About "Flight" Models and remakes....

B

Bloodspray

Spaceman
I see Privateer is being redone, and it looks cool, I'm really looking forward to it.

Even though WC is my all time favorite game series, I've always been a realism nut. I did manage to overlook and/or rationalize the arcade flight of the WC series. I figure if they have atificial gravity down so well that it's absolutely no big deal for them, even on third rate, ancient, battle scarred warships, and even inside the smallest of fighters (the good ol' accel absorbers from WC1. At least, I thought that was a form of art. grav. to keep the pilot from becoming mush under heavy acceleration loads...), then their use of "fields" must be so advanced, that the crazy, totally unreal space FM can be justified (although the power consumption has to be totally outrageous when you consider the amount of inertia built up by a heavy fighter moving at 1000kps or so). Even the planet-side FM is kinda/sorta acceptable (but it's EXTREMELY disorienting).

The thing is.....they are hurting themselves with over use of their magic level tech. Why require burner use and fuel consumption to maintain full speed? Turn off that crap once you hit speed and just cruise on Newton's dime (first law). (Yeah, I know, a "game play" device, similar to a plot device for fiction. But that's a cop out, really.)

Other aspects are spinning in place so you are pointing away from your direction of travel (yes, caps lock is supposed to "slide" in WC3, but it's not working for me - not sure why), and vertical and horizontal maneuvering.

Ever watch a Babylon 5 Star Fury fight scene? That's a lot of flexibility that WC fighters are missing. And yet, they are very advantaged over Earth Force fighters because they don't need to use fuel to arrest their momentum no matter how extreme the maneuver.

With the remakes and new creations going on, has anyone tried to some how combine real newtonian physics with WCs magic level tech? If you could somehow harness both (and, if we look at it from a "what if" perspective, if you can do the WC thing, totally overcoming newtonian laws (basically), then you, by default, can get the best of the other stuff as well.

In 92, it was probably a bit much to have a newtonian physics model in a PC game, much less one that ambitious (between the system itself not being able to process that, let alone with graphics and sound, and cash/manpower resources to actually make such an project), but that doesn't stop us now.

Or, have I just kicked over an anthill? :D
 
Vegastrike is newtonian based. The remake adds all sorts of little limits like speed governors and max turning speeds (to keep the pilots from being mush? heh) tomake it play like atmospheric planes in space, as in the original. We give ships massive amounts of thrust to accellerate (linearly and radially) then artificially prevent them from moving or rotating any faster.

It would be easy to do away with those limits and let the underlying newtonian physics shine through. This wasn't done, as fidelity to the original was a goal (even if it isn' 100% set in stone) but anyone oculd change this and make a truly realism based remix. Play would be completely dfferent, and it could be interesting :)
 
Cool! :)

Looks like I have a lot of stuff still ahead of me. Need to finish up WC3, then 4, then P, then SO, then Star Lancer, then go backward to Armada and Academy and Privateer 1, then RF, then 2, then start on the fan mods..... I'll be at this for a year or more. lol (not a bad thing in the least. ;) )

Another thing I was thinking of too.... realistic mission creation and resource use. For example - Every capital ship is extremely valuable. It doesn't make sense to leave them so undefended as they almost always are in the WC series. (on both sides) In particular, carriers are super valuable. I just can't see a carrier being without an escorting battle group. Not because it's the USN way, but because it's the only thing that really makes sense. And, the fewer escort ships a carrier has, the more effective it's own defenses should be. In the WC series, we often find lone Kilrathi carriers and just casually head in and take them out. Even TCN carriers (like whichever one we're on in any given game) are by themselves (usually) and it's up to us - super pilot extrordinaire - to kill all the baddies. (and it's possible, another odd thing. Who would send a group that a single enemy pilot could wipe out, to take out an important asset like a carrier?)

Along those lines is the flight deck forcefield. I can't see how they can have ships fly through unaffected and hold pressure in. In WC3, the decks are clear when you come in and are already on the deck when people are milling about, so it may be that with the field up, ships can't cross (or, it could be that the atmosphere will escape when this is done, which would just make it a safety issue then). Either way, it would seem reasonable to make it strong enough to block ships, or....use old school tech like a portcullis. And, once you are inside, there should be a massive numer of crew firing at you with hand totable weapons. Perhaps even designed for such situations.

And then that takes me to the whole super pilot thing in the first place - how can 1 guy be so bad ass? It's not really him, it's the enemy. Is the problem AI? Or is it just that the baddies are given really really crappy fighters to let you be superman?


err....kinda got carried away. sorry. lol :D
 
The only carriers I see flying "solo", would be the big Midway and Vesuvius classes, if only due to the huge fighter wings on each. Added, the Vesuvius would have the equipment to slug it out with other capships on top of that. (I doubt this would ever come up though, as in most engagements, the fighters would do most of the work, and the capships would never even see eachother. But I guess a jump-point ambush wouldn't be out of the question.)

I always wondered why the carriers never used a portcullis. I figured it was because the field would be strong enough to stop incoming fighters if it needed to be (Guess I was wrong), and they cleared the flight deck before bringing it down.

As to the superpilot thing, I think a lot of it is AI. The player can take out "superior" AI ships. I think if they programmed the AI to use more real-life combat manuevers (yo-yo, scissors, etc...), and to capitalize on the advantages their craft has over the player's craft (i.e. using a scissor manuever to get behind a less manueverable opponent), it would be a bit more challenging.
 
A few points, Bloodspray...

Firstly, newtonian physics are not something that is possible in 2004, but wasn't possible in 1993. Newtonian physics in space-sims have been possible as long as space-sims themselves, appearing, for example, in the original Elite - that's the 1980s.

Once you realise this, you are led to the conclusion that the reason why Privateer did not have Newtonian physics is not because they weren't possible, but because the game designers did not want them. It was a design decision. As such, it would be a dreadful mistake for any Privateer remake to implement Newtonian physics - you might as well throw in a bunch of TIE fighters, while you're at it :).

I think you're somewhat overenthusiastic about the benefits of Newtonian physics, as well. Of course, it's your right and priviledge to prefer Newtonian physics, but don't make the mistake of assuming they're actually better :). Take, for example, momentum - yes, ships flying in Newtonian physics can do amazing things. They can fly in one direction, and turn around and knock the enemy fighter off their tail without ever reducing their velocity. But is that really more flexible than WC's approach? No - because unlike WC ships, ships flying in Newtonian physics do not have the ability to make a short-radius 180 degree turn and immediately travel in the reverse direction. They'll make the 180 degree turn... and they'll still be flying in the original direction long after the WC ship has finished the manoeuvre.

Neither type of physics is better - they're just different (and one happens to be what happens in the real world, but that's not actually relevant). And you shouldn't get too caught up in the fictional explanation of why WC fighters behave the way they do - as you surely realise, any game where lasers are slow-moving orange bolts and make a sound when they hit the enemy ship (flown by an alien space cat!), does not care that much about realism :). It's best not to delve too deep into the fictional explanations of why WC ships behave the way they do. Gameplay comes first, and the explanations are only there to rationalise it. For this reason, it's also a waste of time to try to explain (as you did in your first post) why WC ships would not be able to behave the way they do because of real-world physics - clearly, the fact that they do behave that way implies that in the WC universe at least, it's possible.
 
I think the one being "too caught up" in anything is you Quarto. Honestly.

1 - I said there were advantages to each. Not that one was "better" than the other. There is a difference between those 2 statements.

2 - All *good* fiction uses reality as a basis. Even in superhero fiction, there is no reason to assume that physics don't exist as we know them, only that the heros have the means to go beyond them in very specific ways.

3 - I simply asked if anyone was doing, or would be interested in doing, a WC in that manner. Not something totally changed, but, with added player control to work both FMs in whichever way he prefers. Meaning - that if he didn't want to take advantage of any true physics characteristics, he'd (or she'd) not have to. (so it wouldn't be much of a drastic change unless the player wanted it to be such)

4 - WC1 had aspects of this at work. It was a very "loose" flight model. You slid all over the place quite easily. That was a blast and the best one of the bunch (IMO). That strongly implies what I said above. The laws of physicis applies in WC, they just have ways of overcoming them. Artificial gravity and shields are a *huge* deal. If they can do those, they can do everything else we see.

5 - As for "space cats", we really are nothing more than hairless space monkeys, under that line of thinking. Yet, clearly, we aren't. We are just monkey-like. Much as they are just cat-like. Evolution is a crap shoot. There's no telling who's going to get the big brains. On their world, they did. Besides which, humans can't really imagine an alien, by default - because it's "alien". So every space creature we invent is based un us, our planet, and our observations. You pretty much have your choise of humans with bumpy faces, animal based, and insect based. Therefore, using "space cats" as an explanation for not looking at technical aspects is questionable IMHO. :)

Oh, and as for "might as well toss in some TIE fighters" because adding to the FM would be changing it, well, the same applies to the graphics as well. WC1, 2, and Privateer all had a "feel" to them. Seeing (and playing) a, Hornet say, in the Secret Ops engine wouldn't feel right. No more than trying to get a Vampire to work in the WC1 engine.


Don't get me wrong - As I said above, WC, even as it stands, has always been my all time favorite game series since it first appeared ('92? or '91?). So, in that regard at least (aka - love for WC), we are on the same page here. And, I'm not advocating anything be forced on anyone. I just see a lot of things that cause problems for suspension of disbelief and personally would find it an improvement to change those things (while still keeping the feel of WC, naturally).

:)
 
Forgot - I didn't know about Elite. Good point there. I just assumed it was too much for 286s to handle with the level of graphic and sound detail that WC had. Guess that's my flight sim experience sneaking through a bit. lol

Lasers were another thing that bugged me. But.....for WC, I just remember the age and let it go. But, space is dark. Turn off your lights in deep space and you can't be seen with the naked eye. So space fights would not 'look' like WC, even if the tech existed for movement like we find. So.........who's to say the "glass" isn't really just a giant, surround hud? We have something to that effect in the helmet visor in the vitrual pits of 4 and on. So it's certainly possible. The computer system just represents what it's sensors see for the pilot, and also add sound effects to provide yet more information. :D (like you said, it's all an after the fact rationalization. ;) )
 
The thing is.....they are hurting themselves with over use of their magic level tech. Why require burner use and fuel consumption to maintain full speed? Turn off that crap once you hit speed and just cruise on Newton's dime (first law). (Yeah, I know, a "game play" device, similar to a plot device for fiction. But that's a cop out, really.)
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Yeah suffers that in few areas. If they had nano tech as advanced as weapons why dont they have nano factories. They use antimatter mostly as weapons, no AM reactors, no supercoductors. I think they use these names on weapons to make them cooler. Pitty there is no database similar to ones in Priv2/I-war2.

Another thing I was thinking of too.... realistic mission creation and resource use. For example - Every capital ship is extremely valuable. It doesn't make sense to leave them so undefended as they almost always are in the WC series. (on both sides) In particular, carriers are super valuable. I just can't see a carrier being without an escorting battle group. Not because it's the USN way, but because it's the only thing that really makes sense. And, the fewer escort ships a carrier has, the more effective it's own defenses should be. In the WC series, we often find lone Kilrathi carriers and just casually head in and take them out. Even TCN carriers (like whichever one we're on in any given game) are by themselves (usually) and it's up to us - super pilot extrordinaire - to kill all the baddies. (and it's possible, another odd thing. Who would send a group that a single enemy pilot could wipe out, to take out an important asset like a carrier?)
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Yes Conflict Frespace has all that.
Ever watch a Babylon 5 Star Fury fight scene? That's a lot of flexibility that WC fighters are missing. And yet, they are very advantaged over Earth Force fighters because they don't need to use fuel to arrest their momentum no matter how extreme the maneuver.

With the remakes and new creations going on, has anyone tried to some how combine real newtonian physics with WCs magic level tech? If you could somehow harness both (and, if we look at it from a "what if" perspective, if you can do the WC thing, totally overcoming newtonian laws (basically), then you, by default, can get the best of the other stuff as well.
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There are games that are like that I-War series. First game is somwhat similar to WC and in I-War 2 EoC you play privateer/pirate.
 
Personally I stay FAR away from any spacesim that promises newtonian physics. Not that I suck at them, I just don't like them one little bit. Only one I tried for a 'longer' time was Jumpgate and only because it was the first space MMORPG. Oh how funny it was to see everyone crash into the stations when trying to land the first 20 times or so, NOT.
 
Bloodspray said:
I simply asked if anyone was doing, or would be interested in doing, a WC in that manner. Not something totally changed, but, with added player control to work both FMs in whichever way he prefers. Meaning - that if he didn't want to take advantage of any true physics characteristics, he'd (or she'd) not have to. (so it wouldn't be much of a drastic change unless the player wanted it to be such)
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Redoing Privateer with "realistic" physics would be interesting, but can actually be filed under the "has been done"'s:
Try Vicarious Vision's 'Terminus', released 2000. It's still available on Amazon (and certainly eBay), and the demo is also still out there in the net. For a first impression, look at the official homepage: http://www.vvisions.com/terminus/index2.html
They actually even made your "realism experience" tweakable by degrees, so that you can have full zero-g behavior, or any increment in between to full atmospheric flight.

Sure, it's a different storyline and has nothing to do with the WC universe, but it follows the same general concept - and I enjoyed it a lot.
 
Independence War figured it out. They explained ships had automatic thrusters to keep them going in one direction in the semi-Newtonian mode. You could still slip, but you would try to go in one direction. Or you could turn off the assist and fly in straight Newtonian physics.
 
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