"Go 'way, GUI": A play in one act

Updates Announcements
#1

(The scene: Sabrina and Jean-Claude are working at their computers in a cramped attic)

Sabrina: Oh Jean-Claude! Our Roblox game is finally complete! Now all we have to do is get some good screen shots and perhaps make a promotional video! Then we can finally take a break and go pants-shopping, just like we always dreamed of!

Jean-Claude: Alas! That it not so easy Sabrina! Do you want our promotional art to have the Roblox Blue bar and chat window?

Sabrina: Ugh, no!

Jean-Claude: And do you want our custom UI elements like the welcome window or compass to show up either?

Sabrina: The very idea gives me the vapors!

Jean-Claude: Then we are doomed. We can take screenshots and video capture of our game, but we’ll have to do some kind of complicated image and video editing to get rid of the GUI elements!

Sabrina: Gods help us! That will take hours! I will NEVER get to go pants-shopping!! (sobs miserably)

Jean-Claude: Our lives are a grim and comfortless farce. Perhaps we should just end it all… (reaches for a box of poison)

(Santa enters, stage right)

Santa: Ho-ho-ho!

Sabrina & Jean-Claude: Santa!

Santa: Put that poison down, son! You’ll be out pants-shopping in no-time, now that Roblox allows you to hide the GUI on your own games!!

Sabrina & Jean-Claude: Wha-wha-wha-WHAAAT?!??!

Santa: That’s right! If you are editing a game locally in Studio, or if you are playing a game in Studio or in client while logged in as a user with edit access to the current Place, then you can Hide That GUI!!

Sabrina: But Santa, how???

Santa: Just hit Ctrl-Shift-G to toggle the Roblox GUI on and off, or Ctrl-Shift-C to toggle the developer-created GUI on and off. On a Mac, you might need to use Cmd instead of Ctrl!

Jean-Claude: (Tries it on his machine) It works!

Sabrina: Now we can take screen shots and make videos with no GUI clutter!!

Jean-Claude: Now life has meaning and joy fills my heart. So long, poison!! (Throws poison out the window. (I should have mentioned there’s a window)).

Santa: Now… who wants to go pants shopping???

(All laugh merrily)
(Scene)

94 Likes
#2

-applause-

15 Likes
#3

I love you

7 Likes
#4

So is this a studio only feature or both the client and studio?

Edit: Well derp.


[quote="MrgamesNwatch, post:2, topic:31371, full:true"] -applause- [/quote]
Gif [img]//devforum-uploads.s3.dualstack.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/uploads/original/3X/c/7/c79465cbfb2fe50a6819bd9bfdd473e9243f77b7.gif[/img]
5 Likes
#5

Genius. Just… genius.

8 Likes
#6

Works in-game too as long as you have edit-access to the game.

3 Likes
#8

Nexus isn’t a big fan of theatre

3 Likes
#9

Thank you so much!

2 Likes
#10

Brought a tear to my eye :crying_cat_face:

When does the film’s production begin?

on topic - awesome news! Thanks a ton, Santa!

5 Likes
#11

So a little background for the curious: this feature was actually scheduled to release a couple months ago, but didn’t end up shipping because it had the critical design flaw of allowing users to hide things like flashbang blindness to give them an edge in the game. This is why after a change in design only users with place edit permissions can toggle the UI.

This is definitely useful just for developers though – I used to have to replace the menu button with a transparent image in the ROBLOX assets folder to achieve this. There are also some potential improvements I’d love to see in the future:

  • Allow users to hide ROBLOX (core) UI regardless of edit permissions

  • ROBLOX UI doesn’t affect gameplay so there are no adverse effects here

  • Allows users to take cinematic screenshots in games that don’t have developer-created UI

  • Allows users to hide menu button for more immersive experience in games pursuing realism

  • Allows users to shut off social experience with one key combination should they so wish

  • Allow developers to flag UI elements as hidable / not hidable

  • Default of hidable provides consistent user experience across games

  • Default of not hidable maintains backwards compatibility for old games that are no longer maintained, but makes the feature significantly less useful as most games likely won’t manually take advantage of it

  • Mention of shortcut in Menu > Help

  • Mobile support somehow

10 Likes
#12

Sweet!
Is there a way to make the studio viewport fullscreen?

3 Likes
#13

Art. Please go into the film business.

2 Likes
#14

So glad that tragedy was avoided! Good show!

3 Likes
#15

I find that many gfx artists would appreciate this in all games (even ones you don’t have access to edit) just so they can get great screenshots/captures. Is there a reason that I am not thinking of why it wouldn’t be this way?

1 Like
#16

Earlier experiments suggested that there can be a gameplay advantage to turning off the GUI.

6 Likes
#17

@MasterXertz @CycloneUprising In my previous post, I acknowledged the benefit of the feature being available to all users, and suggested an implementation that would mitigate the problems associated with the initial design of the feature.

2 Likes
#18

I think that is a very great idea!

4 Likes
#19

Dinner and a show? You guys are spoiling us.

5 Likes
#20

I think this is worth posting

on the subject of pants
5 Likes
#21

slow_clap_citizen_kane.gif

12 Likes