Does gender matter when designing your user interface?
by Mathew McCurley 
Mar 6th 2012 at 5:00PM
Our interface today comes from lady gamer Rinjichan. I would not be so inclined to point out that Rinjichan is a woman if Rinjichan herself did not make it a subject of conversation. Why, you would ask, would a discussion of gender be relevant to a discussion about user interfaces? Plenty of reasons, actually.
Do genders approach user interfaces differently? Do men and women identify different elements of the UI as important or relevant? Go beyond the stereotypical pink bottom bar and look at the placement of addons, the structure of the buttons, and the overall layout. These are the things that interest me, as well as whether or not a user interface can have gender ascribed to it.
As always, we begin with the email testimonials and trials of the patron of the Church of Saint Lua of Latter-Day Addons, Rinjichan, as she bares her soul before the congregation.
Heya WoW Insider!Thank you for the email and submission, Rinjichan.
First of all I wanna say that I love WoW Insider. Your Blog is a great place for all things WoW in and out of the game. Reader UI of the Week has helped me tons on getting my UI set up for me. I have learned a lot about different addons and how they can make my game play better. I have been playing WoW for about 7 years now. Since The Burning Crusade. I, as a woman, started out in WoW like any other newbie would. Not talking to NPC's and just running around killings thing. No idea what gear, spec, talents, and all that jazz was until my friends told / showed me how to play.
So once I finally understood the game, how to play, spec my toons, and learning my playing style. I noticed one thing that started to bug me. When I was playing on a patch day or expansion release day where all the addons were un-useable. My UI was all over the place. I would spend hours getting my UI without addons set, but once I got my addons update. I would have the same problem of resetting everything back to the way it was.
This is my UI for my Blood Elf Hunter Rinjichan - Llane US. It took some time to get it like this to where with or without addons I could play just as smoothly. I hated have to reset my UI all the time. So this is the UI I finally love and it's fun and easy.
Used Addons:
Align - Helps me with a clean looking UI.
Deadly Boss Mods - Mainly used for Instances and Raids.
Dominos - Action bars
ForteXorcist - Spell Timers and Cool down timer
Grid - Raid Interface replacemnet
Healbot - For when I'm on my healers
kgPanels - I like this one over Skinner
Mapster - Map replacement. Easier to move around
Masque - Action Bar Skinner
OmniCC - Another CD timer
QuestHubber - For when I'm questing on my low level toons.
Recount - DPS Meter
Shadowed Unit Frames - I did use X-Perl for a while, but this is easier to configure.
SilverDragon - I am a Hunter, I gotta have my rare pets.
TellMeWhen - Keeps me in check on my shot rotation.
Titan Panel - One stop to see where I am at on anything I need to know.
WIM - I don't use a chat addon, but I hate to miss a whisper from a friend or guild. Perfect addon for that.
Enjoy My Girly UI!!
-Rinjichan
By now, readers have taken a look at one picture of Rinji's UI and have made many preconceptions and judgments based on sight alone. What were they? Did anything about Rinji's setup seem feminine? Do you want my first impressions?
First impressions
I look at a lot of user submissions, and one of the key components in my mind to a great UI is good color choice. My first impression of the pinkish-not-really-fuschia-whatever color was not that it was related to gender but rather one of the least-used hues of red in World of Warcraft. I had assumed that the color choice was made for practical contrast reasons. The saddest part about this last paragraph is it never occurred to me until the end that someone could just like a color and want it on their UI. Absolutely nothing wrong with that, either.
My second big impression was the tidiness. Tidiness does not speak to gender for me because of first-hand experience living with all sorts of messy men and women. Rather, the neat placement of buttons and clear, clean areas gave me a sense of understanding and experience, a UI that's had eAlign on for too many hours pushing bars pixels to the left, pixels to the right.
Why would men and women even have differing priorities regarding their UIs? Aren't we all playing the same game with the same set of rules? Sure, but we can always approach the game differently in terms of setup. I guess the question that I'm getting at is, what about Rinji's UI is "girly"? If it's the color, is that still a thing?
I look at Rinji's UI, and I see something similar to what I personally use -- a slim bottom bar with an opaque background for supreme contrast and slick buttons that stand out and hold the whole thing together. Player and target frame placement, along with associated buffs and debuffs, stand out against the world and are positioned for quick reference. Every piece of the middle of the UI is stuck together like an Aztec wall, the weight of the stones holding the monolithic structure in place.
There doesn't seem to be anything that really defines a gender and its UI proclivities, no?
The raid shot
Here it is -- the raid shot. Gaze upon the horror of a crowded interface and horrible placement of ... oh. That's not so bad, is it? Yes, yes, let it all out now: Hunter UI, DPSers don't need as many addons, etc. True on every account. When comparing UIs, however, we live in the realm of our role, and for a DPS raiding UI, Rinji's is pretty slick.
Simple, compact raid frames and a suitably sized DPS meter? I think I'm in love. Transparent bag buttons that don't clash with the rest of the empty space? Be still, my heart. Everything is boxed up together nicely with a Titan Panel up top, like the lid to a wonderful jar of cookies.
Rinjichan not only configured her UI with addons to be perfect for her playstyle, but she also created a configured version of the default UI in case addons don't work, a patch day is particularly nasty, or something just decides it doesn't want to play nicely in the middle of raid night. Whatever the case, configuring the default UI to its best specifications is a great idea, and then laying addons over that. That way, even if the "power goes out," so to speak, you're still capable of playing and having a good time. Don't stress yourself out, kids, it's a hell of a thing.
In fact, this is such a great idea that I'm going to do it for myself as well. There are plenty of new options for UI replacements and default, built-in features that it shouldn't be hard at all to get most of the functionality out of the default stuff. Ah, the thrill of adventure.
Submit your UI!
Do you want to bask in glory and fame while getting tips, tricks, and advice on your setup from friends and fans in the WoW Insider community? Why, it's so simple. Just send some screenshots and an email discussing or describing your UI to readerui@wowinsider.com. If everything is kosher, you might see your submission right here in the column, and I'll say lots of words about it.
Interested in getting the most out of your user interface? Come back once a week for more examples of reader UIs. For more details on individual addons, check out Addon Spotlight, or visit Addons 101 for help getting started.
Filed under: Add-Ons, Reader UI of the Week
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
(cutaia) Mar 6th 2012 5:08PM
All I know is that women need different scissors. Like left-handed people.
Wait, that's still true, right?
*looks up women's suffrage*
slim1256 Mar 6th 2012 5:56PM
Women's suffrage is still going on, right? I mean - it'll be going on as long as men are around for them to have to deal with, no?
Wait - what does suffrage mean again?
Rhamona Q Mar 6th 2012 9:50PM
I only need a different pair of scissors because I'm apt to find my husband has used them to clip his nose hairs, or puncture a soda can, or taken them to the garage where they've mingled with the other tools and developed that layer of grease that all garage tools seem to develop. No good for crafting after that.
Pyromelter Mar 6th 2012 5:11PM
"There doesn't seem to be anything that really defines a gender and its UI proclivities, no?"
I helped my ex-gf set up her UI (not because she wasn't smart or anything, but more because she was much more casual than me and isn't the UI freak that I am). There was nothing in her UI that anyone could say was boyish or girlish in gender.
I've seen lots of UI's from lots of people, and I would have to say that the above quoted statement is generally true for everyone's UI proclivities, unless someone is putting something like hello kitty themes on it, but I've never seen anyone do that :P.
Khirsah Mar 6th 2012 5:24PM
"unless someone is putting something like hello kitty themes on it, but I've never seen anyone do that :P. "
I knew my UI was missing something!
Imnick Mar 6th 2012 5:25PM
Are you implying that my Hello Kitty UI is girly?
I'm offended! 0:
Revynn Mar 6th 2012 5:49PM
Actually, there was (is?) a ButtonFacade skin that puts little Hello Kitty ears on all your buttons.
And my My Little Pony themed Power Auras would also like to have a word with you.
Haiko Mar 6th 2012 5:53PM
The link to WoWInterface is no longer live... At least I still found a screenie.
http://i55.tinypic.com/apfh1k.jpg
Click, but mind you: What has been seen can never be unseen.
Pyromelter Mar 6th 2012 5:59PM
@Haiko lol that is an awesome UI. Someone needs to submit that to reader ui of the week. Are you sure it's not photoshopped though? it looks like the actual kitties might have been 'shopped on there.
mitch_b_666 Mar 6th 2012 5:20PM
Anyone else got My Little Companion installed? BRONIES UNITE!
Lipstick Mar 6th 2012 5:22PM
I've never considered Gender as a motivating factor for myself, when I have designed my interface. But being a woman is such a part of who I am, who am I to know if decisions I make naturally are based on being a woman, or based on being a woman who plays wow on a some-what competitive level.
I've always designed my interface around the job that I enjoy most in wow: healing, and tweaks, when they happen are done to make the most out of that method of game play. Now I know there are men who say that all healers are female but pretty much from my BC days on I have always been in guilds which employed a lot of male healers. I never felt that I gravitated towards healing because of my gender, but rather my personality.
Being a healer does have some limitations with game design -- which is to say that your raid frames are an intricate and inescapable part of UI design. I've seen UI's which look like they were designed for dpsing or tanking which shove healing frames off into a corner somewhere. I am sure there are some people who can heal comfortably on a set up like this, but for me personally I've found this more distracting than designing my UI around healer frames front and center, but not so center that they distract me from seeing what the boss is doing, or keeps me from being aware of my feet, or allow me to tunnel vision.
It's a running joke in my house-hold which for one reason or another tends to be mostly woman, that if something was designed in a way which defies logic it was clearly designed by a man. It's a joke, and not meant in any real seriousness -- but given the role many woman in my life have taken -- which is to say -- the ones which keep everyone else moving and making sure the chaos which is our lives, functioning.. I'm not surprised that I take the same approach to how I utilize my UI.
For me, my UI is about controlling what needs to be controlled and keeping everything moving in a functional and as simple a way as possible.
Juzelle Mar 7th 2012 10:01AM
Ditto. I think the concept that a players UI's is biased around their gender around is laughable.
I built my UI simply based around my needs. I've played the same hunter(my only 85!) since vanilla and raided through nearly every tier of content. Similarly to your healing rig, mine was built around making my DPS/CC activities as efficient as possible based on the way in which I play, and to help support my weaknesses & amplify my strengths.
Every one of my guy friend's who's come over to visit or tried to play on my account ususally throws their hands up in frustration because it's just too difficult for them to wrap their heads around.
See, I'm actually severely dyslexic IRL, and I have a hard time navigating keybinding setups, not because I'm stupid or anything(I have an IQ of around 138, lol), but I sometimes in the heat of a difficult moment (i.e: kiting adds on a boss) I will panic & 'forget' where certain keys are. Its incredibly frustrating, but it happens, and I try to minimize that as much as possible. However what it ends up meaning is that I'm a partial clicker. Yes, the dreaded clicker! Clicking is not ideal, and generally frowned upon by videogame elitists/epeen strokers, but it is what it is and I try to make the most of what I have and turn it into as little of a hinderance as possible.
Thusly, working around my dyslexia, I built a ui that sits centered on my screen in a rough 'U' shape, with bars that fade out in & out when being moused over. When I play, it's almost entirely muscle memory, & I generally stare at the dead center of my screen and watch everything else out of my peripheral vision. I use addons like powerauras, range display, omnicc, castbars, & sexymap to bring everything together in a nice little compact package, which warns me when I'm screwing something up(power auras), and my limited key-binds are all set to simple, easy to remember keys like '~' through '4' or mousewheel, with maybe an alt/shift mod-key thrown in.
So like tilda = pet attack, 1 = hunter's mark/mod: assist, or clicking alt+mousewheel = trap launcher. Everything else is clickable, and is hardwired into a series of macros I scripted that're based around memetic image/word associations, sometimes combining two or three abilities into 1 key. the standard arrangement is:
#showtooltip (ability name)
/cast [btn:1] (ability 1); [btn:2] (ability 2)
so like...
#showtooltip Freezing Trap
/cast [btn:1] Ice trap; [btn:2] Freezing trap
I thumb alt+mousewheel, mousover the button, and then left/right click to select my trap. it ends up being really fast and smooth, and I can react just as quickly as any of the other keybind hunters in my guild. I also use alot of mod-key macros, so like for example, I would have my #2 key setup with:
#showtooltip
/cast[nomod] scatter shot
/cast[mod:alt] master's call
/cast[mod:shift] intervene
The whole UI is kind fo unorthodox & looks like this:
http://i.imgur.com/FCzD4.jpg
So after reading all that, and reading the reasoning behind it, I don't think anyone could realistically ascertain that my UI was built based on gendered preference or choices, but instead to make my playing experience less of a hassle, which is ususally what UI mods are for ;p
shatnerstorm2 Mar 6th 2012 5:29PM
Your UI should be what works for you, regardless of your gender/age/ethnicity/favorite color/favorite food/favorite Ninja Turtle/any other (IMHO) completely irrelevant factor as to what makes a good UI.
Tinkereena Mar 6th 2012 5:37PM
Hmm. I'm a lesbian and play in an all-female guild, but nothing quite strikes me as a ui thing from all the female contact I have. Maybe Skada and IceHUD are somehow feminine compared to recount and whatever all the boys use as their HUD these days?
slim1256 Mar 6th 2012 5:58PM
I'm male, and I use Skada and IceHUD!
(Steps back to reassess priorities)
Bapo Mar 6th 2012 6:29PM
For me personlly, I like recount because it can tell me what people were doing for attacks and what not if I mouse over their name (I haven't seen that in skada, yet). I am slowly moving torwards skada myself since it doesn't require nearly as much memory.
As for Icehud, everything about it confused me (ton of options), so I went with Shadowed unit frames instead which is still customizeable, but less confusing for me. Granted, this is also because I don't like the bars icehud has.
Tinkereena Mar 6th 2012 7:24PM
You totally can get that in Skada. I use the damage done current fight setting, and clicking on a name will give you their damage sources and what % of their damage it accounts for. "Healing and absorbs" and the threat pane don't have the same functionality, but they shouldn't really be used that way anyway. I will admit I mostly like Skada for being both recount and omen in a lightweight package though.
Duts Mar 6th 2012 5:41PM
All my addons and buttons are on top so I can see over mah boobies.
But Imma dude so I should say Moobs.
Plus, having been in LFR on a bunch of toons this week, I am removing everything except Autoattack cuz clearly all those other buttons are not necessary!
HappyTreeDance Mar 6th 2012 5:43PM
I've actually put thought into this before. When I was designing my UI, I found a particular texture for a bar that I thought was pretty, and decided to base my UI off the idea of it. From a purely design point of view, most of the UIs I had seen on this column looked very clean and almost sci-fi looking, and I wanted to do something different, so something clean and feminine without it looking like Hello Kitty puked all over it. I'm very happy with the result, because I specifically made it in a way that if you switched out a couple of colors, fonts, and textures, I think it would work just as well for anyone else. One of these days, I'll get around to submitting it to this site.
Pyromelter Mar 6th 2012 5:55PM
You can just screenshot it and post it to imgur or photobucket or tinypic and link it. I'm sure McCurley gets far more submissions than he could ever possibly use, but it's always fun to see more people's UI's.