I was talking about the Resident Evil series. 

but he means that x-wings move like spitfires, they swoop and turn like they're using differences in airpressure on the wing like a plane in air rather than a spacecraft which would have to use other means such as thrusters. He doesn't mean that nothing we've put into space can ever be pointed in a direction we want.

Very well thought out post there Kell by the way, nicely articulated the argument for believability being the goal in scifi technology. It's all about keeping the world coherent and plausible while allowing yourself to create the story you want. If you want absolute realism, you probably have to rule out humans meeting any alien races, especially humanoids that speak english as so often happens. 

guess i was replying on a page that had been open for a while.. 

I was talking about the Resident Evil series.

Actually I thought you were referring to Parasite Eve hence the capital P, but same difference.
Maybe I should have used a different smiley.

starbuck: thanks. with a name like yours you ought to know a bit about swooping spaceships yourself :P 

is exactly what im aiming for. (that's a very relative concept, btw) As i explained earlier, im not really trying to nail down my spaceship design for the maps directly. It's like building a ww2 themed level - you try to gather as much information and background on architecture, landscape, army, etc. as possible, to get a picture of how it worked. Maybe that's a pretty good phrase for what im doing: getting a picture of how something like that could happen.

re: believability in games: Look at hl2. those giant three-legged thingies that shot at you. throw one grenade on the ground before them, and they should be gone (but they aren't in the game(?)) - nobody would design a weapon like that. I can't even think of a scenery where they would be of advantage. That kind of stuff annoys me (slightly).

Now, q3 is obviously not a realistic environment to build in, but i tend to build my maps in a way that doesn't base off the q3 scenarios. And thinking stuff through is kind of fun for me, makes the process more interesting.

Also, i thought guys like bambuz would like the discussion =)

on topic again: Im sketching around a bit after chatting with bamb and others yesterday. What about the loading bay having 'arm'-like structures, kinda like those flexible hallways they have at airports to make the planes easily boardable? Those would make getting out of the ship fast on rough ground easier. 

Listen to Bambuz, he obviously knows a lot about this field.

I think you're confusing him with Kell. 

makes sense, you make decisions like that... (Though I don't find the circular gravity thing unbelievable.)

If you're not creating a whole universe that is trying to stay internally consistent, then it's easier to just concentrate on short term believability (which in itself is hard of course).

If you are going to create a whole universe then you have to spend some time thinking both the rules and also the ways you still can break the rules to just make it presentable. 

surely, the same ship that travels through space wouldn't also land during the invasion; it would stop in orbit and then release hundreds or thousands of smaller landing craft right? Just like the large, ocean-worthy troop transport ships didn't beach themselves during the invasion of normandy, they stopped at a distance from shore and launched smaller landing boats.

Regarding realism, the whole idea of aliens traveling across space to invade earth requires so many leaps of imagination it's hard to make any claims of "realism" since we have to invent biology and technology just to have the scenario happen. E.g. what is a "realistic" faster-than-light drive? There is no such thing, based on our current knowledge of physics.

So, I agree with what kell said in that you can at best pursue "believability" because realism is out the window. Like with the troop transport ships and landing crafts, and the dogfights in starwars, and the submarine battles of star trek, your best approach will be to make heavy use of analogs to human experience. 

going to point out the flaw here:

Neither do they travel through "interstellar" space, since by definition they remain orbiting earth and don't travel between stars.

because it is too obvious to mention, nor the maneuver I was alluding to to buttress my point in using 'interstellar' instead of 'interplanetary' in my choice of words. However, that purpose is the flaw in my own argument because now it is also used in chasing comets. 

http://steamcommunity.com/id/ankh_dk 

gosh you're so smart HT, so smart you don't even have to bother with a rebuttal, right?
I'm afraid it's not really obvious enough for me though, crushingly thick as I am.

You're still deliberately ignoring the perfectly valid and comprehensible point I was making: star wars starfighters don't move in a way that would be possible in space, they fly like aeroplanes. Everyone gets that.
I don't know what your problem is. 

add me to!!!

http://steamcommunity.com/id/trinca 

would be a great name for a black exploitation sci-fi thriller. Think "Shaft" meets "The Andromeda Strain" 

 

you cut-up 

obviously,

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/9/94/Xwing_vs_tie_fighter_cover.jpg/255px-Xwing_vs_tie_fighter_cover.jpg

the tie-fighter and X-Wing were not designed aerodynamics in mind. Look at those flimsy wings. The combat is realistic in terms of space movement, what you and Starbuck are seeing are distorted interpretations created by your earthling centric minds because you want to relive the glory of aces on high. That is not what happening in Star Wars at all. 

in space, when you fly forward, you can turn and point your nose to where you are coming from and still keep going where you were going... Like spacecraft and satellites do.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r8BbrXT97SE

But X-wings don't do that. They fly swoops like WW2 airplanes.

That's what the whole fuss is about. 

The combat is realistic in terms of space movement

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Newton 

as to which thread breaks out into a flame war first:) 

...there I am struggling with the existence of God and the Problem of Evil and Cacodaemony rears its ugly head.

DooM is everywhere ;) 

starwars 'physics'. i hate that like every space flying game has them. :\

btw, kell, did you actually design the Shirow ship on your site? it's not really clear if all 3 ships there are from movies (as the sulaco is).
if you did design it, nice one. it's a sweet silhouette. :)

i loved the look of the aliens sulaco ship when i first saw it. it struck a chord that i never found in other mainstream scifi. i like the more 'utilitarian' approach to ship design. i wish we could see that in games more often. 

The combat is realistic in terms of space movement

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac...

take the easy side of a argument. 

starwars 'physics'. i hate that like every space flying game has them. :\

As I recall, Frontier, the sequel to Elite, had very realistic physics. At least, it allowed for the facing-reverse that bambuz described.

btw, kell, did you actually design the Shirow ship on your site? it's not really clear if all 3 ships there are from movies (as the sulaco is).
if you did design it, nice one. it's a sweet silhouette. :)

Yes I did. I designed the Ohio as well, extrapolated from a very small and simple detail in one of the diagrams in the afformentioned Aliens Technical Manual.

i loved the look of the aliens sulaco ship when i first saw it. it struck a chord that i never found in other mainstream scifi.

As I say on my page, I believe it's the most influential ship design because it manages to strike such an effective balance between 'realism' and 'believability'. It just feels right somehow. 

and Bambuz/Lunaran,
what part of the word 'earthling' made you think that post was serious?