I Hate HUDs / Status Bars

[Doesntcareaboutname]

I've notice that Bethesda themselves have tried to reduce the HUD as much as they apparently thought possible for the newest entry to the Elder Scrolls series "Skyrim", and I myself have searched for a mod that eliminates the need for the immediate HUD (immediate as opposed to menu, dialogue et cetera) and status bars, especially HP, Stamina and MP or omits these but the closest mod matching my search query that could find was this http://oblivion.nexusmods.com/mods/4101/ which allegedly seeks to infect yet is ... still on the site for some mysterious reason. I have always disliked status bars and would much rather see / hear in game effects (bleeding, out of breath, pulse / heart-rate, avatar emotes exhaustion, vision blurring in and out) and or mere popups so as not to needlessly break from immersion.

 

Additionally, I'd like to see the magicka (perhaps optionally) shared with health as a solution to knowing how much magicka one has remaining, this would even add to the immersion with story arches where characters sacrifice themselves casting a powerful spell in order to subdue a powerful opponent. an arch which cannot make it into gameplay as it stands because they never have us risk dabbling with the occult / death in order to cast in games despite the fact that it would be more poignant, this could especially be achieved in Skyrim since it brings a charging preview to how much magicka will be spent to cast as we prepare to cast but it would be more intense in this case of sacrificing health, imagine the tension as your character draws near death and you have to judge if casting is worth it. However, I mostly just want to get rid of the status bars for Oblivion, that was just a solution.

 

The compass can be handled the same way as it is in Just Cause 2 or even in The Elder Scrolls (I believe Skyrim, albeit it still has a compass, does this when near) e.g. the icons are just orbital representing the actual location in the cell, some maybe fading or shrinking with distance, if Oblivion already does this itself, a modder (and maybe even the player by way of menu) could presumably increase the distance these are visible to, especially north and current quests or even give the player an actual (maybe even disposable) compass item that can be assigned a key as some mods do or preferable like most items that can simply be added to a number key for vanilla quick selection due to a compass being an actual item. Maybe all of this could even be managed with a menu, such as one of those miscellaneous items some mods have for adjusting settings.

 

Obviously the equipped weapon doesn't need to be identified by the HUD (not even sure why it does that to begin with, guess that's why they got rid of it in Skyrim), I can see a representation of how many arrows I have remaining, and the currently armed spell doesn't need to be anything more than a popup as a reminder ... although unlike Skyrim, spells don't have the element of the spell poised and visible in the palm of our hand in Oblivion but whatever, I don't technically need that one either (the icon is usually useless anyway as it doesn't really tell one which spell is ready and in some cases doesn't even tell us which category) and it could be optional to choose which meters, icons and such someone wants to still see anyhow.

 

Pre-emptively I clarify, I am obviously not referring to dialogue boxes, menus or the like, though come to think of it, presumably books could be done in real time to avoid breaking from immersion as well.

 

If viable mods of this nature (immersing the player by at least somewhat getting rid of the HUD) already exist, please do direct us to them,

(HUDless game) style needs to be normalised or at least introduced as a mod. Edited July 14, 2012 by Doesntcareaboutname