Diegetic UI
ダイエジェティックUI / 2009– / Technique / UI Expression
A name for the corner of game interface design where an element belongs both to the fiction and to the three dimensional world. A 2009 master's thesis at Chalmers University of Technology, written with EA DICE, mapped game UI on those two axes and reserved the word for that corner. Health glowing on the hero's own suit is the type case.
At a glance
Visual cues
- Health or ammunition shown on the protagonist's own equipment instead of in a corner of the screen
- A map the character holds up and reads while still walking, rather than a paused overlay
- Panels of information projected into the air that tilt with the camera because they occupy the space
- Directions given by the color of a signpost standing in the world itself
Best used for
- Moving health and ammunition out of the corners of a first person game and into the world itself
- Placing information in VR or in a vehicle as an object in space rather than a layer stuck to the view
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Dictionary entry
- Type
- Treat every character as printed or projected onto something in the world, so it skews with the camera. Some angles will be unreadable, so carry the same meaning in shape and color too.
- Composition
- Leave the four corners of the screen empty. Distribute information across the body, the held device, and the environment, and keep those roles fixed.
- Material
- Use only materials the fiction can account for, such as a lit tube or a projected plane. The style collapses when the material stops being explainable, so settle the world first.
- Caution
- Building an object into the world and then printing controller button names on it mixes fiction with rules, and that is exactly where the thesis's own focus group reported the illusion breaking.
- Further study
- the design space diagram in the Chalmers thesis, drawn on the two axes of fiction and space / the definitions of the intermediate categories such as meta perception and signifier / games that guide the player with a map held in hand or with signs standing in the world
Related entries
- Skeuomorphism (スキューモーフィズム)Same UI Expression lineage.Compare Diegetic UI and Skeuomorphism
- Cyberpunk (サイバーパンク)Shared effects: Exhilaration.Compare Diegetic UI and Cyberpunk
Often confused with
More from UI Expression
Continue through styles in the same UI Expression family, prioritised by shared effects.
- 1-Bit Icon Design (1ビットアイコン)Shared effects: Play / Technique.
- Feed Interface (フィード・インターフェース)Shared effects: Technique / Exhilaration.
- Masonry Layout (メイソンリー・レイアウト)Shared effects: Play / Exhilaration.
Browse all UI Expression entries
Cite this entry
The dictionary is meant to be linked to. Take whichever form fits where you are writing.
- Link
- https://indexstyle.org/styles/diegetic-ui
- Markdown
- [Diegetic UI — IndexStyle](https://indexstyle.org/styles/diegetic-ui)
- HTML
- <a href="https://indexstyle.org/styles/diegetic-ui">Diegetic UI — IndexStyle</a>