Defining UI and GUI

So, what exactly do UI and GUI stand for, and what’s the difference? UI stands for user interface and GUI (pronounced “gooey”) stands for graphical user interface. To interface means to interact with, so the UI is the set of devices that let a player interact with a game. The mouse, keyboard, game controller, touch screen, and so on are all part of the UI. The GUI is the subset of the UI represented by graphics. So, onscreen buttons, dropdown menus, and icons are all part of a game’s GUI. As the GUI is a subset of the UI, many people (myself included) tend to just refer to the GUI as the UI. Unity also refers to all the GUI items they provide templates for as the UI.

This book will focus primarily on GUI design, but it will discuss some non-graphical aspects of UI controls, such as accessing data from the mouse, screen tap, keyboard, or controller. This chapter specifically will look at some basic design considerations for different interface types.