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TIGSource ForumsCommunityTownhallForum IssuesArchived subforums (read only)CreativeFlight simulator/game prototype
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diegzumillo
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« on: June 01, 2015, 06:57:49 PM »

Hi all

I posted an idea at that other thread called 'post your game ideas' or whatever and that got me excited to actually start working on something. It's a flight sim/game in a futuristic context. I noticed that everyone that plays flight sims - myself included - love to fly next to the terrain, buildings and, if there's a bridge, it's federal law to try to pass underneath it. But every flight sim is constrained to boring realistic terrain, so that's where my futuristic context comes in! The player will fly on futuristic cities of highly complex structure, with plenty of stuff to fly close by and inside.

I want it to feel as realistic as possible. In normal circumstances that would put the project in the 'extremely challenging' category to develop but, given that 'realistic' is whatever the hell I want, it's a bit easier than it sounds. Still hard though.

Here's a video of the first test I did this weekend:




I want the opinions of flight sim enthusiasts out here. If possible, if someone cares to fly a bit and tell me what they think about it, that would be great. I couldn't find good references on flight simulation so I'm trying to do my own thing here, it's extremely important to get feedback. Right now it feels like you're flying a cessna in terms of maneuverability but it has the lift and speed of a jet.
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EvilDingo
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« Reply #1 on: June 02, 2015, 02:29:32 PM »

It looks like a nice approximation.

I wrote my own flight simulation and found a that most people like an easy to fly model. There are some die-hards but nearly everyone enjoys simple models.

I spent a lot of time improving the accuracy and making the game more realistic and when I released the update, the casual audience abandoned the game. It was too much work to change back, so lesson learned.
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diegzumillo
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« Reply #2 on: June 02, 2015, 04:05:43 PM »

Cool! I've been wanting to talk to someone who did a flight sim. I'm trying your game right now, it's pretty good :D By the way, I died a little inside when I read a review there that said "PLEASE FIX I CAN'T LAND THE PLANE". Play store reviews are the worst kind on all the internet, even worse than steam reviews.

Do you know anything about blade element theory? This seems to come up a lot in my research, as it was used on X-Plane and other simulators. Apparently it was conceived to model propellers but the same principle can be applied to the whole plane body. But I find nothing more than these hand waiving explanations.
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darklight
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« Reply #3 on: June 02, 2015, 10:41:38 PM »

Hi - I fly various flight sims, plus also I'm interested in 2D versions of that type of game too Smiley  I would say don't worry about blade theory - sure it is useful in simulating realistic planes (i.e. approximating a specific real plane's flight characteristics) - but this doesn't sound like what you want.  In my opinion a 'futuristic flight mode' means a nice generic model that feels nice to fly, without the nasty features of a real plane - I mean in the future they'd have erased all of those, right? 

You don't need a maths degree to come up with that, you can hack together something quite simple.
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Pishtaco
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« Reply #4 on: June 03, 2015, 12:49:25 AM »

If you haven't seen it, Lift (in these forums) has flying through structures: http://forums.tigsource.com/?topic=36851.0

How are you modelling things right now? See my sig for my sim, Venus Patrol. The model there is pretty simple. Each plane has about five aerodynamic surfaces - the wings, the horizontal and vertical stabilizers, the sides of the fuselage - and each of these is treated as a point, with a certain area and normal. You get the relative vector of the wind, calculate lift and drag for each of these, and that's it. (And I suspect I'm calculating drag wrong.) To model moving a control surface, just bend the normal. This works fine, at least for straight-winged, subsonic flight. I started from knowing nothing about aerodynamics, and used this book - http://www.av8n.com/how/

A big issue was the interface - how are you going to cram the whole sky onto a small screen, with a player who probably doesn't have a joystick?

The sim I'm currently working on (when I get time Shrug) is here: http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=39640.0
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EvilDingo
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« Reply #5 on: June 03, 2015, 02:20:22 AM »

Hi - I fly various flight sims, plus also I'm interested in 2D versions of that type of game too Smiley  I would say don't worry about blade theory

This is good advice. My first iteration of my simulator was about as accurate as me thinking, "huh, that looks about right?" It had nearly no aerodynamic calculations at all. And it was a big hit until I broke it trying to make it more realistic.

And, yes, I usually don't read the reviews. It's difficult sometimes to not respond to the trolls and I find I get better feedback by looking at Google's rating number on the dashboard instead. If I'm making a big update, I'll look through them to see what are requested features but it hurts. Smiley
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diegzumillo
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« Reply #6 on: June 03, 2015, 12:56:13 PM »

@darklight @evildingo

I'm absolutely obcessed with this simulator for the past few days, so I can see where this advice is coming from. It's easy to get sucked into it trying to get it to feel just right and realistic.

@Pishtaco

I love Lift! it pretty much reduced KSP to just the planes and that's great.

My model changes in an hourly basis (here's a webplayer of the current version, if anyone wants to try) Right now it works like this: the whole thing is built on top of unity's physics engine (physx) and the plane is a rigidbody, so it falls to my system to calculate the forces acting on it. I work around the angles of attack (theta) and yaw (phi) of the plane with respect to the air stream. Then I define curves for lift and drag with respect to these two angles. For instance, lift is has a positive peak at theta = 20 and -20 and I multiply this with the curve for phi and square of velocity and I have the lift force. For the drag I have a slightly different approach, I add both angle coefficients instead of multiplying, and the relation of drag with velocity is given by a curve as well instead of just square (U shaped for subsonic speeds and and slowly decreasing for supersonic).

I used to work with connected rigidbodies but they are pretty unstable so I switched to just one. The problem is that now I have to calculate torques by hand instead of having them naturally arise from the interaction. This is tough but I'm following a similar procedure as lift and drag, I have a bunch of curves defining how much torque is applied on different angles and speeds. It also creates a problem of handling input. I'm simply applying a torque to the whole thing but doesn't feel too good. I'm also enveloping the input in a velocity curve (so torque is zero if the plane is landed, for example).

I'm thinking about shifting the position I apply lift to handle input. I think that would be closer to what Pishtaco is doing.
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diegzumillo
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« Reply #7 on: June 05, 2015, 12:04:49 AM »

I've updated the player (forgot to activate the mouse controls I implemented though). I feel the obsession is gone. I'm satisfied with that. My life feels empty now, what was I doing before I started this?
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EvilDingo
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« Reply #8 on: June 05, 2015, 03:52:42 AM »

Quote
My life feels empty now, what was I doing before I started this?

Oh man, that's a feeling I know well. The world is full of possibility and suddenly, without warning, the drive is all gone.
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woodsmoke
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« Reply #9 on: June 09, 2015, 05:53:17 AM »

Sounds like my kind of game! Smiley I've played many flight sims in the past (Flying Corps, IL-2 Sturmovik, Aerofly FS, FSX, YS Flight Simulator, that Desura Flight Sim in Brazil,..), and don't like the complex stuff (looking at you FSX and IL-2), but love the realistic handling and relentless difficulty of a simulation.
The future urban setting is a great idea. I don't think that's been done before in flight sims.
I'll test this when I have some time some time.
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diegzumillo
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« Reply #10 on: June 09, 2015, 07:03:11 PM »

There's a level complexity that really don't make sense from an entertainment perspective. Like transferring fuel and tweaking the fuel mix before starting. It's part of what sets 'simulators' apart from pure games. But there's a certain satisfaction in pushing a few buttons that make bleep bleep and blink some lights as you fly the plane. A satisfaction that comes with mastering a complex system. I like that in simulators.
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