Is Habbo removing the zoom-out feature?

[Sandoo]

Recently Puhekupla uploaded a furni called memorial_size (http://i.imgur.com/Bvnz3mp.gif) which features a couple Habbos amongst some zoomed-out furniture. Habbo has previously released "memorial" furni when they have removed other integral aspects of the client (i.e. the big hand, the hotel view, the old loading screen, pixels). This would suggest that Habbo is indeed removing another part of the client. Based on the "_size" suffix in the furni name, and the furni itself, it's safe to assume that Habbo is removing the option to zoom out in Habbo.

To further back this up there have been a few smaller changes within Habbo recently. First off, many furnis' info-stands (http://i.imgur.com/5yVbp5x.png) now show the large "zoomed-in" image of the furni, rather than the small, zoomed-out version which has been typical previously. As well, anywhere where images of small Habbos were used in-client (i.e. the console (http://i.imgur.com/JsBa0nn.png), chat bubbles (http://i.imgur.com/MdpItgj.png), saved outfits (http://i.imgur.com/TFhgnDf.png), etc) now have terribly compressed resized images of large Habbos in their place.

This seems like a big step in the wrong direction, zooming out is a really integral part of Habbo for a lot of users because it can reduce lag and allows for the larger rooms to be shown in full. What do you think about this change seemingly coming to the hotel?

[Yannyboy]

I hope they don't remove this feature, thats the only way i can stop lags these days, it seems they don't have alot of servers like in the old habbo days when lag experiences were quite good

[lawrawrrr]

they'd better not or I would not be a happy bunny!! Big rooms are impossible to screenie without zooming out :l

[Star-Fighter]

Looks like it might happen. Habbo Finland seems to have updated the zooming today so that once you zoom out, it won't show the "miniature" version anymore but a compressed-looking appearance... and you can also freely zoom in and out by saying ":zoom x" (x being a number). Looks like the days of having that miniature-Habbo look which originated from old public rooms is over.

[dbgtz]

A necessary change in order to cut costs. Also, a lot of furni doesn't seem to look right zoomed out (well, mostly aimed at the builders blocks).

[xxMATTGxx]

537597723915329536

[dbgtz]

So it seems like instead of separate sprites, it will just be a blurry mess?

[Jssy]

I hope not I like how cute stuff looks zoomed out like in the old public rooms

[Joe]

I don't quite understand why there's any reason it'd be removed in the first place. Surely it's not causing problems nor is it costing them anything?

[dbgtz]

I don't quite understand why there's any reason it'd be removed in the first place. Surely it's not causing problems nor is it costing them anything?

Takes time to make the extra sprites required for new furni and clothes and, you know what they say, time = money.

[Sandoo]

Habbo.fi had a new method of zooming out implemented today. Instead of there being a large sprite and a small sprite, zooming out will now just resize the large sprite. This looks really unprofessional and makes Habbo look like ****.

http://bottila.com/admin/data/upimages/8067709160hahmospedejuttu.png

Macklebee what's the deal?

[MKR&*42]

Find this hilariousssssss after sulake's art guide which pretty much says dont resizeeee

[oftenMiceElf]

Find this hilariousssssss after sulake's art guide which pretty much says dont resizeeee

Funny; Maybe, given the timing and when the guide finally trickled down to you all, but its purpose was geared more at making sure fansite submissions work with-in the file constraints for our web assets in addition to limiting what the production team would need to fix. While at the same time keeping some elements secured for us to use and not confused with user made imagery. The game itself and its assets live outside that guide. ;)

The bigger picture here is where the time gained from not needing to redraw assets can better be utilized. The sheer amount of work that goes into items like clothing or pets, coupled with the small team, really makes those small assets a hinderance (unfortunately); Despite the history and the communal love for them.

I can fully respect your initial displeasure with the look of the code base down-scaling because it will never be exactly on par with the manually redrawn assets you're so accustomed to seeing, but, give it a chance. It's something we introduced with the iOS version of Habbo and it can only get more refined with constructive feedback. If this were a Disney forum this would be a good spot to throw in a "to infinity and beyond" reference. But it's not... so now I feel silly.

[Rachel]

I sometimes use that feature as it does remind me of back in the day. I hope they won't be removing it :(

[Kotu]

Don't necessarily mind this, but it looks incredibly messy right now because of the inconsistencies between the way the Habbos are being resized and how the furniture and everything else is being resized.

[Michael]

The new :zoom feature is really cool, they should put it as a button though instead of commands

[Yannyboy]

The new :zoom feature is really cool, they should put it as a button though instead of commands

Agreed

[dbgtz]

Zoom command is great. I love zooming in a lot, reminds me of that mini series they once did. Snout Hill I think it was called?

[Joe]

Takes time to make the extra sprites required for new furni and clothes and, you know what they say, time = money.

Ah, didn't read that bit..

[October]

A necessary change in order to cut costs. Also, a lot of furni doesn't seem to look right zoomed out (well, mostly aimed at the builders blocks).
how would that cut costs?

[Sandoo]

Funny; Maybe, given the timing and when the guide finally trickled down to you all, but its purpose was geared more at making sure fansite submissions work with-in the file constraints for our web assets in addition to limiting what the production team would need to fix. While at the same time keeping some elements secured for us to use and not confused with user made imagery. The game itself and its assets live outside that guide. ;)

The bigger picture here is where the time gained from not needing to redraw assets can better be utilized. The sheer amount of work that goes into items like clothing or pets, coupled with the small team, really makes those small assets a hinderance (unfortunately); Despite the history and the communal love for them.

I can fully respect your initial displeasure with the look of the code base down-scaling because it will never be exactly on par with the manually redrawn assets you're so accustomed to seeing, but, give it a chance. It's something we introduced with the iOS version of Habbo and it can only get more refined with constructive feedback. If this were a Disney forum this would be a good spot to throw in a "to infinity and beyond" reference. But it's not... so now I feel silly.

Thankfully the new zoom out doesn't look bad at all on high density displays so I'm not really bothered with it on my retina Macbook. I'm glad to hear the rationale being put behind more new content. The only real piece of criticism I have is that the chat-heads look absolutely terrible now. I would suggest that leaving the chat-heads as the traditional smaller sprites would make Habbo a lot less low-budget looking. It really should not be that much of a hindrance to have to redraw new head accessories/hair, etc. when it is released either.

Seems like a way to appease both sides of the debate.

[Kyle]

how would that cut costs?

Time = money.

I like the zoom in feature but I'm not fond of the one zoom out option. Logistically it may make sense to pre-emptively remove all pre drawn small furni and clothing sprites fom existence but in doing so it shows the clear flaws that will continue when new ranges are introduced. The lack of outlines is a HUGE problem, it makes drawings look unfinished and like they have been zoomed and skewed on ms paint. Not only is it ugly, it's also very hard on the eyes of those with already existing eye problems. Black outlines allow for clear enough distinctions between colour to get by but without them, when zoomed out a lot of furni (using the greens in macklebee bubble lounge as a perfect example) are merging together in messy blobs.

Now I realise that this is a company decision to redistribute 30% of currently used time into newer projects but my question is - is it really needed? Attached's post on the forum recently about habbo milking features (his example being LTDs) until they become stagnant is one that rings true in this instance too. I would much rather smaller and more well-drawn furni ranges and less clothing (perhaps I'm biased as I haven't changed my habbo look in a number of years) than quickly knocked up and ultimately shoddy work that can only be fully appreciated at one level of zoom. The university furni is an example of a furni range that is largely hit-and-miss in terms of quality ad desirability. I remember long ago when habbo was a platform that encouraged creativity in design. It was a unique and unrivalled isometric game where people would use what they were given to create some quite astounding things. We'd make lakes from blue oval rugs, tomb stones from area hatches, Eiffel towers from nothing but a handful of z shelves and a French flag on the wall. Now we're given so much premade furni that the scope for creativity has shifted ever so slightly from the consumers to the producers. There is nothing wrong with releasing cool new furni ranges, just slow it down a little? We don't NEED a new range every month, it just stops us appreciating what we already have. Mayan furniture is well designed but because of it's poorly timed, badly backed (the campaign surrounding it was boring) and short-lived, it has faded into obscurity. Rather than drawing entire new ranges I would much prefer utilising old ones, as has been the custom in the past, with new campaigns. Yes, you can draw 3/4 items to add to new campaigns, but why draw entirely new ones every single time?

The iOS app and desktop client are not homogenous products and should not be marketed as such. If I wanted habbo to look like bobba bar and to have difficulty seeing and navigating it then I would play the iOS app rather than my laptop. Don't draw them in any closer to the same thing please.


~~from phone

[Rakker]

Funny; Maybe, given the timing and when the guide finally trickled down to you all, but its purpose was geared more at making sure fansite submissions work with-in the file constraints for our web assets in addition to limiting what the production team would need to fix. While at the same time keeping some elements secured for us to use and not confused with user made imagery. The game itself and its assets live outside that guide. ;)

The bigger picture here is where the time gained from not needing to redraw assets can better be utilized. The sheer amount of work that goes into items like clothing or pets, coupled with the small team, really makes those small assets a hinderance (unfortunately); Despite the history and the communal love for them.

I can fully respect your initial displeasure with the look of the code base down-scaling because it will never be exactly on par with the manually redrawn assets you're so accustomed to seeing, but, give it a chance. It's something we introduced with the iOS version of Habbo and it can only get more refined with constructive feedback. If this were a Disney forum this would be a good spot to throw in a "to infinity and beyond" reference. But it's not... so now I feel silly.


The new update means the end for me on Youtube. I have spent years making videos and tutorials. However, with the new zoom system is the end insight. zooming is very weird. We get our rooms never nice in focus. We shoot mostly with zoomout to get our entire room on screen. This is no longer possible. When we are zoom out all the elements are blurry and not tight. it will mean that we now only record neatly with the zoom in. But this does not bring rooms fully in my 22inch screen. Then I have not even talked about the macbook users. This is very regrettable and the end for many elements from my youtube channel and other well known channels.


I understand that it will cost Sulake a lot of extra work (30%)... but it also costs a lot of promotion on youtube and social media. People share their rooms tidy out on twitter.. Free promotion for habbo in this hard times.


Share my opinion and see if there is something to settle. almost all new furniture have the zoom out images. Why throw away all that work? It takes a lot more work to update the BC blocks, for example.. It has no more lines.. hole elements and nice graphic from habbo are gone. large building is now no longer an option.. we need the zoom out function.. We stuck to screen sizes.


http://i57.tinypic.com/2ihwmeb.png

[DJ_Shadow]

What an improvement. Thanks Habbo! :/

http://i.imgur.com/M15nCzD.png

[Michael]

I think they should just remove zoom out completely and keep the zoom-in.

[DJ_Shadow]

I think they should just remove zoom out completely and keep the zoom-in.

To be honest, they might as well if it's just going to look like this. What a pity. I'd rather they spent more time focusing on quality rather than quantity.

[Rakker]

cya..

Edited by Derrener (Forum Moderator) - Please do not post pointlessly

[dbgtz]

I don't think the lack of a decent zoom out is going to cost them a lot and I imagine they must have some reason for adding the zoom in feature in the future otherwise why bother adding it in the first place. I suspect it's to do with the increase of resolutions essentially making zooming out obsolete and zoom in necessary.

[Michael]

http://oi58.tinypic.com/4rq4bt.jpg

[dbgtz]

Would ctrl+mouse wheel would really be the best way to do it?

[Michael]

Would ctrl+mouse wheel would really be the best way to do it?

I wouldn't mind just the mouse wheel doing it, but then again they should still enhance that zoom button to include the new zoom features

[dbgtz]

I wouldn't mind just the mouse wheel doing it, but then again they should still enhance that zoom button to include the new zoom features

Oh yeah but it's just standard for browsers to have ctrl+mouse wheel to zoom so it might just be a bit naff, that's all.

[DJ_Shadow]

They are still using the older zoomed out images on the marketplace offer window! Just comparing how beautifully drawn they used to be with the awful mess we are left with now. Thankfully they didn't actually delete the old sprites when they switched over :P

Though surely they will have to redraw new furniture smaller anyway for inventory icons? Unless they are planning to scale everything down even smaller than they are already doing now.. For anyone without a retina display Habbo would become too much of an eyesore to play. It would be for me anyway.

Developers, if you are reading this my advice to you is stop cutting corners!



http://i.imgur.com/47vHAdW.png

[Rakker]

They are still using the older zoomed out images on the marketplace offer window! Just comparing how beautifully drawn they used to be with the awful mess we are left with now. Thankfully they didn't actually delete the old sprites when they switched over :P

Though surely they will have to redraw new furniture smaller anyway for inventory icons? Unless they are planning to scale everything down even smaller than they are already doing now.. For anyone without a retina display Habbo would become too much of an eyesore to play. It would be for me anyway.

Developers, if you are reading this my advice to you is stop cutting corners!



http://i.imgur.com/47vHAdW.png


true

[DJ_Shadow]

Just imagining now what it would be like if they really did decide to scale down absolutely everything, including icons. Cutting so many corners, they'll be running round in circles. Time = money, right?



When attempting to post furniture on the marketplace:

http://i.imgur.com/Plajycz.png


Mock Inventory Icon (right):

http://i.imgur.com/1FQNuPY.png


(Disclaimer: The images displayed above are mockups done on Adobe Photoshop in an attempt to illustrate how users without a retina display might experience Habbo Hotel in the event of further downscaling).

[solitaire]

This is another extremely dumb thing Habbo has done. Did they ~really~ do this to be time efficient or to save money? Sure. How much would they have saved? Not much. They did this because Habbo Hotel staff are lazy and don't know how to actually look after their hotel and yet they still decide to make another ugly update on the hotel. The funny thing is though is that their new feature seems to only benefit the staff, not the players. What kind of graphics team would give the go-ahead for poorly reduced low quality compressed images? How they managed to do that without, like, stabbing themselves in the eardrum as a reflex to the stupidity of it all baffles me.

How about instead of them outsourcing moderators in Malaysia for 50 cents an hour, they could spend that money hiring more graphic / pixel designers to join their development team so they wouldn't have to downscale all the images for their lazy bobbas.

[dbgtz]

Just imagining now what it would be like if they really did decide to scale down absolutely everything, including icons. Cutting so many corners, they'll be running round in circles. Time = money, right?



When attempting to post furniture on the marketplace:

http://i.imgur.com/Plajycz.png


Mock Inventory Icon (right):

http://i.imgur.com/1FQNuPY.png

(Disclaimer: The images displayed above are mockups done on Adobe Photoshop in an attempt to illustrate how users without a retina display might experience Habbo Hotel in the event of further downscaling).

It's possible they might not shrink the inventory icon down since it's not the same image used in rooms. It's less costly to produce than the small room furni since it is only 1 sprite as opposed to the many used in rooms; is a static image and doesn't have any kind of user interaction.


This is another extremely dumb thing Habbo has done. Did they ~really~ do this to be time efficient or to save money? Sure. How much would they have saved? Not much. They did this because Habbo Hotel staff are lazy and don't know how to actually look after their hotel and yet they still decide to make another ugly update on the hotel. The funny thing is though is that their new feature seems to only benefit the staff, not the players. What kind of graphics team would give the go-ahead for poorly reduced low quality compressed images? How they managed to do that without, like, stabbing themselves in the eardrum as a reflex to the stupidity of it all baffles me.

How about instead of them outsourcing moderators in Malaysia for 50 cents an hour, they could spend that money hiring more graphic / pixel designers to join their development team so they wouldn't have to downscale all the images for their lazy bobbas.

Because if they did that, then there would be no moderators whatsoever lmao.

[Samantha]

Just imagining now what it would be like if they really did decide to scale down absolutely everything, including icons. Cutting so many corners, they'll be running round in circles. Time = money, right?



When attempting to post furniture on the marketplace:

http://i.imgur.com/Plajycz.png


Mock Inventory Icon (right):

http://i.imgur.com/1FQNuPY.png


(Disclaimer: The images displayed above are mockups done on Adobe Photoshop in an attempt to illustrate how users without a retina display might experience Habbo Hotel in the event of further downscaling).

I could imagine an increase in scams with that as the final 'Petal Patch' image looks like a Floral Patch when it's in another state.

Also, when they do room competitions that require a screenshot how are they going to go about it? Surely they're not going to want poorly designed graphics to ruin them as then they'd have to visit every room to see how good they are for themselves.

[Zak]

Takes time to make the extra sprites required for new furni and clothes and, you know what they say, time = money.

Makes sense now. Anything to do to save money they will do :P

[Drewar]

Wow, Habbo has really outdone themselves, haven't they?

Really bummed to see this. The quality of rooms when zoomed out looks absolutely dreadful. A pixelated mess.

Kyle said it perfectly (I'm paraphrasing, obviously): If all of this new furniture takes too much time to redraw on a smaller scale, then stop releasing so much new furniture!!! The Habbo community did amazing things for many years without all of this new generation furni. Making lakes out of blue rugs, etc. Sure, release some new furniture every once in a while (that's essentially what "rares" were created for, by the way), but not every month or few weeks or whatever it is.

This seems like a step in the wrong direction. Although personally I have never viewed rooms in their "zoomed out" version since the inception of zooming out (the rooms were way too small for me to view, I have always had to zoom in to avoid headaches), I can absolutely see why people are upset about the new zooming.

I mean, honestly. It's just a mess.

[e5]

Having good graphics and nice rooms to look at was one of the main reasons I still went on habbo. Now they just look dreadful :(

[Rakker]

Openletter by Rakker:


Hello Habbo,


Habbo is a game, which I've been playing for a long time. There have been a lot of updates. This is something amazing, given that a game should develop with time, so that it doesn't get outdated. That's why I support updates and the evolution of Habbo. These last months you have let a lot of users test these updates. Finally, the feedback of those who need it most (the actual 'audience') gets taken into consideration, so yet again, this has been a great improvement. Unfortunately, I cannot agree with everything that has changed, recently.


The Zooming System:


With deep regret it is not possible anymore to zoom out with the quality that we are used to, which is disastrous. This might seem a bit exaggerated, but I will elaborate on this more specifically:


"Before I took any conclusions, I have carefully read the document "Behind the Scenes", that has been provided for the forums of Habbo"


1. The old method of zooming has been the ideal phenomenon for a room builder. It brought everything into perspective, and fitted right into our screens. People could easily make screenshots, and share this on social media. Not only screenshots, but also video makers that wanted to share on YouTube for example, benefitted from this feature. For years I have been using the zooming function to share all the amazing things Habbo can offer on my YouTube channel. The people that follow me, and even those that get to know about Habbo via those video's are counting on the quality of rooms and the game, and this is something vital to show with the best aesthetics. With the new system, the rooms I want to share become very blurry and buggy. This makes it very hard for me to show all the good Habbo has to offer, and show the art I want to share with everyone on the internet.


2. The enormous differences would possibly be the biggest issue. When one makes a room zoomed in, it looks completely different zoomed out. Some furni take other formats, and could bug or align differently. Showing the bigger picture of the entire room is almost impossible this way. When we place furni, we will have to control whether it looks neat when we zoom out, constantly.


3. When we are building, we can fortunately use the stacking tile. Nonetheless, when we are building something high, the stacking tile will fall outside of our computer screens, and we can't select the bottom tile on which we have to stack on - which makes zooming out a necessity. Because everything is getting even smaller whilst zooming out with the new feature, clicking the stacking tile and small furni is very hard. It is practically impossible to build quickly, and to see the overall building quality at a glance.


There are some other problems as well, in regard to the bugging Builder's Club blocks. Habbo's that create amazing rooms with these blocks cannot work properly, which is a pity, given that this amazing new BC-exclusive feature enables more (new) people to build on an accessible level. Therefore, it is very important that this percentage of users can show their artwork properly too.


My personal opinion is that the system poses problems in the building sector of Habbo. For several hours I have been testing it, and it has been a big obstacle for me. Despite the fact that I understand that it saves 30% of your time not to make a miniature version, the pros do not outweigh the cons in this case. Therefore, I would like to ask Sulake with great respect, whether it would be possible to go back to the old system, and go back to the train that already worked. Some people preferred to see their rooms zoomed in, and some vice versa. But now we are not left with a choice, and we feel helpless. Not only can I see my YouTube channel's following decline, but also my future as a motivated builder.


To put it short, unfortunately, me, and a lot of other builders (like Jendro and Hawaii5.O) are quite disappointed when it comes to the new zooming function.


-------------------------------------------------------------


Response Sulake:


Hi rakker,

Thanks for the passionate feedback!

we are aware of the issues raised by the latest changes and are working on improving the situation. unfortunately, we are not planning on rolling back to an older version. I’ll go through your three concerns below:

1 . we will be adding a button which you can press to export a high-res 1:1 pic of the whole room to be used in videos etc. hope this solves majority of your problems

2. these are one-off cases. pls document the issues and we'll try to bug fix them

3.this is part of a complex building related UX issue. we will try to be solve this later on in 2015 as one part of a bigger improvement project focusing on making building easier and more powerful


Thanks again for writing to us and looking forward to many users loving the zoom function’s power and loving your rooms!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB5C16002TQ

[Michael]

I'd rather they had 30% more time to create extra designs for features and furni than resizing silly furniture.

[Kyle]

Their response to 2nd point is ridiculous. These are not 1 off cases, everything is being displayed in a horrible way.


~~from phone

[Bloop]

Now I can't zoom out without my eyes bleeding ew.

People like rakker are complaining about how the 'new' zoomout feature ruins rooms; and I do agree. Bad, bad move, sulake.

- - - Updated - - -

Oh wait didn't notice he posted his feedback oops but yeah. Horrible!!

[Eazy-E]

People complain about every single change. I like the new change, love it.

[dbgtz]

Openletter by Rakker:


Hello Habbo,


Habbo is a game, which I've been playing for a long time. There have been a lot of updates. This is something amazing, given that a game should develop with time, so that it doesn't get outdated. That's why I support updates and the evolution of Habbo. These last months you have let a lot of users test these updates. Finally, the feedback of those who need it most (the actual 'audience') gets taken into consideration, so yet again, this has been a great improvement. Unfortunately, I cannot agree with everything that has changed, recently.


The Zooming System:


With deep regret it is not possible anymore to zoom out with the quality that we are used to, which is disastrous. This might seem a bit exaggerated, but I will elaborate on this more specifically:


"Before I took any conclusions, I have carefully read the document "Behind the Scenes", that has been provided for the forums of Habbo"


1. The old method of zooming has been the ideal phenomenon for a room builder. It brought everything into perspective, and fitted right into our screens. People could easily make screenshots, and share this on social media. Not only screenshots, but also video makers that wanted to share on YouTube for example, benefitted from this feature. For years I have been using the zooming function to share all the amazing things Habbo can offer on my YouTube channel. The people that follow me, and even those that get to know about Habbo via those video's are counting on the quality of rooms and the game, and this is something vital to show with the best aesthetics. With the new system, the rooms I want to share become very blurry and buggy. This makes it very hard for me to show all the good Habbo has to offer, and show the art I want to share with everyone on the internet.


2. The enormous differences would possibly be the biggest issue. When one makes a room zoomed in, it looks completely different zoomed out. Some furni take other formats, and could bug or align differently. Showing the bigger picture of the entire room is almost impossible this way. When we place furni, we will have to control whether it looks neat when we zoom out, constantly.


3. When we are building, we can fortunately use the stacking tile. Nonetheless, when we are building something high, the stacking tile will fall outside of our computer screens, and we can't select the bottom tile on which we have to stack on - which makes zooming out a necessity. Because everything is getting even smaller whilst zooming out with the new feature, clicking the stacking tile and small furni is very hard. It is practically impossible to build quickly, and to see the overall building quality at a glance.


There are some other problems as well, in regard to the bugging Builder's Club blocks. Habbo's that create amazing rooms with these blocks cannot work properly, which is a pity, given that this amazing new BC-exclusive feature enables more (new) people to build on an accessible level. Therefore, it is very important that this percentage of users can show their artwork properly too.


My personal opinion is that the system poses problems in the building sector of Habbo. For several hours I have been testing it, and it has been a big obstacle for me. Despite the fact that I understand that it saves 30% of your time not to make a miniature version, the pros do not outweigh the cons in this case. Therefore, I would like to ask Sulake with great respect, whether it would be possible to go back to the old system, and go back to the train that already worked. Some people preferred to see their rooms zoomed in, and some vice versa. But now we are not left with a choice, and we feel helpless. Not only can I see my YouTube channel's following decline, but also my future as a motivated builder.


To put it short, unfortunately, me, and a lot of other builders (like Jendro and Hawaii5.O) are quite disappointed when it comes to the new zooming function.


-------------------------------------------------------------


Response Sulake:


Hi rakker,

Thanks for the passionate feedback!

we are aware of the issues raised by the latest changes and are working on improving the situation. unfortunately, we are not planning on rolling back to an older version. I’ll go through your three concerns below:

1 . we will be adding a button which you can press to export a high-res 1:1 pic of the whole room to be used in videos etc. hope this solves majority of your problems

2. these are one-off cases. pls document the issues and we'll try to bug fix them

3.this is part of a complex building related UX issue. we will try to be solve this later on in 2015 as one part of a bigger improvement project focusing on making building easier and more powerful


Thanks again for writing to us and looking forward to many users loving the zoom function’s power and loving your rooms!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DB5C16002TQ

At point number 2, surely because it's zooming out an image it's a perfect resize? Some small furniture used to be bigger than they should have been so I don't see how #2 works.

[DJ_Shadow]

2. these are one-off cases. pls document the issues and we'll try to bug fix them

Sulake and developers,

I have taken the liberty to document some of the fundamental flaws with the new way rooms are rendered when zooming out. Please remember, I am writing from a viewpoint of someone without a retina display. So someone with a superior monitor will experience zooming out in an entirely differently way.


1) Petal Patches and everything else.

I’m singling out this particular piece of furniture because not only does it appear terribly pixelated when zoomed out (alike everything else, including avatars), half of it actually appears black (see image). But it only appears like this for people without a retina display. I could go on without end picking bugged examples, also with animations such as the water flow with the ’Greep Carp’ (a typo you still have not fixed after 4 YEARS) is somewhat jumpy.


http://i.imgur.com/M15nCzD.png


2) Room Designs.

I picked up on this one fairly recently. Whenever you zoom out of a large room (V7 room sizes +) notice how it is almost like you can see how the room was designed. There are visible lines on the floor that were not present previously. I do not know whether they appear for users with a retina display, but it I suspect that they don’t. This error occurs regardless of what flooring is applied.



http://i.imgur.com/VOwN72f.png



I am led to believe that these are inherent problems you can’t just simply fix. As this error is mostly likely brought about by using a lower resolution screen. By implementing this rendering update you are hereby discriminating against anyone who doesn’t have a computer which was made a year or so ago. Judging by what I have read on this forum and from others in the Hotel, there is a severe majority of us who don’t and have pretty unanimously reported a significant degradation of their user experience.



How will you fix this?

You simply won’t, will you? I'm probably wasting my breath here, but I've included some of possible solutions in case you are vaguely interested in doing something about this:


Solution 1) Editing the ACTUAL furniture images to make them compatible with the new zoomed out mode (since there is nothing you can do about our individual pixel densities).

Reason why this won’t happen: Firstly I don’t see how this would actually work. Though if it did, not only will this take perhaps thousands of hours of your time to make the furniture compatible; not to mention the opposition it would get. It would be much more time-effective to continue the tried and tested system we are used to.


Solution 2) Have every user upgrade to a £2,000 mac to ‘enjoy’ a slightly worse user experience or put up with the new status quo. I'd imagine this to be the preferred option for Sulake. Requires minimal effort on their part.

Reason why this won’t happen: Wake up Sulake. You have tirelessly orientated your game around a young audience to the extent of banning gambling. If you are to believe that every 13+ year old out there (existing Habbo user or a potential customer) has / can afford a retina display computer then you are misguided. I can see new users coming on being vastly disconcerted with the unprofessional graphics, no matter how many new pieces of furniture you churn out instead. They will probably go play another game that prides itself on it’s graphics and actually listens to their community, instead of pretending to.


Oh, by the way. I should point out that the scaling code takes your monitors pixel density into account. So if you have one of those high pixel density monitors (retina macs for example) you’re in for a treat! I’ll leave that to you to figure out though!

Surely you mean, if you don’t have one of those high pixel density monitors tough luck? :P


Solution 3) Sulake restores the original sprites and the old way of rendering. Everything is back to how it was from Mobiles Disco in 1999 to present.

Reason why this won’t happen: By cutting out the time they spend on properly drawing graphics to an acceptable standard, they are going to increase the rate at which they produce more furniture and clothes. Contrary to belief this is not entirely to do with lowering their operating costs, as their designers are still working for (as I imagine to be) the same amount of time to produce more furniture in lieu of the extra graphics. (Basically Habbo is a sell out).


Your new christmas ad campaign featuring ‘Sam Ta’ might draw some more users in, but by poorly rendering the graphics you are deliberately hindering unofficial advertisers, such as Rakker, that give you FREE publicity on social media such as Youtube and Twitter. In an attempt to quell their concerns you have issued the following statement:


1 . we will be adding a button which you can press to export a high-res 1:1 pic of the whole room to be used in videos etc. hope this solves majority of your problems

Let me remind you that the purpose of zooming out is so we can fit larger rooms in the average screen size. Exporting larger rooms in a 1:1 image will not solve this problem, and zooming out of that image will distort quality in a similar fashion. You have given us the option to export a static image, however this does not solve the problem with trying to RECORD rooms on video (Rakker).

Sulake, you are out of touch and have your priorities in the wrong order. This is a seemingly unavoidable problem for the average user and if you do not address this situation you will be blatantly disregarding a significant proportion of your customers. Please reconsider this decision.


Thanks again for writing to us and looking forward to many users loving the zoom function’s power and loving your rooms!

Name them, Sulake. Then tell us what percentage have retina displays? What percentage is that of total active users?

[Rakker]

UPDATE:

http://i58.tinypic.com/2q9w8r6.png

BEFORE:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7xNYajxObA

AFTER:

http://i59.tinypic.com/230eb8.png

http://i62.tinypic.com/2hwzreg.png


Request send to sulake:

http://i61.tinypic.com/nyurcx.png
BEFORE <> AFTER

If you create a system where we can place furniture directly on the stack tile we have solved the biggest problem.
We would no longer need to search the tile on the floor for placing furni

Moving the room, and you can stack.. without zooming or something.

[Samantha]

It just looks blurry lol.

[DJ_Shadow]

Okay, they have solved the blackness problem. But they cannot fix the blurriness with screens of a lower resolution.

[Kyle]

Can somebody post a screenshot of the way speech bubbles and the heads on them are appearing after macklebees tweet about changes or is it still only available for those with sandbox access

Problem seems to be largely that design is catering to (or simply a consequence of ring created by) those with higher end retina displays, leaving those that aren't living luxury ( 99% of habbos teenage user base) with a lower res blurry clunky product. Don't think blurriness will ever be fixed unless old method is employed again.


~~from phone

[lemons]

hate the new zoom out so much but i usually only zoom out in big game rooms like death runs etc

[MKR&*42]

Can't believe they're even attempting to ''fix''such a piss poor method of zooming at all. nor can i believe theyre still going through with it after all the complaints, what a shambles.

[DJ_Shadow]

Things are looking a bit clearer now, but still blurry. You have fixed the black blotches on the petal patches, but there is now another problem with them. They bizarrely seem to now look different depending on where they are placed in the room :P



http://i.imgur.com/uvd4yj7.png


-----
Edit: What is even stranger is after I posted this I went back onto the Hotel tab on my browser and noticed the different brightnesses of the petal patches have somehow changed sides of the room without doing anything? :S



http://i.imgur.com/kzz3YrA.png

[Samantha]

Things are looking a bit clearer now, but still blurry. You have fixed the black blotches on the petal patches, but there is now another problem with them. They bizarrely seem to now look different depending on where they are placed in the room :P



http://i.imgur.com/uvd4yj7.png


-----
Edit: What is even stranger is after I posted this I went back onto the Hotel tab on my browser and noticed the different brightnesses of the petal patches have somehow changed sides of the room without doing anything? :S



http://i.imgur.com/kzz3YrA.png

LMFAO that's hilarious, they seriously can't think that's ok can they?

[Kimmy]

Probably not worth coming to conclusions about yet.
I personally wish the hotel was still like it was when I first joined. I loved the pool and the little maid thingy that stood behind the bar who you could be like "coke please" and she'd give you it.