Coming from a long history of ARPG games, I’ve found the placement of items in the inventory doesn’t feel consistent/good compared to others. Often times items seem to have a preference for being placed to the top and right of where you might expect.
For example, take this 1x4 item: https://i.imgur.com/iukvynQ.png
- Best example of right preference…you can’t see the cursor, but almost immediately when it crosses the line between the 2nd and 3rd inventory square, it jumps over a full inventory square even when the item is still 100% within the first 4 (of 5) squares. If looking at it visually, it should land in the left-most 4 squares…it’s pretty obvious to a player that this should be the expected behavior, but because the center of the item (where the mouse curse or) crossed over the second square it moved an entire space to the right unexpectedly.
This second example of a 2x3 item: https://i.imgur.com/iF1hqfi.png
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In this one, I am showing off both the top and right preference of item placement.
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Specifically, the cursor is barely in the top half of the second square (vertically), but the item is trying to “snap” up an entire square. Additionally, it’s about 1/3rd of the way over the center line (horizontally) to the right, and this 1/3rd distance is enough to snap all the way to the right one square.
Third example of a 2x2 item: https://i.imgur.com/c0hCxhv.png
- Another good example of the top and right preference…drew a yellow outline where it feels like the object should fit. The cursor (in the middle of the item) is just barely 1/3rd of the way above the horizontal center line (center of the yellow square), and just barely 1/3rd of the way the right of the center vertical line of the same placement. This results in the object snapping a full square up and right from the place the object fits mostly within.
Not pictured, 1x3 objects (like wands) show this same issue. With the mouse cursor in the middle of the object, it snaps upwards the moment the cursor moves above the halfway point (vertically) of 3 squares. This results in the object snapping upwards the moment it visually begins to touch the square on the top, even though it visually sits 2/3rds of the way or so into the square on the bottom and, again, visually appears that it should be in the bottom 3 squares instead of the top 3 squares (in a space of 4 or more vertical squares).
My proposal?
- Odd sized items (like 3 tall or wide) should have to cross an inventory square border to snap to the next square vertically or horizontally. Because they take up an odd amount of space, changing the snap position to be on a line means that the center point of the object being over that line will require the object to visually fall within the top/bottom or left/right of 3 of 4 given squares (the wand/grand idol will always favor the squares it visually falls into the majority of).
- Even sized items (like 2 wide or 2 tall) should use the middle of a given square to determine where the item is placed. Currently they appear to favor 1/3rd of a square but also seem to have a sort of “sticky” preference to go to the top and right of the cursor. 1x4 items appear to go exactly for a line, but actually look better using an imaginary middle line of the 3rd square (left to right).
- Items that have both an even and uneven side (like 2x3) should use both…each one for the respective dimensions as mentioned above.
Regardless, the way item placement is currently determined can be frustrating as items tend to snap awkwardly up to an entire square away from where you are trying to place it. Some refinement to how this is determined would make inventory/stash management more consistent and easier to use at a glance without having to move an object visually (based on the object image) off-center to get it to land in the squares you want it to.