Hello all!

I've been working on a new way to render Warzone maps in the browser, using a tool I call UJS. See this link to see it for yourself:

https://www.warzone.com/SinglePlayer?PreviewMap=72163&Mode=UJS

For comparison, here's that same page in Flash and in Unity:

https://www.warzone.com/SinglePlayer?PreviewMap=72163&Mode=Flash
https://www.warzone.com/SinglePlayer?PreviewMap=72163&Mode=Unity

The Unity version isn't desirable since it loads super slowly and uses lots of memory. The Flash version isn't desirable since it depends on Flash which is a dying platform and won't work in the future. The goal of the UJS version is to fix both of these problems.

I hinted at this feature a while back on the blog, but I've just released a new update to it that fixes some bugs so I'd love it if you guys could try it out and let me know how well it works for you. I am considering making all Map Preview links use UJS by default, so it would be great to get some additional testing on it.

Here are some other maps for testing:

https://www.warzone.com/SinglePlayer?PreviewMap=70306&Mode=UJS
https://www.warzone.com/SinglePlayer?PreviewMap=11704&Mode=UJS
https://www.warzone.com/SinglePlayer?PreviewMap=41941&Mode=UJS
https://www.warzone.com/SinglePlayer?PreviewMap=30362&Mode=UJS
https://www.warzone.com/SinglePlayer?PreviewMap=42171&Mode=UJS

You can test any map by opening the PreviewMap link and adding &Mode=UJS to the end of the URL. You can change Mode to "Flash" or "Unity" to compare the page to the other versions.

Feel free to post your experiences with it in this thread! Thanks!

Two comments:
- The colors seem too bright on UJS/Unity in comparison to flash. Is there any way to reduce brightness?
- When you click a bonus on UJS, it brings up a window with all the individual territories in the bonus. Mouse scroll doesn't seem to work on this in the same way as Unity.


Edited 5/7/2018 00:33:35

is there a way to do UJS and recreate Flash UI

Four comments :
-The pop up window sometimes covers the red arrows when you click on individual territories. The window should be optional like in the
flash version.

- I very much like the jumping animation when you select a bonus from the left selection bar. It is a good animation that also happens to be entertaining.

- I like how easy it is to get to the map page. I saw the "More info" link as soon as I opened the map preview. It was intuitive for me as for what it does.

- The zoom buttons are doing the job. They look okay.

For me, Unity is a bit 'out of focus' while UJS is crisp and sharp.

In UJS, the bonus links on the side are fast. But clicking one of the link on the map, it' lags half-a-sec.

For Unity/UJS, the More Info should be made blue or something so that you know you are leaving the page. Also, renaming to Map Page I think. Will Send Feedback be added to the page as well? Since Unity now has mail?

EDIT: Bug? If a bonus link in a map if it is a 1 territory it jump's when clicking the bonus link. Whereas bigger bonuses only get highlighted. (eg. Rome in Imp. Romanum map vs other bonuses )

Edited 5/7/2018 00:52:09

Coming from someone who only uses flash, this version look amazing. It seems to take the best of both unity and flash and is much faster to load. I also enjoy the additional brightness and it looks much clearer than either version. I also like the bonus expanding when you click on a bonus. However, the scroll bar does not seem to work while using the mouse scroll and has to be moved manually. Is there a way to fix that? Besides that though I think it looks great so far

UJS is much faster than Flash and Unity. The functionality of UJS Map preview works (at least on https://www.warzone.com/SinglePlayer?PreviewMap=72163) :) however, there are things that could be improved, including:

• army number text looking a little small
  
• when a territory or bonus is clicked:
  
  
  
  • overflow of territory/bonus name is hidden (full territory/bonus name not visible)
    
  • scrollbars can only be controlled click clicking on the down arrow (can't drag or scroll up/down)
    
  • view more on wikipedia button could do with more bottom padding
    
  
  

Yellow outline for bonus links aren't displayed (is this a bug or feature?) looks strange how it's not there.

I like the arrows that extend outward when clicking on individual territories, but I don't like that popup window that provides redundant information often while covering half of the arrows, (this is frustrating on mobile since the window covers so much of the screen aswell) makes the feature uncomfortable to use since you can't stop the window from appearing. Since the only unique information provided by the popup is the names of the adjacent territories, a much nicer feature would be that the popup did not appear at all, but instead alongside the arrows the names of the territories appeared.

I don't like the glow highlight, on yellow territories it's difficult to see and would've been impossible to see at all if not for the "jumping", which begs the question what's the point of the glowing at all if it needs a jumping animation to make it noticeable?
the blue is simple, the blue is better.

I like that the territories are not in a drop down menu, what I don't like is that it's organized by alphabetical order instead of by armies per turn which would be more helpful.

the "example army numbers" feature is interesting, but I don't understand what's the point of it is.

love your site, keep up the good work.

Looks really good, I like it a lot!

- Arrowheads are still hiding the army number of a territory though. This is something that bugs me in flash and unity as well - especially when you click "View Teammate's Orders" because arrows will have high opacity then and you can't see the numbers below. It kinda improved here though. Arrows have lower opacity which helps. But it'd be even better if you could "shorten" them, so that they are pointing at the outline of the army numbers and not in the middle. Just like you did with the starting points of the arrows.

- When I zoom in and click a random bonus in the left toolbar the map should bring me directly to it, but it doesn't so I need to look for it manually.

- The yellow highlight when selecting a bonus is hard to see and the jump animation is very short so you need to click multiple times to see which bonus is highlighted. On bigger maps it'd probably be pretty much impossible to find the selected bonus. I like how it is in flash, where the selected bonus or territory is filled blue when you click it.

Edit:

- The popup when clicking a territory should indeed be optional. It doesn't provide any extra information does it?

- When clicking a bonus on the map there seems to be a short delay before it is highlighted (less than a second). When clicking a bonus from the left toolbar territories are highlighted immediately.

Edited 5/7/2018 08:44:13

As MotD pointed out, the colours on unity are very bright. IMO it's at a point that they aren't a proper representation of how the map will look anymore.

As Dan pointed out, scrolling always zooms in/out on the map. Even when you're in the little list on the left or scrolling through territories that are part of a bonus.

Not very important, but when you click territories in a very rapid succession it will start lagging pretty quickly (it works fine once you stop clicking again though).

Going through distribution modes on https://www.warzone.com/SinglePlayer?PreviewMap=41941&Mode=UJS# (as an example) and clicking "Lodges", gives a pretty ugly result IMO. The territories jump out way too much. Not certain why that happens but it seems to have to do with the fact that the territories are spread out across the entire map. Smaller bonuses or super bonuses/distributions where all territories are clustered don't have this problem. Once again a minor thing though.

-Staying in Ursa Luna, it takes notably longer for ujs to load the little info box when you click on a bonus link for a super bonus compared to a normal one.

---

UJS definitely runs smoother. It looks very nice as well :) Luckily an annoying part of Unity (giving you the "this map has been processed for Unity yet" message) seems to be solved with this. Happy to see the map making part of WZ is finally getting some love in the unity version.

Thanks everyone for the feedback! A new version is live now with some fixes. It's also been made the default mode for map preview links.

The colors seem too bright on UJS/Unity in comparison to flash. Is there any way to reduce brightness?

Fixed - I have reduced the brightness, to be closer to Flash's color.

When you click a bonus on UJS, it brings up a window with all the individual territories in the bonus. Mouse scroll doesn't seem to work on this in the same way as Unity.

Fixed.

is there a way to do UJS and recreate Flash UI

Nope! But if there's something you want in the Flash UI that isn't present, bring it up and we can talk about it.

The pop up window sometimes covers the red arrows when you click on individual territories.

You are right, but I'm not sure how to fix this yet. This is a common component that's used in the main game, too, so I need to figure out a solution that works everywhere.

In UJS, the bonus links on the side are fast. But clicking one of the link on the map, it' lags half-a-sec.

The extra lag comes from making the little thumbnails to show in the inspector dialog. The solution to this issue may depend on the solution to the previous one.

the More Info should be made blue or something so that you know you are leaving the page

The hope is that UJS loads quickly enough that it shouldn't matter you're leaving the page.

Will Send Feedback be added to the page as well?

The Send Feedback feature was added back in the day before we had a mail system. Today it's easy to send feedback as a mail thread, I don't think the button is necessary anymore.

Whereas bigger bonuses only get highlighted.

The issue is that the bigger bonuses cause a bit of lag, so by the time your browser is responsive again the bounce effect has already passed. I need to figure out a way to solve this still.

the scroll bar does not seem to work while using the mouse scroll and has to be moved manually

Fixed!

army number text looking a little small

They should be the same size as in Flash. The Unity client has a feature that enlarges army numbers when zoomed out. That feature was primarilly added for mobile devices since they're on smaller screens than PCs generally, so UJS doesn't have that feature. I may eventually add that feature to UJS too but it's a low priority.

Yellow outline for bonus links aren't displayed

Fixed!

I don't like the glow highlight, on yellow territories it's difficult to see

It should be easier to see now that the territories aren't bright white.

what's the point of the glowing at all if it needs a jumping animation to make it noticeable?

The jumping animation finishes playing in half a second, whereas the glow pulsates continually forever.

When I zoom in and click a random bonus in the left toolbar the map should bring me directly to it, but it doesn't so I need to look for it manually.

Good idea -- done!

scrolling always zooms in/out on the map. Even when you're in the little list on the left or scrolling through territories that are part of a bonus.

Fixed!

Going through distribution modes...gives a pretty ugly result

I agree the bounce animation isn't that great when they're spread over the map. I need to find a better solution for this.

This is pretty cool!

These colors are really nice! Cool update.

If a territory contains big words, it is partially clipped (ex. Impenetrable). However if the name contains many small words in it, it renders fine(ex - Hidden Entrance). Is there some way to dynamically determine font size and ensure it is always visible? (Like you do with Way of Skulls in the ex below). Alternatively, is horizontal scroll an option in this window?

UJS


Unity handles it like this (splitting the big word into multiple lines), which isn't ideal either.


nitpick: The x to close this window(on UJS) looks like a weird overlay on the vertical scroll. Would moving it to the left of this window look better? Another option is to move it above the entire text + vertical scroll.

What if when clicking something on the map once, you don't show the dialog? But x2 click would generate the thumbnails? Seems like the dialog is creating more problems then it being useful tbh.

Also, if I am fully zoomed out, I want to stay zoomed out when liking on of the side bonus links. I would suggest making this a x2 click feature too? So just x2 click and the window will pan to the bonus.

Oh, and the colors looks amazing!

EDIT: The yellow pop-up box giving bonus names when hovering over can go outside the window instead of keeping itself inside the borders.

Edited 5/8/2018 05:03:51

- Mouse scroll doesn't work for zooming.

- What about the arrows hiding the army numbers Fizzer? I believe that is something that should be fixed.

^could fix that by making arrows a little transparent.

Names of distribution modes don't fit in the buttons, as seen in https://www.warzone.com/SinglePlayer?PreviewMap=41588.

Edited 5/8/2018 12:53:22

Looks great!
Small suggestions
- The wikipedia page does not fit in its box for territories/bonuses with long names.
- Would it be possible to have the wikipedia page open in a new tab? Now the complete map needs to load again.

Edited 5/8/2018 18:19:07

In my honest opinion, i kinda like the darker "grittier" look of the flash ui rather than a brighter look because its like war or whatever and it kinda fits the theme and makes it more tense for me but others might like the brighter ui

I think that one thing is missing - when clicking on bonus one should see how much territories are in bonus, or to see that on thumbnail on the bonus menu. On flash version, one can see now bonuses just by hovering over bonus value (which was part of Unity so far).

Don't know if hovering over bonus will be implemented to flash game itself, but that would be nice advancement.