I twisted my buddy's arm into installing and playing TW. He's also a hard-core gamer, we've been playing games together for years. He does not come from a programming background, but he's played a truckload of games and has learned a lot along the way.

Anyhow, after giving him a few days to play with TW, he came back to me with these questiosn:
* how do I make a computer player?
* how do I get more than these few ships?

And for more than one ship, once I did an "Add all" in the fleet editor for him (this was most prevalent with ships that weren't from SC2, as he happened to vaguely remember those ships, and no others):
* how the heck do I use this ship?

What'd I like to do is approach the UI from a complete noob user's point of view, and rework it. This should get higher priority than the other stuff I'm experimenting with. 

A great example of an interface that is easy to use is the new Mario Kart game for the Gamecube. It also allows for multiple players on the same console, and have multiple gametypes, each of which may have specific parameters.

Example -- this is just an example for another game, NOT a formula for how to do TW!:

(title screen - no menu)
* flashes "Push Start" (actually, any button will do). If the user does nothing for a while, it goes into a demo loop, and returns when the user presses a button.
* only the player1 control can ever do anything major in the menus, including pause the game. The only place multiple players can interact is in "select characters and karts" and of course when playing the game)
* pressing the big green A button accepts the current choice. pressing the red button goes back one level in the menu, with the last selections already highlighted (so it's possible to go back, change one option, then go forward again)

(title screen - menu)
* has menu options: Start game, Records and Options

(start game - select players)
* asks how many players, with a title at the top "How many players", Mario's voice which says "Select players", and four menu options. 1 player, 2 players, 3 players or 4 players. They also have a picture for each selection of how many gamecube controllers are needed.

(start game - select "vs" or "co-op" or battle)
* In the game, every kart holds two characters. In VS mode, each player controls one kart, and can switch between the two characters in the kart whenever they like. In Co-op mode, each player controls one character, so it takes two people to drive one kart (one player drives, the other shoots the weapons). The two players can switch roles if they push a button at the same time. In battle mode, each player controls one kart.
* if there is only one player, this thing is skipped.

(start game - select characters and karts)
* a list of character portraits is displayed at the top of the screen, in little boxes. Each player controls an outline which can goes around a portrait. Each outline has "1P", "2P" etc as appropriate. For VS mode, each player picks two characters; in Co-op, each player picks one character. 
* if character has already been picked, its portrait is dimmed, and it can't be picked by anyone else (not sure what happens if more that player highlights the same character, and one player picks him, making one player's highlight invalid. Probably changes highlight to somewhere else)
* Below on the screen, an screen area ("kart preview") is given to each kart (1-4 of these areas as needed). Each time someone picks a character, this kart preview area is populated with a little model of the character (who cutely says their name, and jumps up in celebration).
* after a player has chosen their character(s), they pick the kart. In the kart preview, a rotating model of the currently selected kart is shown, with its two occupants shown right beside it. Players (one per kart, not sure how to decide who makes this choice if it's co-op) can press left or right to select different karts. Arrows are drawn below the kart, inside the preview window, to indicate that the user can select different karts.
* once all characters and karts have been selected, a text message appears, with Mario's voice saying the same thing: "Ok?" Player1 must press A button to continue.

(start game - select map or course)
* an appropriate selection of maps or courses is shown for the selected game mode (VS, Co-op or battle). player1 has to pick this to move on.
* once a map is chosen, a text message (but no voice) asks what "CC" to use. This controls the size of engine each kart has (the same as every version of this game since the SNES version), this also selects the difficulty. (50 cc, 100 cc, or 150 cc).
* once the "cc" is picked, it asks again for an "Ok"
* after this, the screen fades out, and then fades back into the actual game.

Notes:
* I musta missed something, it's possible to play with computer players in one of these modes, and without computer players in another. I think VS, co-op and battle makes this determination, but anyhow, you get the idea.
* This whole thing is very very simple, yet it gets a lot of information in whole process. It reminds me of a "Wizard" in some software, that walks a user through a number of pages, each of which gets some more info from the user. 

Pro:
* the actual humans playing the game are sitting close to one another, so it is possible for them to ask each other questions as they are going through each step. 
* being able to go back in the menu system easily is very very useful, especially if player1 is trigger-happy
* each page asks one question, and allows the user to answer that one question. That's it. Nice and simple.
* the interface is tailor-made for console controls. pressing right or down or something will move the current highlight/selection one unit right or down. It's not like using a mouse interface, where there are ten things in places all around the screen, and a mouse has to move to each position in order to interact with them. 
* major decisions which play an important role later, are made first. Picking "one" as the number of players, for example, removes the battle mode option in the next screen (it's not possible to play against AI players in battle mode, only against other human players). 
* decisions that are not up the player are outright not shown. For example, the player never sees the computer pick it's AI karts and characters. Furthermore, the players have first pick in which karts and characers they use (the AI can only use the leftovers). 

Con:
* advanced players may want to just rush through these screens, and not want to wait for other players. If this kind of game was internet-enabled, this format of forcing players to wait may not be appropriate.