| > Forcing users to learn a whole new language Each and every videogame has a lot information to learn about it. Game mechanics, interactions, that sort of thing. Games are wildly different in these aspects, so why would icons of all things be worth nitpicking here? Since games are so different having unique icons makes total sense, since I can associate them with whatever unique mechanics of the game. > a game is often something you move on from quickly and on to the next one For you, maybe. I have 1400 hours in dota, and almost 1500 in tf2. Over time as one gets acclimated to a game, having icons is really helpful for quickly scanning/displaying information, etc. --- Videogames have the problem of needing to visually display a lot of data, and needing to have good menus to traverse among its information/mechanics. Some games have really bad menus but I can't recall icons being the main issue in any of them. A bad menu is almost always one with options in confusing places or hiding a commonly-used option behind 4+ clicks, etc. |
With a typical application GUI you usually want to get some stuff done and the program is the thing you chose for the job. This means unless you really plan to learn that thing, every friction that program needlessly puts on reaching your objective is gonna piss you off.
This is btw. the same in Games, if e.g. the graphics settings don’t work as expected etc