Moach

I meant it in regard to computer-driven simulations, of course. The real universe (sometimes referred to as "The Matrix") doesn't really have such arbitrary constructs as fixed reference axes. Not unless we make them up and imagine them on top of what we see, as we often do - Such notions are useful theoretical aids to help us measure and calculate things in space. They aren't a built-in feature of reality though, not as far as we can tell, at least... You can come to "orbit" over a flat plane by, as I said before, using mathematical tricks within a simulator environment. What I did that one time to achieve this, was to have the game track the distance you traveled and use it as a factor of an arbitrary circumference. Then, it was simple enough to figure the angle this should represent around this imaginary "globe", and add it's sine component to your altitude as you moved parallel to the ground. It worked rather well, though it was only a cartoonish 2d proof-of-concept thing I made for a class assignment back in college. In an abstract mathematical interpretation of things, it's indeed all relative. -- Our real universe however, is inconveniently not a mathematical construct. (not one that we can easily tell from inside it, at least)

that is actually not the reason why KSP loads so slowly - and caching wouldn't do much to help, I think. the real reason for the long loading times is that KSP has to load everything up front - so even parts you have never used are parsed and loaded along with all their models, textures and whatnot when the game starts up. I've considered making a mod that replaces parts with a fast-loading surrogate of sorts and then replaces them with their full versions only when and if they are actually used.... It's theoretically possible to pull this off, but not being a rich man, I am unable to spare that much effort into such an endeavor. This was actually something I made a point of avoiding when I made the part-loading logic for my own MotorWings project - It only loads parts when you pick them up for placement or load an airplane that uses them. It's startup time from desktop to hangar is negligible because of this. Thus I can confidently say that caching those text files would alas, most probably not really help KSP load any much faster...

Problem with a flat world (besides the obviously false theory that it is) - is that, you cannot get in orbit unless gravity pulls you towards the center of something.... A "Flat KSP" would only allow you to fly as far as an atmosphere takes you. As long as the direction of gravity remains a fixed "Y" axis, you can never get in orbit. (not without some geometric trickery - I once made a KSP-like Flash game that did exactly this - that was a year before KSP, btw) As you also mention finding and trading rare parts, and having friends online -- I'll risk tooting my own horn and say that MotorWings is far closer to the mark in its concept. It's not as far along in its development as to have any of those features implemented yet, but they are indeed all planned. Also, since it's an airplane-oriented game about things that surely could not get to space, the world of MotorWings is indeed flat -- It just goes on and on, infinite in all directions.... (though if user feedback indicates enough desire for orbital flight someday in the future, I just might reuse the same trick from that Flash game to make it possible)

Look up "King David's Spaceship" by Jerry Pournelle. Or also, there is "Janissaries" by that same author, which is a bit more war-minded but also has the medieval-civ-in-space theme to it. There's also a sequel to that one, though I forget exactly what it was called...

some fancy flying, that I had expected the final docking procedure would have been somewhat more eh, intense

Thou Shalt Useth MOAR BOOSTERS!!! really, how did nobody raise that one yet? it's probably the most classic KSP meme there is

NASA had pretty much the same dilemma with the Space Shuttle.... Sure it's nice to be reusable, but is it worth having to take apart and rebuild the whole damn thing every time it flies? I personally use generic-and-overpowered as a design philosophy mostly for bottom stages. A good "OrbiTower" is always useful, regardless of what you strap on top.

Today has been a day for Atlas, Rise! by MetallicA

It might be worth considering acquiring perhaps, say, a mouse that actually isn't for all intents and purposes and for discussions sake, let's say uh: broken? And/Or, if that doesn't suit, or fully-functioning hardware is somehow not to your taste as a general concept, you could try an autohotkey script to have the one good remaining mouse button change functionality upon a key being pressed and thus fill in for the one that's not cooperating much. Such scripts are pretty commonplace and shouldn't be too much trouble to find. You don't really have to learn AHK scripting to use it. I'd personally argue that GTA 5 has a pretty terrible key-binding system which leaves a lot to be desired (such as basic modifier keys, like shift and ctrl as combos instead of individual assignments only) - But I do get your point. It'd be nice to have KSP2 a little more flexible with controller inputs, especially considering how different craft might require specialized controls and all that.... On the other hand, as a game programmer I must point out the very critical fact that: UI programming is something of a poodle. Key Bindings in particular are a very awkward concept to write code around also. And such a thankless task, for if done right, nobody ever raises a cheer for awesome key-binding capability, only when lacking there's no end of grief about it. Most things that are really notable achievements in computer science tend to be received like that by end users... But yeah, most games do seem to kinda relegate the fact that inputs needs to be assigned onto actions to something of an afterthought. Maybe I'm getting old, but back in my day, you could bind any keys to do anything you wanted and some more you didn't even think of!* *read the last sentence in the voice of Adam Sandler doing his Grumpy Old Man character (a meme from 1990's era Saturday Night Live, another indicator of how old I am) .

pah, give the man a challenge: Mk1 EVA space suit - Travel the system. Go!

truth be told, games nowadays haven't pushed hardware as hard as they used to (relatively, that is) I remember back in the early 2000's when we had to go buy a new GPU every 6 months or so - Moore's law was in full furious effect back then. What happened? Why has it slowed down? Well, it's hard to make a game look any better than what's considered "average" nowadays without an exponential investment in artwork development. A graphics engine can showcase any number of supposed eye-candy features, but what makes for what players consider "awesome graphics" is really just sheer hard work from a team of sometimes hundreds of artists. (check the end credits of a game like GTA 5, and see how many designers it takes to put that much detail into such a large area) Since most relatively decent mid-level GPUs can handle something like that reasonably well, even if with some compromise on graphics settings, it follows that to push hardware any further would require so much more detail that it just doesn't make any sense to take on the gigantic effort of developing it. How realistic does it have to get before it really doesn't make any much difference anymore? I personally think we've gotten to that point a few years ago. There are games who make a point of showing characters with every single pore detailed on their skins. An eye-grabber and wow-maker on cutscenes. But does it make the game any more fun? Most often, not really. Most games don't really need that level of detail anyways. Better use that hardware for something more practical; Hence, GPU physics. But even then, how many tumbling bricks does it take before any more won't add anything to the experience? That point has also already been reached, in most cases, as most games with that kind of thing going often have them affect only certain objects, whilst others have to remain unnaturally indestructible, lest players be able to bring down the whole level on their heads and make the game unwinnable.... Point is, It's really, really hard to push hardware these days. Not only has the industry kept up with software quite well, but software itself has also developed new "tricks" and optimization techniques, such that older hardware can do more than it could when it was made. Makes sense, the more players are able to play any game, the more will buy it. "You'll need to get a new GPU" is hardly an enticing sales pitch.

Actually, KSP was originally meant to be deliberately free of any such DRM methods. The reason for this is simple: DRM systems don't stop piracy. Instead, they just aggravate legitimate users by assuming anyone who plays could be stealing the game - Whereas the first thing a hacker does to pirate a game, is to remove that very source of aggravation. Effectively, aggressive DRM means pirates can offer a superior version of your product for free. That was the original reasoning behind KSP's much simpler and perhaps more effective approach, of simply making sure players understood the small-scale nature of the developers back then, and hoped they were conscious enough to reject illegal copies with the awareness that they'd be hurting the people who are working to finish their new favorite game. This reasoning seems to have proved correct, or at least close enough so that no DRM arrangement was ever seriously considered thus far (that I know of) This was all before T2 took over, and most likely makes zero difference nowadays - Large corporations have similarly large rules, and those cannot be bent by little things like "good sense". If their board of directors say there has to be DRM in all their titles, then who could ever argue? The fact that it doesn't really do anything to achieve what it claims, doesn't really come into the executive decision making process. My personal theory is that players who seek "cracked" versions of a game would never have become legitimate users anyways if such weren't available. Those who do so are often teenagers, not unwilling to pay, but more often than not, fully unable to do so. They do not have credit cards, and learning how to hack software in binary form just might be easier than asking mom and dad to let them buy something. So whether they succeed or not, that copy of the game would never have been sold in the first place. To the average piracy-seeker, the alternative is not a legal purchase, If they can't find it for free, they look for something else instead. That's my own opinion anyways, and probably it goes against the "politically correct" corporate train of thought. Still, don't get me wrong: I do NOT mean to condone or excuse software piracy, but I understand what drives a kid to seek out such a thing, having been that age myself once. They'd have never bought the game instead of trying to get it some other way. It's not that they don't want to pay, they often simply can't. That's why DRM doesn't work. Hopefully, T2 is clever enough to save themselves the trouble and cost of such a pointless thing.

Try saying "no" to a girlfriend/wife who wants to go out for a show instead of watching movies on TV at home - That'll rapidly change your mind

Hurray for mod-making as a learning device! Making addons for Orbiter was how I got around really learning C++ I took a course for it, but working on the G42-200 StarLiner was the thing that really drove it all home. Having a project you personally care about to apply your new skills on makes a world of difference when learning something like that. Welcome Back - We've saved your seat for you. But I think someone stole your snacks while you were away...

Just to elaborate, perhaps pointlessly: The whole idea of the rule that .dll addons have to be open source is for two reasons. First for security, as nobody right in their head would write malware and make the code public for all to see, so it kinda prevents that. But second, and perhaps most important of all: So that every single mod that comes out can be in itself an example and learning opportunity for other mod makers. Being able to see how any mod works and how it was done has been key to making KSP one of the most mod-friendly games ever. So that's why we have the open-source rule. It's proved quite a good one, as far as rules go. I say "we" because I was a moderator back when this first came up - Haven't been one in a while though, got too much stuff going on for it... Cheers!

Relax mate, these guys are just yanking your chain. As perhaps the oldest user of these forums, I've (sadly) seen ppl get banned before. But they sure did a lot to deserve it before it ever got to that. This is a very friendly community. So, From one of the oldest to one of the newest here: Welcome aboard, and fly (mostly) safe out there... <

0b11111100100

I was already here when the rest of all you guys showed up. True story: Note how the number by my user profile URL is 9. That id number is really just the position users arrive in as they first join these forums. I suppose the other 8 were mostly Squad staff members back in June 2011.... Man, I feel old.

I do not need to be driven to madness, as I've already gotten there, parked and the garage doors have long since become welded shut by rust... But one can always add more madness on top of what's already a pretty damn loony pile - To this purpose, and seemingly to it exclusively, exists the relentless pounding of hammers on walls coming from the apartment above being renovated for what feels like the whole last geological era. I can no longer recall a time when the walls didn't shake from relentless banging all day, every day.... Even with earbuds shoved tightly about as far as beyond eardrums depth, I can still feel the ceaseless repeated blows. It feels like my very soul is being banged upon. Madness is no stranger at times like these. Even without the hammering, I'm already a pretty screwed up person. This merely adds a little bit of rain over the veritable ocean of insanity that lies inside this head-shaped reservoir of chaos I keep atop my neck

New version out today! This one has internal views! https://www.motorwings.net/updates

because of how Windows is constructed, it is actually not very straightforward at all to type in more than one program at a time. Windows runs each keystroke through the active window first. And said program gets to decide whether or not to "trap" the key or allow it to have it's default behavior (if any) - Once the active window traps a key, the buck effectively stops there. Windows might quite possibly detect any means of interception as a possible (even if false) attempt at data theft. Microsoft is rather poophole about security, with perhaps good reasons, (most of the time) so they make it intentionally difficult to have various programs stealing inputs from each other. Perhaps the only way to achieve true multiple-focus typing would be to write software that does so at a driver level. Unlike regular (so called "user mode") programs, drivers can do pretty much all they want with your computer (though there are still various restrictions even then), which is why Windows makes such a bit fuss about whether or not you really, really, no really, I swear I won't break it, mom! trust your software provider when you install a driver. Easier perhaps would be to have a script that rapidly alternates between windows and retypes what you just wrote. Though this would make for some awkward flickering if it ran on each key, I expect. It'd also have to be able to receive inputs even while on the background, which might be troublesome if any programs you're using makes a point to capture and trap all inputs (games usually do this, especially when running in full screen) So this would work perhaps only some of the time, depending on what particular combination of programs you're trying to multi-type into. There are ways to do it - but I don't think any are anything you could call "trivial". ---- also, mind that if the goal is being able to input more keystrokes at one time, it might not be possible to get any faster than the game is able to accept your inputs. Unless the program queues up key press events, you'll most likely be limited by it's update cycle rate. (this may or not be the same as it's FPS)

In some parts of the US you might be hard pressed to tell.... Anyways, I started learning english around age 12 - Me and my brother were enrolled in a special after-school course for this, as in our native country one cannot gain any useful language skill whatsoever from the ludicrously insufficient english classes included in the regular education schedule. At this day and age, I hope kids are getting something better than I had back then at schools, or they're pretty much doomed to isolation.... Anyways, having discovered the wonders of cable TV and the inexplicable number of mostly-generic sitcoms available in the 90s (which cable TV had the decency to present with subtitles instead of the horrible overdub used on open channels) - We found that English was really the language spoken by people in the Real World. This then absolutely needed to be learned. At some point around that age (perhaps around 13 or so) I gradually began trying to think in english, rather than just translate from native. This proved to be the key. Even without enough vocabulary to go around, one can begin to use english in his "internal dialogue" with as little as a year's worth of decent part-time classes (2 hours a week, rly) - Once that capability becomes sustainable, one may confidently say that he can speak the language, even if this requires some roundabout descriptions where exact terms aren't familiar. To be fair, most native speakers of any language don't really bother learning any more of it than required not to flunk gradeschool. This is where me and my brother fall a bit outside the curve - I personally flunked my native Portuguese as a school subject thrice. Conversely, I don't recall ever having had any non-passing grades in english. And in the off-school course, my tests were reliably graded above 80% - This is not to say that we were good students. On the contrary, our colleagues were befuddled to the point of jealousy by how we managed those grades while at the same time just as consistently failing to ever return any single piece of the course's assigned homework. I personally don't believe in homework. I much rather prefer to use my time actually paying attention to class while I'm there, instead of taking notes for revision some other time... Anyways - that was then. Our all but exclusive preference for "cable culture"* and persistent endeavor to convert our brains to think in english by default payed off rather well. Each new aspect of the language learned, either in class or elsewhere came as an "A-ha!", instead of a "what the?" moment. This made all the difference. * (this was the late 90s, mind you, Internet then was a thing that made a weird noise and hogged the phone line) It was also around that same age that we started growing the very real feeling that English was really meant to be our first language. So even after we stopped taking classes, we continued to learn and seek to master it as a native tongue. Thus we shunned all translations and opted for English on any source of entertainment or device that provided the option. By age 18, we spent two months living in the Netherlands with english speaking folks all around (Dutch is an insanely hard language, and I have not yet found a dutch person who didn't revert to english so naturally they appeared not to notice the change.) - It was satisfying to confirm then that not only we could hold perfectly comfortable conversation with anyone about anything, but our accent in english was drastically more subtle than that of any of the other students we met when our interchange group got together. After that it was pretty clear that English really was my first language. I found that when I speak my native portuguese, I'm half the time having to translate myself back to it from the english spoken inside my head. This can be a bit awkward at times... Eventually I moved to Canada, and finally there I truly felt "at home". It is very liberating to be able to converse in the same language one uses inside one's head. But before I set out and got on an airplane, I made a conscious effort to exorcise any remaining trace of my native accent. It is actually not possible to have "no accent whatsoever", as someone somewhere else will always claim their pronunciation is really the correct way and everyone else is doing it wrong. What resulted for me, is really an accent made up of blended bits of most others I come across online every day. People often ask me where I'm from, saying they're unable to place me by the way I sound. My usual reply: "I'm from the Internet". I never stopped seeking to learn more and more English, as I find it a truly fascinating language. Curiously, the more I learn of it, the more I find in common with various other languages. Then it becomes obvious why it has become an "unofficial official language" of the Internet (and with it, the whole world) It is not, as some hard-headed overly nationalistic folks claim, because of US cultural dominance that English is the world's standard language. Not at all. In fact, just ask folks across the pond and they'll tell you most Americans don't really speak proper english anyways... English is a natural common language for the world (much more so than languages deliberately conceived for that very purpose, like Esperanto (which is only really universal across latin-based tongues)) because it is literally a language made of all the others. If you think about it, the British empire for most of post-medieval history has come in contact and (quite profitably) traded/warred with pretty much every culture in the globe. This was their main strength, as a sea-faring folk, they became quite literally the "center of the world". (This is clearly seen on any world map, note where longitude zero is.) It is then perfectly natural that the language spoken by such people would be one that took bits from all over the place. And this has been going on for just about a thousand years. What results is really a universal language, not because any king or queen said so, but because it was really cobbled up from the best (and usually the most easily absorbed) parts of all other languages. The result is that english is one of the easiest languages to learn there are. (some are more logical, and easier still, but far less common and thus curiously harder to learn for it) - Even if not properly spoken, bad English is still enough to get communication across for most purposes. It's actually quite difficult to speak it "wrong" and even if you botch half or more of it, you'd probably still make at least a little bit of sense. At age 30+ it appears my English has massively outgrown my supposedly "native" Portuguese. Having recently acquired the habit of going through audiobooks at a furious rate, (sometimes >1/day) I have come to a point where I can actually be more eloquent than most people who were born speaking it. But then again, having it for a "second" language perhaps made me treat it with more attention than those who can take it for granted. Case in point, my own originally native language probably wouldn't do to pass a high-school test these days... But well dammit, Portuguese is HARD!

I'm now working on the world map for the game. And I've come up with a only handful of fictional place names that I'm generally satisfied with so far. So in order to make this easier, I've set up a forum thread where I'm collecting suggestions for naming destinations which will be eventually featured in the game. This is the known world, roughly: You can click the image above and it'll take you to the forum thread where your suggestions are welcome. This is a unique chance to make your mark in the game. Mind that this map covers an area of about 1000km², so there's a lot of ground to explore and much room for imagination Cheers! Edit: Btw: New build Mk1c is now available. This one has explosions! See changes here

1: Aye, pray forth that He shall press the key! And that this key shall be F8! -- Thuswise be the key for The Saving Of States! 2: Forsooth and verily! All existence that be shall thenceforth restore to The State of Saving! -- And Lo! For as He presses F6, aught once again shall be as ere was! 3: And convenience be unto He! Aye, that keys 1~0 (alphanum) beget the Selecting of The Slot of Saving! -- Thencewith behoove Him of Multiple Save Slots! .... worked out well enough for me to get the Silver PP7 in GoldenEye (much harder than gold, must beat Train in <4:00) on my N64 emulator Should work for Life, The Universe, And Everything....