I don't find it any less easy to use than the tech tree in Civ4.
Can you give me an example of a complex and robust tech tree which 'does it right'? You can't use any of the MoOs, they are neither complex nor robust. I wouldn't really accept GalCiv either, because if my memory serves me, there was a lot of scrolling to be done there as well.
If the tech tree is complicated enough, some amount of scrolling will be necessary because it's impossible to fit everything on one screen at once. But being able to horizontal scroll to see farther ahead isn't the same thing as needing to scroll this stupid circular thing around (or apparently zoom it out, which I didn't even know you could do becuase it's not at all obvious from the screen that you can do that) in order to see what options are available to you right now.
SotS doesn't even let you see that far ahead in the trees, so what you're really looking at is just what's available to you right now. Civ 5 manages to do that with a single list on the side of the screen with absolutely no fuss whatsoever. There's certainly none of this circular scrolling around nonsense, and looking at that list doesn't take you out of the game to anther screen. It would be easy to do that in SotS, and it'd also be easy to optimize the existing research screen to display every option on one screen without that "looking around a room from the center" motif. That was just some UI guy trying to be creative and failing usability 101.
But I get the feeling that this isn't really a UI issue.
It really is. My day job involves a fair amount of UI design. As a result, I do not have a high tolerance for bad UI that gets in my way.
Fun? Interacting with the tech tree is something you do once every 'X' (where X is usually >8) turns. The tech pace, as well as the tech design (not the UI) is different from most other 4x games I've played. In as much as it's not the every turn focus it can be in other games.
That you don't have to do it as often as some other games is no excuse for a poor UI.
I just don't buy this 'the UI is crap' argument, because it's not crap. It's different, and sure, you may or may not like it, but it's no less inferior to anything else based solely on ease of navigation, or representation of information. That is, what game gives you that complete tech tree picture which is actually useful? What game does not require you to scroll (circular vs. flat? who really cares?) to navigate the tech tree? Or worse, jump between tabs to see the different areas (more clicky, still have to scroll probably).
I sure hope the devs of SotS 2 don't have your sense of denial. Also you're wrong, UI design is a well studied and documented field. There are absolute wrong UI decisions based on very large amounts of usability research. The research UI IS inferior in navigation and informatoin presentation because it takes what could fit in a relatively compact design with a known navigation pattern (horizontal or vertical scrolling, not that you'd need to do either in the early game given the number of techs available) and instead throws a confusing and annoying circular design at it instead.
Since SotS doesn't give you the complete tech tree like other games do, that isn't even a relevant factor. For what it's actually trying to present it does a very poor job of it. And even if it was a complete picture it'd still be doing a poor job of it because of how little of it you can fit on the screen at once due to the need to circular scroll and the amount of space being wasted on screen for that.
So what is the point of UI anyway, if that's really what we're griping about?
Really? You're arguing about UI and you don't know what the point of a UI is?
Is not a UI issue. It's a learning curve issue for not just how to use the UI (because come on, the UI in SotS is not difficult to figure out), but what the techs actually are, and how they implemented techs and research as a mechanic in the game. Or, what do you really want to see? The whole tech tree laid flat? That would be rather pointless considering the zoom level you'd have to go out to see the whole thing (as evidenced by those who put it flat on the wiki).
No, I was able to learn pretty quickly that I had to circular scroll. That doesn't make circular scrolling a good or even acceptable method of navigating the tech trees. It's far more cumbersome then the alternatives seen in other games (in particular with how it's laid out, a tabbed structure like Sins of a Solar Empire has would be a drastic improvement).
What do I want to see? I want to be able to jump from branch X to branch B without having to circular scroll through Y, Z, and A first. Most UIs make that easy either by simply having them all on screen or having simple scrolling or tabs to jump to the one I want. SotS instead gives me the annoyance of circular scrolling a few times until the one I wanted in the first place swings around into view. If I gave this UI to my dad, he'd quit the game and go do something else within 45 seconds. That's not a good thing.
So if you don't like it, so be it, I'm not going to argue that you should like it. The idea that the UI is bad, is just bizarre to me though, because it does everything you want a UI to do, and it tends to do it with fewer clicks than most other UIs I've seen (you know you can drag it right?). It also displays the information you need, though sure, you need to do some customizing on zoom level or display setting or whatever, but meh, once you set that up, and once you learn the hot keys it's as fast to get anywhere as anything else, for the level of detail and complexity it contains.
Other people have kindly already replied to this pointing out the other areas where the UI is deficient. It doesn't do nearly as good a job of presenting information as it could or should. The research one is just among the most obvious examples.
If you want to see games with good UI, try anything from Blizzard. Those guys take usability seriously, and one of the reasons why WoW destroyed so many other MMOs over the years is that there was a three year stretch where WoW's UI simply destroyed everybody else on the market (and anywhere that the base UI was deficient somehow, modders took care of until Blizzard upgraded). It's only been recently that games like Rift have launched with competitive stock UI. The Civ 5 UI is also quite good, though the game itself has some issues.
