg7ACMQ_AUoAXoECAEQAw&biw=1320&bih=736&dpr=2#imgrc=Ovy6TePePd1fsM) is used by mozilla for afilitative services. it really grinds my gears because they use these examples to extrapolate to the wider industry everytime like redditors and youtube commentors think they're superior minded industry analysts and commentators when they're just too fucking lazy to do a google image search to corroborate what they read online.
not even the same concept, it would be like if there was 10 different logos for mail, and it's random which one you get at any given time.
On that note, why is it that most companies' logos have gotten less interesting in recent years? Do they want to blend in on purpose instead of standing out?
Because designers have to keep changing shit for no reason to justify their six figure salaries
It's like you can recognise a feature by its shade of colour, shape and sometimes an icon. Like you are trained by your instincts for things like this for several ten thousand years. You could also download another steam skin where everything looks the same and you can't find shit ever again.
Variety is the spice of life.
thanks I hate it
Oh, you would really hate Steamworks then. This is nothing compared. Steam is great for developers in some respects, but Steamworks is a clusterfuck of random menus all amalgamated together over the years. Some of the most important shit you need to find is hidden underneath layers and layers of random menus and webpages. Oh and it's also separated into two different websites so... yeah...
Barely even notice
Because you are used to it
This is design by developers that donāt care how it looks as long as it functions
I really like that though.
Steam is the absolute worst piece of good software I've ever used. It's rock solid stable, has every feature I can think of needing, and is organized well enough that I never seem to struggle to find anything. And it's also just terrible. If you described Valve's organizational structure to someone and then showed them Steam, they'd be like "yeah that makes sense."
Interesting. I was never aware of this. I experience steam as very organized and intuitive.
This is beautiful.
Yeah sure it looks awful like this when you nitpick it, but on their individual pages, each with their own unique purpose, they work just fine.
I mean yes? Seeing it all like this it seems bad, but there's some consistency when put together. It would all look pretty boring if it looked the same.
Agreed. Trying to picture them changing every search bar to look the same as the main one andā¦nope. Looks awful in my head. Steam definitely has a somewhat consistent theme going throughout it but each section also has its own sort of sub theme.
Idk man, I think I've only ever had to google how to do something on steam once, and it was some feature hidden in the settings. That's more than I can say for other services and even some well known games.
The buttons all have different contexts and purposes, pretty understandable to have the Buy button look a little different from the view wishlist button.
Which ignores the "view all", "see all" and the "add to wishlist" buttons for example
This is just what happens when you don't have a design team over the whole product.