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360-degree flight
seraphantilles
Member Posts: 97 Arc User
Surely I'll get flamed for postig this again, but since beta, I have wanted 360-degree rotation in spaceflight. Now I ask again, please.
I realize that this might require some upgrades to the underlying game engine. You need to use quaternion math to avoid gimble-lock scenarios. If you don't already use quaternion rotation this would need to be implemented, which would probably not be easy depending on your existing code-base.
But if your engine already has quaternion rotation (I'd frankly be surprised if it doesn't!), then you just need to disable the angular constraints and add controls for rolling the ship.
It's out of canon for starships to have their rotation constrained like this. Watch Wrath of Khan or the latest Star Trek film. The starship combat is so awesome, with ships flying in all directions.
For people who find it disorienting, there could be a "constrain ship rotation" option. Simple.
It's tweaks like this that I think could bring people back to STO and attract new players too. Anyone who seriously likes space games is likely to expect 360-degree flight, since it's in all the great classic space games (such as all the LucasArts games like the classic X-Wing, Battlefront II, etc.).
I realize that this might require some upgrades to the underlying game engine. You need to use quaternion math to avoid gimble-lock scenarios. If you don't already use quaternion rotation this would need to be implemented, which would probably not be easy depending on your existing code-base.
But if your engine already has quaternion rotation (I'd frankly be surprised if it doesn't!), then you just need to disable the angular constraints and add controls for rolling the ship.
It's out of canon for starships to have their rotation constrained like this. Watch Wrath of Khan or the latest Star Trek film. The starship combat is so awesome, with ships flying in all directions.
For people who find it disorienting, there could be a "constrain ship rotation" option. Simple.
It's tweaks like this that I think could bring people back to STO and attract new players too. Anyone who seriously likes space games is likely to expect 360-degree flight, since it's in all the great classic space games (such as all the LucasArts games like the classic X-Wing, Battlefront II, etc.).
Post edited by seraphantilles on
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"...the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one..."
...in other words, a majority of the players have a hard enough time dealing with what space they do have to fly in and could not handle full 360 degree rotation through all 3 axis.
...and there was something about it being canon that starships NOT be flown upside down.
Even though in space there is no up or down or left or right or north or south, east or west, etc.
There's a reason why the ships in the series and movies rarely if ever did anything like that, even though the real world physics would support the idea. It doesn't display well to the human eye. Heck, even Star Wars never showed inverted flight for any extended period of time. Name me one sci fi movie or TV show where they consistently portrayed full 3D space flight, all the time. I sure can't think of any. They'll do it briefly for dramatic effect, but they always revert back to "normal" orientation for the viewers' perspective.
Cryptic has already compromised by allowing a greater degree of vertical pitch, but they aren't likely to change it again.
Case closed. End of.
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On ST:TNG, last episode "All Good Things" Adm. Riker's Enterprise decloacks from directly under the Klingon cruisers, on a 90 degree angle relative to their fligh plane before firing the lancer phaser.;)
Member since Jan 24th 2010 (more or less)
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Babylon 5 was pretty consistent 3d space combat.
Having never seen those last episodes, I'll have to trust your description.
But a single point of view attack that ends the battle is not the same as a protracted furball of a fight with full 360 degree rotation through all 3 axis.
In TWoK while the ships are in the Nebula, on the main bridge viewer there is a shot of the top of the Reliant as it passes close by the Enterprise. How is the Enterprise oriented in relation to the Reliant?
Now provide an answer to the following question as quickly as you can without spending hours thinking about it: was the viewer pointing downward, forward, rearward or upwards in relation to the plane of the Enterprise? In other words, in relation to the Enterprise, was the Reliant below it, in front of it, on its side or maybe even behind the Enterprise on its nose?
Full 3d "movement" would bring about a perception challenge to the game that adds a level of complexity that most players would wind up passing on.
-The Milkshake Song: Vulcan Edition
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
I don;t recall a single B5 episode where we saw 360 degree combat. It all looked like it was on a plane to me.
edit: Heck, I don;t even recall a single upside down ship when compared to others.
To quote Ripley from Aliens:*
"Did IQs just drop sharply while I was away?"
I already said it would be an optional feature. Protip: that means you can turn on or off. Please read posts before responding, in the future.
What you said here makes zero sense.*
First of all, this is a game, not a movie. Most space games dating back to Space Rogue, X-Wing, Starfox, and countless others have full 3D rotation.*
Second of all, the only reason you didn't see more crazy full-3D space flight in the TV show was because of budgetary and technical limitations. Notice how in the movies they do a lot of full 3D rotations, because that's how they ultimately wanted it to be all along.*
The argument from canon to justify no 3D rotations is just made of pure fail.
So it can technically be done, but they just chose not to enable it. Good to know.
This is just so wrong. Star Wars is absolutely full of spaceship maneuvers that would be impossible in STO. Watch the opening space battle scene of Episode 3. Watch the Millennium Falcon vs. star destroyers in Empire Strikes Back (where it ends up parked vertically on the side of the star destroyer!). Or the scene in Attack of the Clones where Obi-Wan is being chased by Jango Fett through an asteroid field. Do I really need to go on?
Really all of the most compelling, exciting, visually awesome space battles ever recorded to film have involved full-3D rotations.*
And don't even make me list you all the awesome dogfight sequences in airplane movies such as Top Gun and many, many others.
You best be joking. Look.. I'm not suggesting that ships be forced to barrel roll 100% of the time. There could still be a "home" orientation whenever combat ends. Many space games even like Galaxy On Fire even have a setting to drift back to the home orientation automatically after no other directional control has been pressed for a certain duration.*
But during combat, full 360-degree rotational capability is a MUST for an serious, decent space or air combat game. Give me a break! Only craptastic flight sims like Sega Afterburner lack 360-degree rotation. Star Trek needs to not be the "Afterburner" of space games. I can't think of ONE decent space game that ever imposed the kind of rotational limitations that STO does.
We really need this for PVP and fleet actions. I can't tell you the number of times I was directly underneath or on top of a group of enemy ships, yet I couldn't just fly in a straight line directly to them due to this stupid rotation blocking. So I have to fly in a spiral rotation maneuver to get there. That doesn't make the game easier, it makes it harder and more frustrating.
I challenge you to find one single space battle scene in one single space movie where there is NO full-3D rotation of any kind. Must be a major studio film. (I'm sure there are one or two, but not very many.)*
Not that what is in movies is valid for arguing about anything other than the cut-scenes of STO, but anyway.
Not closed. Not end of.
Why would it ruin the game for you if this option existed for those of us who would enjoy it?
I love these old threads, this one is almost as fun to read as player crewed ships.
Course, in the end it comes to nought, just as it has every other time this topic gets dragged out. You can poke holes in other peoples arguments all you want, parade all the other games out that you can think of, make all the snide comments you can giggle to, and yet still nothing is going to change.
Several scattered through this montage (check at 6:50 and 8:00 for a couple really good examples)
join date: Jan. 2012
I tend to agree.
However to be able to fly vertically up or down would be nice and not break that model.
You do realize that most people who did not major in Mathematics in college do not even know what quaternions are, much less software-based quaternion rotation? Your average person can barely handle using i, much less j and k.
1) It's canon. Yes, there are a handful of times in the shows/movies where ships did crazy 3d movements. 99% of the rest of the show, any ships that met in space, were sitting on the same invisible plane, with both of their respective 'ups' pointed in the same direction. This is Star Trek, in Star Trek there IS an up in space.
2) Full 3D flight, without the benefit of huge landmarks like, say, the ground, can get very disorienting. Don't get me wrong, I love a full 3d Space Sim as much as the next guy (gah! Bring back Freelancer! and Tie Fighter!), but it DOES get confusing, even to me. A newbie, who's only here for the trek, and doesn't have a lot of experience in other space games, can already get overwhelmed in combat as it stands today. Add full 3d movement to that, and you've lost a customer.
Oh, and btw, Quaternions TRIBBLE with my head constantly. Our sky system uses them for sun movement, and it takes me forever to get something into the position I want it to be.
2) In StarWars there are several moments where you see a ship "not right side up" through out it. Heck Han dives between two Stardestoyers that are flying one upside down the other right side up, they nearly collide during Empire Strikes Back.
3) Reason STO won't go "Real" is CBS, the Space Ships must Always be right side up, as if we sailing on the ocean or something. They're also why we have turn rates like there is "resistance" in space, doesn't match up with physics, but meh it's a Game. There is no "Up" in space, unless you play STO.
4) As Tacofangs said they try to keep it super Simple for the kids.
"...just look at my track record for making the improvements that I said we would with the KDF and judge by that." - Dan Stahl
How dare you insult the best SWBF2 pilot in existence!? :eek:
But really, I've flown a lot of stuff around, and my biggest issue is that sometimes I had a tendency to be doing a really fancy maneuver, only to ram a capital ship. In fact, I would recommend the Battlefront Project mod (moddb) for SWBF2, it really gives a realism boost - that's where I mostly blew up in a capital ship's face.
Plus it has just one custom map, and it uses game mechanics that make it impossible to play for anybody who joins a multiplayer game in it - instant crash.
Edit: To explain the beginning of the post, I'm only 14
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
I have never, not once been confused about orientation, in BC, Freelancer or Darkstar one, regardless if there were "landmarks" or not".
Don't forget Wing Commander! :P
Hold on... Did you say Darkstar One? As in the Ascaron game? I got that thing!
I only wish there was something for me to return to... so boring now that I've saved the universe and gotten all the artifacts in existence (and discovered the Ascarong system)
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
Have you flown all the possible combos?.
Yes, that game is pure awesome... But it lacks the "continueability" of Freelancer.
I think people forgot this part of the original post. I would love to see full 3D space flight (or at least straight up and down).
I can remember a few times this happened in Star Trek. What about the Defiant flying straight up and over to come behind the ship it was being chased by. Star Trek always allowed for manoeuvres to be done to allow for tactical initiative in a battle. Captains calling for evasive manoeuvres pattern delta etc. (which I believe, as described by Sisko, was "rock her" "hard port to starboard")
Star Trek used to do battles on a single plain because it was all done by modelling. Since it went to CGI we started to see a lot more adventatious manoeuvres seen.
It's been said in this thread that Cryptic have said that it would confuse people to have full 3D flight. Was this said before or after they introduced the ability for the camera to keep track of a targeted ship. I seem to remember in the early game sending in reports about the fact the camera never shifted to keep a targetted vessel on the screen. I think that now the camera keeps up with a targeted vessel, full 3D space flight wont be as confusing.
Plus if anyone gets confused as to what the game considers to be up perhaps just have a display at the side that shows what direction is up. Perhaps do what they do when you can view your ship in the shipyard. That, afterall, has full 3D movement and if I get offset I can just click a button that will automatically manoeuver me back into the correct position.
This is not as difficult as it's made out to be and it can be made usable for everyone just by having a limiter applied. If you're worried about PvPers having an advantage then allow for matches to be set to equal settings for manoeuvrability just like they do with difficulty when you have two people of differing levels team up.
as a compromise, would the dev team be open to doing "space emotes" where you can press a button and have your ship do a barrel roll or some other kind of maneuver?
I totally agree with a compromise but instead of making it an emote I think it should be made into captain abilities that are variants of evasive maneuvers and shares a 15 second global cool down with it and all similar abilities. There could be a maneuver meant to turn 180 degree quickly, one to move up, and one to move down 90 degrees relative to the current plane we play on. One other maneuver that would be really nice to have as well is an ascending 360 degree loop that will put us 2km to the rear of where we started the maneuver.
then u need to rewatch b5 dude...
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Ohh, if you have to deal with quats for your sun positions, then the system is over complicated. That could have been done with a simple 360 degree longitude and latitude and calculated using cos and sin.