Open Beta Testing V3 Layout

[larissar]

We are very excited to announce open beta testing for the new game layout!

Horse World Online is currently running version 2 (of the game) and we're preparing to transition to version 3 (of the game) and version 2 (of the game layout code). We need your help to make sure this new layout works well in all browsers and doesn't introduce any new bugs.

How can you help?
You can help us by enabling the new layout on your account, and trying to play the game from various browsers and devices (desktops, laptops, tablets, phones, etc). We are already aware of performance issues loading the horse images in Firefox browsers both PC and mobile. Officially Chrome and Edge are the preferred browsers.

We need feedback on the following aspects of the game:

• Overall header/navigation (functions, looks good, easy to find what you need, nothing is broken)
• Horse profile page (all game functions continue to work exactly as in the old layout, nothing is missing/broken/confusing)
• Performance of page loading, and page navigating
• Bugs or weird behaviour while playing the game
• New changes you are happy or unhappy to see
• Features missing that we're in the old layout but not found in the new layout

Note: the forum and user account related pages are incomplete and will be addressed soon, its the game related pages we're focusing on for now.

How to report bugs?
Continue posting bugs in the Bugs forum, or use the Contact Us link in the footer to submit a report if you're unable to post in the bugs forum.

What do I need to know before enabling the new layout?
It's strongly advised to make sure you've completed the Tutorial before trying the new layout because at the time of writing this announcement the tutorial portion of the layout is incomplete and not a good experience. We will be working on that over the next few days though.

How do I enable the new layout?
To enable the layout simply visit the Preferences page, scroll down to the option for "My board style" and change from "smarthwo" to "smarthwo v2", then click on Save. You can switch between the layouts at anytime if you need to switch back to the old layout.

Have fun and happy testing! Please make sure to let us know what you like or hate about the new layout, and what you're most excited for with the future of HWO.

Credit: Laptop and smartphone Image by Vectonauta on Freepik

[Mania57]

I've turned it on, looks gorgeous so far! Will take some getting used to but looks great, I haven't had any issues so far minus the player character being greyed out when viewing a horse.

[BlackOak2]

I'm quite enjoying the new layout and the new forums! It's a tad of a learning curve, so it'll take some time to get used to, but I can see myself getting hooked on it decently easily.

Kind of miss the forum ability to keep what you've typed. Before, if I accidentally navigated away from the page, I could go back and what I happened to start typing, pops back up. That hasn't happened in the new layout, had to retype what I started, but I understand that. Just a little bit of a that must be dealt with. Most online sites are like this. So just must deal.

Anyway, I'm also liking that all of the BR and confo scores are now included on one tab. So, if I'm doing investigational work and working within projects that require oversight of both of these, be quite more useful once I get used to that layout a bit more.

Also, REALLY looking forward to the genetics testing I can see [And Can't Yet Touch! ]... just... want... to... click...

New layout on the stable page seems... odd... not sure I can explain it though. It feels both right and not right. It works great though. Maybe it's a reading thing? Used to the old layout where we go down. This one is left to right and down. Won't be a hard thing to get used to, just feels a bit awkward from the last one.

Will we get testing for non-real-life-testable colors? There aren't any options for pangare or roan or sooty... metallic... ect.

And... I'm just realizing that I've completely lost sight of where to change the name of a horse... Nevermind! That one hasn't changed location.

[larissar]

New layout on the stable page seems... odd... not sure I can explain it though. It feels both right and not right. It works great though. Maybe it's a reading thing? Used to the old layout where we go down. This one is left to right and down. Won't be a hard thing to get used to, just feels a bit awkward from the last one.

There has been enough feedback on this particular page that I'll be reverting it back to a horizontal "table" like layout in the near future.

Will we get testing for non-real-life-testable colors? There aren't any options for pangare or roan or sooty... metallic... ect.

There will be additional genetic tests added in the future, but I cannot say for certain exactly which tests we'll have available.

[KeenHorizon]

I am really liking this new layout! There are so many great new features, and it definitely has a more modern look to it that I really love. I'm viewing it from a desktop and haven't tested most of the features yet, so I haven't come across any bugs, but I'm really liking what I see so far.

There's so much good to unpack here but there are a few things that I feel deserve a mention;

• I love the new graphics and icons! The navigation bar looks great and seems to work exactly as it should. The pasture/barn graphics on the "Barns and Pastures" tab in the farm page are my personal favorites.
• The new horse profile pages are great! I love the way they look, and the ability to hide/show certain things on it really makes it easy to look at everything without getting overwhelmed by all the information at once. I really love being able to see all the progeny of a horse in a list view with all their info on the "Breeding" tab (might be my favorite change so far).
• On the horse profile pages, the navigation feature that allows you to go from horse to horse is a great addition! That definitely makes viewing horses so much easier.
• I am sooooo excited for the genetic testing feature! I think that will prove to be a great feature for this game and will help clear up a lot of the horse color questions.
• The human silhouette next to the horses immediately made me hope for customizable people. Being able to change the person's appearance and clothes, and even less obvious things like height (to aid in horse-height comparisons? Idk but I think it'd be cool) would be a really great feature.

There are a few layout things that stood out to me that I don't particularly like though;

• Farm name covers barns/pastures on the "My Farm" page. Makes it look a little messy and hard to read the names of the pastures behind it. This also makes it impossible to rearrange certain items or access the barns/pastures should they happen to be behind the farm name (not sure if this is a bug or just a layout thing).
• The sizing of the barns/pastures/decorations on the "My Farm" page don't seem proportional to the size of the new layout. With the larger font size of this layout and the bigger background, they just feel a little too small in my opinion.
• To go along with the previous point, when viewing the pastures (and barns) the horses seem super small to me (they're about the same size out in the pasture as their pictures in the lists below).
• The tabs on the horse profile page have a scroll bar. Seeing as there's only 7 tabs, I think it would be more user friendly if the tabs were scaled down a bit so that all are visible, and no scrolling is needed.
• Adding to the tabs on the horse profile page, the "Stabling" info box is located on both the "Information" and "Training" tabs, and the "Equipment" info box is located on the "Information", "Training", and "Competing" tabs. I think having them only on the "Information" tab would make more sense.

That's really all I have for now, but overall, I think this layout is great and will be a great update to this game!

[DaughterOfFrigga]

It's strange but I like it so far. There's some things that appear off but it could be because I'm in portrait view on mobile. I'll play more later and see! Great job!!!

[GrayGray]

Good afternoon, developers. I tried a new theme, and noticed first of all that:
On the competition registration pages, competition results, and in the store, the text is too small for this font. I would suggest using a slightly different font. or at least the one on the old topic. Basically, everything looks more modern, but is very overloaded with the number of tabs. I would add an option with and without tabs, for people who analyze a lot, and for people who breed horses for beauty (simplified mode). It's great that you decided to display pastures and stables in blocks, not lines. It would be cool to do the same with horses. Due to the future cross-platform nature, many design elements will have to be polished for a long time. This mainly concerns huge margins and incorrect font sizes. I repeat, the serif font looks very inharmonious... in my subjective opinion.

As for the simplified mode, I would just leave the tabs there, but for the pros, I would like to immediately see important information on the horse page: report, confo, genetics.

And since the topic of animation has come up, I would be glad if you would give me the opportunity to completely disable animation, including in local competitions. Because waiting for 2 seconds every time tires me, I look at the results through the code inspector, it's also long and unpleasant. It would be great to record for the owner (so that only he can see) the best result of the local competition. I think only one variable is required, which could be compared with the previous one every time - if it is better - overwritten.

since I am writing through a translator, there may be inaccuracies in my sentence, if something is unclear, quote it, I will try to explain it in other words.

Thanks!

[Farant]

Returned to look at new layout. Same old, same old.

Visual bells and whistles aside, the same uncomfortable for a big farm with hundreds of horses layout was repeated, small pastures, small barns (my broodmares were spread across 9!!! different ones and it was a pain to keep track of, always had to come up with various * and ? and / to mark them, it was a mess), lots of unnecessary clicking. Can you please offer bigger options? Breeding projects that span multiple generations and hundreds of horses are not only hard to do, but detrimental to the player's health. My fingers hurt when I remember sorting through 30 foals at a time, my regular batch. I've probably bred thousands of horses.
When I enter a pasture, I need to scroll down to see horses, and no, I don't want to see grazing horses for the 1000th time. I want clear, compact information. No way to look over all of your horses, no list, no table view without same blank images everywhere and no information, no quick visual representation of horse's BR. When you're breeding for records, pretty visual effects are not the priority, sorry. Navigation between horses is hidden by default. Another click, and it doesn't remember your choice when the next horse page loads.
Horse image can't be done in two clicks and forgotten about. It is also not done automatically at let's say 3 yo. I have to click, then it loads small and off to the side, and you have to resize and reposition every. Single. Time.
I seriously don't know what screen size you are testing it on, but 1920*1080 is not enough to not scroll on every single tab. I hope that training settings are saved between days, or training is gonna be one * of a ride.
So, a quick glance proved that this layout is the same thing, just a little bit prettier, and I have zero desire to return. And I bred multiple RH before I left. Plus, with the new shiny interface, horses look less polished and outdated. The interface does the game dirty because it downgrades it to a child's play with pretty horses (would ask myself twice if horses are pretty, because some RHs look like crocodiles), when a child doesn't know what a good UI is.

[Tom]

Thank you for the feedback everyone! Keep it coming, we are still working on refining the layout.

[BlackOak2]

New layout on the stable page seems... odd... not sure I can explain it though. It feels both right and not right. It works great though. Maybe it's a reading thing? Used to the old layout where we go down. This one is left to right and down. Won't be a hard thing to get used to, just feels a bit awkward from the last one.

There has been enough feedback on this particular page that I'll be reverting it back to a horizontal "table" like layout in the near future.

Will we get testing for non-real-life-testable colors? There aren't any options for pangare or roan or sooty... metallic... ect.

There will be additional genetic tests added in the future, but I cannot say for certain exactly which tests we'll have available.

Oh! Wonderful! On both items. So... Very... Exciting!!!