Community

--Home likes--

The fact that the main navigation buttons are prominent at the top for Home, Collection, Play, Store, Trade, Account, and Help (not specific to the Home screen but I thought I'd mention that here.

The tournament list is nice for those whose who play them, though I don't play tournaments so it doesn't affect me really.

Announcements are easy to spot.

--Home dislikes--

None of the sections on this screen are resizable via splitters.

The Contacts section is way larger than it needs to be in order to show the avatars for every buddy, which then takes a while to load all the images when you first log in. I see no reason for this not to be a simple list view, which the avatar being shown if you open a contact's profile. The contacts would load much faster that way and you could use the extra real estate for other useful links or information.

For example, I think a quick play link on this screen could be nice, which could automatically jump to the Play screen and into the next game with the deck and game settings you last used (which would ideally be saved between logins). Alternatively or in addition, this could be a nice place to put information about the logged in user, such as their game record and tournament stats, so you can see how well they're doing at a glance without having to hunt down that information.

--Store likes--

Expanded details window for each product, complete with area to select quantity before it's on shopping cart.

Fact that everything is on one screen except confirmation to purchase.

Fact you don't have to click a button to verify account settings for each purchase and that instead they're available under a link to verify if you want.

Organization of products by category or set.

--Store dislikes--

Fact that CVN is listed before Expiration Date is backward from every other program I've ever seen.

Selected category/set doesn't remain highlighted.

--Chat likes--

I like all the options and shortcuts for starting new chat sessions with buddies, support, and chat rooms.

I like that chat rooms for game types don't automatically open anymore and must be opted in.

I like that all the Chat options are easily accessed in the main navigation bar at the top.

I like that chat text is much easier to select, copy, and paste. I also like that it doesn't seem to get cut off like it often did in V3.

--Chat dislikes--

No way to close a docked chat without first undocking it. There really needs a right-click option and middle-click support for each chat tab in a dock to close that chat. An X button could be nice too. This is extremely annoying as I prefer docked chat windows and don't want to have to undock just to close one.

On that note, there's no way to undock a docked chat window without dragging the tab. A right-click option would be nice, but at the very least double-clicking the tab should undock the chat window. The combination of this and the above issue make closing a docked chat window a major annoyance.

The Users drop down in chat rooms uses a normal Windows scrollbar unlike everywhere that uses your own scrollbar appearance.

The names at the top of chat windows appear as links that underline when you hover over them, but clicking them does nothing.

Right-clicking on a chat post in a chat room just opens the normal chat session options. I would have expected options like Add Buddy, Block User, and Private Chat for the user who made the post, as well as a convenient Copy Message or some such to copy the contents of their post. Particularly the lack of user options are a major limitation at the moment.

The buddies right-click list is cut off and doesn't allow scrolling. It's also not sorted by who's online.

--Account likes--

I love that mouse/keyboard shortcuts are now configurable. Major props for adding support for this.

I like the availability of filters for game history.

I like the availability of in-game alerts and the ability to configure them.

I like the ability to select a theme from within the game.

I like that Order History is available and it's easy to see the details of each order.

--Account dislikes--

In Game History, having Details be a column that only contains the Details button on hover seems unnecessary. The column could be removed, which is more consistent with the Play screen.

The Game Type, Format, and Name columns in Game History don't support sorting.

Drop is an odd name for the button that appears when hovering over members of your Buddies and Blocked lists, particularly the Blocked List. It's also odd there's no right-click menu for either list.

I don't like that there's a search field at the top that is only used/enabled for Game History. It seems like this should be moved into the Filters section for Game History similar to what was done in Collection. This will free up additional vertical space too.

Oct 7, 2012 -- 5:36PM, Gotastewgoin wrote:

I'm playing in Parallels 8 on OSX, and the game is nearly unplayable. It constantly "flickers" and there are several areas of the screen that are transparent (my desktop background shows through in these areas).

Is there a known fix for this? 

I have had issues with flickering as well. I don't think I've upgraded to version 8 yet (its at home, I'm not). I don't know how I resolved my problem. I turned off a couple of flags whose names escape me at the moment (3d accelerator?). Probably rebooted my Mac. I still get flickering in Coherence mode (i.e. individual windows on my MacOS desktop). Something I need to try is increasing my video memory.

I'm running on an old MacPro (i.e. tower model) with its original graphics card. Crossing my fingers that when I upgrade next year the flickering might get resolved.