Uploaded June 2019 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago

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Inventories are hardly ever the stars of the show, but that doesn't mean they can be ignored. There's tons of design work that goes into making good inventory UX. Let's talk about the history of game inventory design, from Zork and other point-and-click adventure games through Skyrim and Moonlighter, how Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Wind Waker fixed their hotbar problems with the help of the second screens on the DS and Wii U, and what games like Resident Evil, Monkey Island, and Doom can tell us about how to make inventories feel great.

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