5 Tutorial - Inventory and HUD

The steel door muffled the ferals' shrieks. There was a scraping that sounded like nails on a chalkboard, which was probably the ferals' talons against the door.

I realized I was holding my breath and so I released it. At the same time, I noticed panting coming from the members of the squad and my own character.

"Alright, people," Locke interrupted my observations. "Resupply and get ready to move. This is their turf. Let's not get trapped in this armory. Makise, get our new friend synced up."

Makise had already grabbed a helmet from a rack. She proffered it to my character. "Put it on."

A prompt appeared, reading, "Press I to open your inventory." I did so and a semi-transparent screen appeared over my view. The 3D model of Divine_Dewpoint stood on the right side. A multitude of empty boxes surrounded her. Lines connected them to various points on her body. On the left was a column that was simply labeled "vicinity."

The prompt continued, "This is the inventory menu. Items can be picked up, equipped, and dropped from here. While the menu is open, movement and stance are unrestricted. However, the camera willed be locked and you cannot fire your weapon. Items that can be picked up or looted will appear in the 'vicinity' column. You must be within 0.5 meters from the item to see it. Approach Makise."

I walked up to Makise and sure enough, A picture of the helmet appeared in the vicinity column. Next to it was text, labeling the helmet as "USNA Tactical Infantry Helmet (Urban Camo)."

"Equip the helmet by Left-Clicking with the Mouse and dragging it to the head equipment slot," informed the game. The head equipment slot flashed in order to help guide my cursor. Upon releasing the left mouse button, the helmet popped into existence on my character model. "Press I or ESC to close the inventory screen."

Closing the screen, I saw lines of code flicker across the screen before buffering on the line "Initiating HUD." Various elements faded in on the edges of the screen, overlaying my view. "This is your Head-Up Display (HUD)," explained the game. "Your HUD will provide essential, tactical information if used correctly."

Using a box, it directed my attention to the center of the screen. Four short lines formed a fragmented cross. "This is your crosshair. It shows you the approximate location you are aiming at. The space between these four lines is directly proportional to the accuracy of your shots. When fired, your bullets will land randomly somewhere between the lines. Weapons, stance, and aiming all affect the spread of the crosshair."

The next box appeared in the bottom right corner of the screen, where the word "Unarmed" was written in white text. "This is where weapon information will be displayed. You are currently unarmed. Once a gun is equipped, the weapon name, ammo count, and firing mode will be displayed here."

My attention turned to the bottom of the screen as the next box appeared. Here were two symbols with numbers following them. A white bar ran along the border below them. The first looked like a first aid symbol with a cross enclosed in a circle. The second was a vest, also enclosed in a circle. "This is your health and armor tracker," read the text. "You have not sustained any injuries so your health is currently at 100. You are currently not wearing any armor so your armor is currently at 0. The bar below the health and armor tracker is your stamina meter. Certain actions will use stamina points. Stamina points will gradually recover over time."

And the final element was on top of the screen. I didn't need the game to explain to know that it was a compass. Still, text appeared, "This is your compass, showing the direction and bearing you are currently facing. Useful for calling out a direction to teammates."

After the last text popup faded, Makise spoke again. "Good. Your helmet's working. I'm going to sync you with the rest of the squad."

In the top left corner, a red exclamation point appeared. The game boxed it and explain, "This is the notification symbol. It will appear when you receive an invite to join a squad or receive a direct message. To accept an invitation, press the F1 key."

A semi-transparent screen like the inventory menu appeared. It looked like a simple email inbox. A column for contacts was on the left. Next to it was a conversation inbox. Both were currently empty.

"This is the communication menu," explained the game. "When this menu is open, your movements are completely locked. Only open the communication menu when the area around you is safe. What you see now is the messaging tab. Direct and world messages will appear here as well as in the bottom left of your HUD upon finishing the tutorial. Please navigate to the squad tab by clicking on the tab labeled 'Squad' at the top of the screen or by pressing F2."

I did so and the screen changed slightly. The contacts column remained, but the inbox disappeared. In its place was a box labeled "Squad." A notification appeared, reading "Squad Invitation from: Makise" with the options yes or no.

"Please accept the invitation," the game requested. I did so and six names of the members of Locke's squad appeared. The game continued with its explanation. "This menu provides detailed information on the current state of your squad. A summarized version of this information will appear on the HUD whenever you join or create a squad."

When I closed the menu, I saw a column of names down the left side. There was a small colored square next to each name. They were all green except for McNally, whose square was red. He was currently unconscious, having the bandages on his torso checked by Norris. Using my Sherlockian deduction skills, I determined that the squares represented the health of my squad members.

"You can see our stats, yes?" asked Makise. Look at her, I noticed that her name floated above her head. There was also a thin, green outline around her body. "Good, then the friend-foe detection should also be working. That's the green outline you see on all of us. You'll be able to it through walls, too. Helps avoid friendly fire. Alright, let's move on to the next step."

She walked over to a rack on the wall and pulled out a gun. It looked different from the ones everyone else was carrying, but as I was a college freshman girl majoring in physics. As if I knew the differences between to matte black assault rifles.

Makise interacted with her wrist computer again. This time, with the HUD, I noticed that I could see a holographic keyboard. As she worked, Makise explained, "All the weapons these days have a biometric safety on their grips. If your biosign isn't recognized by the gun, you can't use it unless you get it reset by a gunsmith." She looked up at me and smiled, "Or get it cracked by someone like me." She extended the gun to me stock-first.

Just as I was about to open my inventory, another tutorial prompt opened. "Sometimes, such as in the middle of a firefight, opening the inventory screen to pick up items is simply too slow and impractical. In such situations, you can place the object in your crosshairs. You will see a white outline on it. It means that the object has a neutral affiliation and can be picked up and used. Then, press the interaction button, F, to use direct pickup. Direct pickup allows you to directly transfer items into your inventory without the use of the menu. The default priority is first to fill any open weapon or equipment slots, then to fill open storage slots. This priority order can be changed in Settings. Items that are neither weapons nor equipment will directly be placed in storage. If there are no open slots, you will be unable to pick up items."

I pressed F will looking at the white-outlined gun. It disappeared from Makise's hand and reappeared in my character's. There was an equipping animation. And instead of it pointing forward, the gun was held across my character's chest, barrel pointed downward. The bottom right corner of the HUD now read Assault Rifle with the fraction 0/0 below the name. The zeros both blinked red. Below that was two small boxes. One had a single bullet in it and was grayed out. The other had five bullets in it and was the same color as the rest of the text.

"Go pick up a bag and some ammo," Makise directed, pointing at the equipment on a nearby table.

I walked up to the closest object, a military backpack, and proceeded to stuff it with the other items on the table. There were ammo boxes, grenades, a combat knife, body armor, and a holster belt. My armor points raised to 50, while the ammo count fraction became 0/600. A label, "AR Rounds (Standard)" flashed just below the gun name for a brief moment.

Towards the end of my kleptomania spree, a prompt to open my inventory appeared. After doing so, the game directed my attention to a fraction in the lower right that I missed before. It was currently 55/50.

"The amount of items you can carry is limited by two factors. The first is carry weight. The amount of weight your character can efficiently carry is shown on the right. The weight you are currently carrying is shown on the left. Every item in the game has weight. When the amount you carry exceeds the carry weight limit, you become over-encumbered. While over-encumbered, movement in all stances is slower and louder. Sprinting is not only slower but also costs stamina. The more over-encumbered you are, the more severe the effects."

"The second factor is storage space," the game continued. It highlighted a 3 by 5 array of boxes that branched off from the Small Standard Military Backpack I equipped earlier. The boxes were filled with the stuff I picked up from the table. Most only took up one box, but the knife occupied a 2 by 1 formation.

"All items have certain dimensions, measured in storage units. In order to carry items, they must fit in the storage space you have. Poorly placing items will restrict the amount you can carry. Direct pickup automatically tries to fit items into the available space, but it may not be the most efficient configuration."

Chastised by the game, I dragged some of the ammo and grenades out of the backpack so that I was within the weight limit.

The game then highlighted the pistol holster's storage units, which had a 2 by 2 blue array and a 2 by 2 green array. They differed from the colorless storage units in the backpack. "Blue storage units are special weapon slots. Green storage units are special equipment slots. Equipping weapons and equipment in their respective slots will allow ease of access."

I didn't really understand what the game meant by "ease of access" but I tried dragging things from the backpack to the holster anyways. In the end, I was able to put four grenades and the combat knife on the belt. The grenades stacked, allowing me to put two per unit box. Interestingly, the knife counted as equipment. This filled my equipment boxes but left the weapon boxes empty.

With nothing left that would fit, I closed the inventory. I snickered a bit when I noticed the items I dropped were simply lying by my feet.

"Hey, Sleeping Beauty," Locke called out. "If you're done packing, get ready to move out."