Devnote Tuesday: Where did we leave the bugspray?

[Capt Snuggler]

sorry if I overlooked it but whats Porkjet been up to?

[MiniMatt]

11 hours ago, SQUAD said:

Another nice surprise recently was the interest of the mainstream British media have taken into Kerbal Space Program, which no doubt has a relation with Tim Peake’s presence aboard the International Space Station. Space is all the rage in the UK right now and rightly so. Therefore we’re setting aside a little time from Ted, Kasper (KasperVld) and Andie (Badie) so that they can work with the media and set up some interviews. Working with non-gaming press on items related to KSP is a new experience to us, and it’ll be interesting to see how it works out.

Re this bit I thought of Kerbal last night as the UK aired the opening episode of (sixth season) "Stargazing Live". It's the sort of programming that the BBC does really well - real science, approachable but not patronising. Anyway they had a big segment on reaction wheels, including "levitating" a garden shed but far more impressively a video link with Tim Peake aboard the ISS playing with a kid's gyroscope in orbit - even though you know (kinda) how they work, a toy gyro operating in orbit is spooky close to witchcraft. Lots of stuff on Pluto & the 67P comet too, with really enthused knowledgeable proper grownup professors - but remaining accessible and exciting to all.

Anyway BBC iPlayer link is http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b019h4g8/episodes/player - I appreciate that folks outside the UK may have difficulty accessing it without resorting to nefarious means due to the unique way the Beeb is funded, but suspect Squad's media contacts may be able to wrangle a private viewing for ideas

[WeirdCulture]

I know bug fixing as a very very satisfying task

[sieve]

12 hours ago, KasperVld said:

No, but I wouldn't want to keep this gem by @danRosas from you.

What is this bug? A frenzy, an illusion,
A shadow, a delirium, a fiction.
The greatest good's but little, and this bug
Is but a dream, and dreams are only dreams

 

Calderón de la Barca would be so proud

[taniwha]

This is not haiku
Haiku is about nature
This is senryuu, dude.

Sorry, making "senryuu" pronounceable by English speakers (myself included!) is..., dunno. sendew? Anyway, both haiku and senryuu are 5-7-5, but haiku must be about nature or seasons. Senryuu is free-for-all.

[sarbian]

2 hours ago, *Aqua* said:

HYPE! HYPE! HYPE!
I can totally see my modded KSP 1.1 robbing all of my 8 GB memory.

I totaly see the "8GB crash" beeing the new "32bit memory crash".

"But I only added 60 part pack mods !?"

[Elthy]

Do we have enough mods to fill 16GB of RAM?

1 hour ago, Capt Snuggler said:

sorry if I overlooked it but whats Porkjet been up to?

Afaik he works on an overhaul of the rocketparts for 1.2...

[KerbMav]

20 minutes ago, taniwha said:

but haiku must be about nature or seasons. Senryuu is free-for-all.

Isn't KSP second nature to us all?

Computer, exit ...

[Umlüx]

64bit!!

i'm gonna mod this sucker sooo hard.. oh my god, you all have no idea

[monstah]

13 hours ago, Hobbes Novakoff said:

Achievements... Not sure where exactly I stand there. On the one hand, it's cool for new players to get recognition. On the other hand, KSP is a certain kind of game. It's not like, say, Portal-something that you pick up, play for a while, then put back down. People play KSP for months, even years. Acheivements in that case would just be a mark of how long you've played, becuase there's only so many challenges you can make up. 

I disagree, achievements can be a measure of how far you've gone in a specific savegame (at least as I understand it; SQUAD has been reluctant to add Steam-like achievements so I read that to mean like the World First contracts and stuff). That makes it suitable for setting personal objectives or challenges.

[kujuman]

If achievement integration into PC was just a "Hall of Milestones" with a list of the World's Firsts (or whatever is tracked in the end), (sort of like the science archives) I'd be pretty happy. The little beeping in the corner when a World's First contract is completed is a nice way to do it I think--it's not at all intrusive, but you can still check the status of it in flight. I think keeping some sort of record of who was first in orbit, or first kerbal on each body would be welcome generally. I don't want: a master list of achievements (aka it lists unfulfilled things), a notification in flight that would ruin immersion.

 

I'd also add that for certain achievements (such as landing on the mun), it'd be nice if it were made more robust. If I bounce my first landing, I don't want to achieve both "landing" and "take-off" from the mun--likewise, if I land and then tip over/break an engine/etc, I don't want my sudden terror of messing up to be spoiled by "Congratulations! You've landed on the Mun!"

 

 

Edited January 13, 2016 by kujuman

[Morse]

14 hours ago, SQUAD said:

The map view was very reliant on the old and deprecated OnGUI system

Hm, never heard about unity deprecating IMGUI. So, what are you going to use now? Should add-ons also move to something else?

[m4v]

Every time I heard about adding an achievements I go back to this article that explains why Don't Starve doesn't have any link
 tldr; intrinsic rewards are more important than giving the player medals for playing.

Yes, KSP already has a sort of "achievement system" in the form of World's First Records, but they aren't as prominent as things like Steam achievements, and you can't see what records you didn't complete yet, so is much easy to ignore and set your own goals.

Edited January 13, 2016 by m4v

[GeneCash]

43 minutes ago, kujuman said:

I'd also add that for certain achievements (such as landing on the mun), it'd be nice if it were made more robust. If I bounce my first landing, I don't want to achieve both "landing" and "take-off" from the mun--likewise, if I land and then tip over/break an engine/etc, I don't want my sudden terror of messing up to be spoiled by "Congratulations! You've landed on the Mun!"

Nah, that's be "you impacted the Mun!"

Seriously though, as a dev myself, I've been bashing my head for a couple hours about how I'd differentiate in code between a successful landing and "land, bounce, tipover, thud"

I guess I'd insist the craft be upright (within a 45 deg cone of local vertical) and no break-off events in the last 30 seconds, or something like that. Defining upright might be difficult, as a craft might launch vertical and land horizontal like a shuttle.

It would have to be robust because people go *batsh-t* *crazy* on consoles when achievements "glitch" - i.e. they fulfill the requirements but don't get the achievement. I follow Achievement Hunter and a bunch of other non-KSP Lets-Players and this is a "I'd stab my mother over that" level of "sore point"

Edit: mainly because a lot of achievements are seriously difficult, and to do the work but not get it... well, you get stabby.

Edited January 13, 2016 by GeneCash
Clarification

[Padishar]

40 minutes ago, Morse said:

Hm, never heard about unity deprecating IMGUI. So, what are you going to use now? Should add-ons also move to something else?

Deprecated doesn't mean it has been removed or can not be used.  It means there is now something better and it will be removed at some point in the future.  In this case, I suspect that it will still be around in Unity 6...

[GeneCash]

22 minutes ago, m4v said:

Every time I heard about adding an achievements I go back to this article that explains why Don't Starve doesn't have any

I think that article ignores the fact that you can play a game more than once, and in more than one way. I know a lot of people that play a game, then replay it to get all the achievements. I do this myself. This gives replayability to rather linear games that are otherwise "play for 5hrs, put on shelf"

I know I have a hard time figuring out what I want to do in Minecraft because I'm not very imaginative, and I stopped playing early-access Don't Starve because of that. I should go back and play the final release.

Similar to KSP, they *had* to add achievements for consoles, thus the Accomploshrine that gives you one achievement, then crank SEVEN HUNDRED AND TWENTY FIVE TIMES for another. Basically to stick a thumb in Sony's eye.

I'm sure the KSP devs are far more imaginative and not so diva. *cough* Or Dr. Turkey will be forced to deploy the pitchfork again...

 

[Just Jim]

Cool!  Can't wait to try out the tutorials.  I know the game pretty well, but I'm always up for learning something new.

And I love the bug haiku...  too funny!!!

[GeneCash]

Ideas for fun achievements:

Aluminum Overcast: get 80,000 tons in orbit (aka The Whackjob Ultimatum)

Genocide: Kill more than 25 Kerbals in one mission

Angel of Mercy: Save more than 25 stranded Kerbals in 1 game

Thomas Edison: Max out the tech tree

Von Braun Trophy: Land a Man Kerbal on the Moon Eve and return him safely to Earth Kerbin

Bernie Madoff Trophy: Run out of funds.

This might be a fun contest for Squad to run... hmmm...

[capran]

1 hour ago, kujuman said:

If achievement integration into PC was just a "Hall of Milestones" with a list of the World's Firsts (or whatever is tracked in the end), (sort of like the science archives) I'd be pretty happy. The little beeping in the corner when a World's First contract is completed is a nice way to do it I think--it's not at all intrusive, but you can still check the status of it in flight. I think keeping some sort of record of who was first in orbit, or first kerbal on each body would be welcome generally. I don't want: a master list of achievements (aka it lists unfulfilled things), a notification in flight that would ruin immersion.

 

I'd also add that for certain achievements (such as landing on the mun), it'd be nice if it were made more robust. If I bounce my first landing, I don't want to achieve both "landing" and "take-off" from the mun--likewise, if I land and then tip over/break an engine/etc, I don't want my sudden terror of messing up to be spoiled by "Congratulations! You've landed on the Mun!"

 

 

It would be pretty awesome if the Kerbals held ticker tape parades and such through Kerbopolis  on your return though.

[cubinator]

Sounds like progress is coming along well! Keep doing your awesome work, SQUAD!

[Majorjim!]

Why have you guys not shared the image of KSP running on the PS4 that was shared on, ugh.. Reddit.. ?

[Racescort666]

7 hours ago, Bloody_looser said:

Wow, it's the funniest anti-achievement reasoning I've read in a while.

 

Achievement systems are useful in many ways.

First, one can brag to one's friends like 'Hey, bro, check out my new 'Launch a vessel' achievement, bet you won't get that evah!'

Also, achievements are essential in a situation like that:

Some 'l337 r0ck37 5c13n7157' appears, all nerdy, term-toting n' stuff, humiliating you with some nerdy words like 'apoapsis'. Without achievements you're kinda screwed, there's nothing you can do with such an intellectual. With achievement system you can be just like - 'Go get 'Land on the Mun' fist noob, and be nerdy later, lel.' Congrats, you just won an argument on the internets!

 

P.S. On a bit more serious note - you know, Steam overlay can be turned off, right?

I'm honestly pretty proud of the fact that I've unlocked all of the achievements in Borderlands 2. Some of them are awesome, some of them are participation, I like the ones that are easter eggs or funny for random reasons.

[Hobbes Novakoff]

3 hours ago, kujuman said:

If achievement integration into PC was just a "Hall of Milestones" with a list of the World's Firsts (or whatever is tracked in the end), (sort of like the science archives) I'd be pretty happy. The little beeping in the corner when a World's First contract is completed is a nice way to do it I think--it's not at all intrusive, but you can still check the status of it in flight. I think keeping some sort of record of who was first in orbit, or first kerbal on each body would be welcome generally. I don't want: a master list of achievements (aka it lists unfulfilled things), a notification in flight that would ruin immersion.

You know what would be AWESOME? Final Frontier-style ribbons for Kerbals.

[GDJ]

6 hours ago, Umlüx said:

64bit!!

i'm gonna mod this sucker sooo hard.. oh my god, you all have no idea

Whoa! Slow down Captain Happy! We haven't even had a release date!

Edited January 13, 2016 by GDJ

[Hcube]

1 hour ago, Majorjim said:

Why have you guys not shared the image of KSP running on the PS4 that was shared on, ugh.. Reddit.. ?

I have a feeling that this will never change...