Making simulation... suggestions

[nameJack]

Creating a simulation game like 'hacker' using text and words is becoming more popular

In VB, how can we create say, a war simulation game,
where there's a console with a few button on the form
when u click on a button, a new 'command window' will come out
eg: if I click on 'Economy', a 'command window' containing few text boxes and labels will appear
However, how do I implement the 'command window' in a single form? Do I use picturebox and put all the controls in it, then make it invisible. When user click on the specific button, the picturebox will appear disguising as the 'command window'
But if there's 10 button, I'll need 10 picturebox with multiple controls in each picbox.
Is there other ways to do that?
What do you, VB professionalist, suggest me to 2?

more detail UI

|-------------------------|
| |----|  |----|  |----|  |
| |    | <--- button   |  |
| |----|  |----|  |----|  | 
|                         |
| |---------------------| |
| |    Picture box      | |
| | containing multiple | |
| |  controls. Behind   | |
| |   this picture box  | |
| |  hidden two other   | |
| |     picture box     | | 
| |---------------------| |
|-------------------------|

p.s = i use the picturebox.visible properties to switch pictureboxes

[Zaei]

You could design the game as an MDI interface. Have a main window, and a different window for each console, with their own controls. This would eliminate the need for picturebox showing and hiding, and make design easier, as well as more pleasing to users.

Z.

[nameJack]

But
can I not use any form?
is there other way besides using form?
using MDI is a bit tedious and as a result, the war simulation would not look like a console anymore
I would want to eliminate the feeling of using normal window during playing this game
any suggestions?

[Zaei]

Let me see if i can get some more details on your idea. You want a console style game, eg, text only, commands typed at a command line etc? I would design it as I would a chat client. Large Multi-line textbox, no border style, 2d border, etc, black background with perhaps white or gray font, with a one line box for commands, same look. If you use a borderless window, and color it the same color as the textboxes, you can't see the difference. It looks neat (tried it). Then, you can easily switch boxes (or use the Load Command, with an array of main text boxes) for different areas (Economy, etc).

Z.

[nameJack]

well
i might try the borderless window style
as u can c in my ASCII window above, it has user interface and controls
that means, user only have to key in or modify information through the UI. No commandlines

what do u suggest?

the 'console' is just a term use for the war simulation main menu
not the real console mode