Spaceships that "fly" annoy me

[DigDog]

Was watching http://elite.frontier.co.uk/ (the video on front page) and i can't help but think "*yawn*, another boring WASD space sim"

Because physics, that's why.

Sorry but i just can't stand anymore spaceships that "fly", like planes do. Rear thrusters and wings, mmk?

Back in 1989 there was Space Rogue, and it had newtonian physics; you had to spin your ship, aim your thrusters in the opposite direction of where you wanted to go, and you would slowly change between your previous vector and the current one. That's it - i haven't seen anything like since then.
Same goes for films... and why would a spaceship even *have* wings.


..
(Slowly getting poster's remorse, thinking this shold be in Gaming)

anyway, fake spaceships annoy me. boo fake spaceships, yay realistic spaceships.

Now make some film/game with them.

 

[UglyCasanova]

I agree. Practical spaceship designs would look odd and boring purely from a gameplay view.

 

[Newbian]

To be fair it looks cool.

That and a lot of the stuff such as the small fighters in shows like star wars go in both space and atmosphere thus they need them and why you usually see them more on the smaller ships and not the big capital ships as much.

 

[xSauronx]

Was watching http://elite.frontier.co.uk/ (the video on front page) and i can't help but think "*yawn*, another boring WASD space sim"

Because physics, that's why.

Sorry but i just can't stand anymore spaceships that "fly", like planes do. Rear thrusters and wings, mmk?

Back in 1989 there was Space Rogue, and it had newtonian physics; you had to spin your ship, aim your thrusters in the opposite direction of where you wanted to go, and you would slowly change between your previous vector and the current one. That's it - i haven't seen anything like since then.
Same goes for films... and why would a spaceship even *have* wings.

terminus did something similar and relied on newtonian physics. it was released for windows, mac and linux at once. wish i still had the discs, i recall liking the soundtrack quite a bit. the game was just ok, iirc. been a long time since i played it

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terminus_(video_game)

 

[Newbian]

I agree. Practical spaceship designs would look odd and boring purely from a gameplay view.

Reminds me of star trek shuttles for the most part.

Giant boxes that crash 90% of the time when in atmosphere.

 

[DrPizza]

Of course they need wings. That way they have more surface area per unit of volume, making them more vulnerable to enemy fire.

 

[UglyCasanova]

Of course they need wings. That way they have more surface area per unit of volume, making them more vulnerable to enemy fire.

Good point.

I don't mind some stylistic design elements in spaceships, but most of the time they go overboard. It also matters what kind of scifi it is, too.

 

[The Boston Dangler]

 

[dennilfloss]

Babylon 5 did it right.

 

[Iron Woode]

Starships were meant to fly......

 

[destrekor]

Babylon 5 did it right.

I think the re-envisioned BSG did it right as well.

Quite a few craft had atmospheric flight capabilities - the massive ships could enter/exit atmosphere/gravity, but I think were strictly massive thrust-based movement (think super-well-controlled rockets/missiles) as opposed to utilizing air pressure to remain aloft.

 

[Mr. Pedantic]

Shouldn't spaceships ideally be cubes or spheres?

Unless they're also designed for atmospheric flight

 

[homebrew2ny]

You might want your spaceship to have wings if ever you had the want/need to enter a planets atmosphere...? Unless of course you ship operates in a self contained zero gravity field, then shape would not matter.

 

[Ken g6]

Babylon 5 did it right.

This. (More or less.)

Of course they need wings. That way they have more surface area per unit of volume, making them more vulnerable to enemy fire.

On the other hand, wings might be useful as radiators, especially if you want the vulnerable area to be a plane, rather than a large volume.

 

[bguile]

I don't know about movies, but Kerbal Space Program has Newtonian physics and as 'real' a space simulator as I have ever seen. I find it to be incredibly fun, but be careful what you wish for though, its not for everyone. You can spend hours just on a single intraplanetary mission (*depending on how you construct your spaceship*), and lots of that is from the burn times.

 

[FallenHero]

Shouldn't spaceships ideally be cubes or spheres?

Unless they're also designed for atmospheric flight

 

[UglyCasanova]

I don't know about movies, but Kerbal Space Program has Newtonian physics and as 'real' a space simulator as I have ever seen. I find it to be incredibly fun, but be careful what you wish for though, its not for everyone. You can spend hours just on a single intraplanetary mission (*depending on how you construct your spaceship*), and lots of that is from the burn times.

Just looked it up and watched about an hour of beginner how to. What a neat game.

 

[DigDog]

I used to love the Eagles from Space 1999; film 'n tv used to do it right before the cultural black hole of the 80s.

 

[AViking]

I played Space Rogue and loved it. A few years later though the X-wing and Tie Fighter games came out and that was the end of realistic space sims. Maybe Freelancer? Did Free lancer have realistic flying?

 

[nemesismk2]

Babylon 5 did it right.

i agree 100% because i am a huge babylon 5 fan with all of the seasons on dvd, all of the movies and crusade too

 

[nemesismk2]

I used to love the Eagles from Space 1999; film 'n tv used to do it right before the cultural black hole of the 80s.

i used to watch Space 1999 too especially for maya played by Catherine Schell

 

[_Rick_]

Star Control also had reasonable mechanics.

Interesting how many first person/3d person chase titles don't.

 

[bguile]

I played Space Rogue and loved it. A few years later though the X-wing and Tie Fighter games came out and that was the end of realistic space sims. Maybe Freelancer? Did Free lancer have realistic flying?

Freelancher did not really have realistic flying.

Independance war did though.

 

[ProchargeMe]

I guess you've never played halo?

 

[John Connor]

The wings are for reentry onto other planets.