KSP2 EA Grand Discussion Thread.

[Vl3d]

17 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

They can't even trust real life rockets to agree 100% of the time 

Oh I'm sure KSP players think SpaceX does things wrongly.

[Bej Kerman]

1 minute ago, Vl3d said:

Oh I'm sure KSP players think SpaceX does things wrongly.

[DoomsdayDuck555]

I don’t want read all 5 pages are people still arguing about where the nav ball should go?

[Bej Kerman]

Just now, DoomsdayDuck555 said:

I don’t want read all 5 pages are people still arguing about where the nav ball should go?

[Periple]

I think this is already way deep into “somebody is wrong on the Internet” territory!

(I do hope they make it possible to move the navball, fix the other usability/accessibility issues, and add a HUD too. I’ve got a HUD on my car and it’s really nice!)

[Meecrob]

9 hours ago, Spicat said:

Why do you keep bringing real craft UI which is not at all the same as a game and moreover when we talk about the third person view?

And also ksp is mostly about spacecraft, not only planes, and generally in spacecraft you don't really look at windows which is different from ksp where you need to know where you land, that's the main argument.

Besides, I don't know where you found this picture of Crew Dragon but all I could find is a navball in the corner:

For Orion in your message, I won't call that "front and center".

So even talking about real life, it's not even a valid argument.

You didn't look hard enough for the Dragon displays, and you mistakenly proved my point by showing that there is, if possible, a navball for quick reference wherever they can put one. Additionally the Orion example is valid. Look at the picture again, pretend to be in the pilot seat. That navball is pretty much where it would be if you were looking at KSP1. And that is my point. KSP1 has the navball EXACTLY where NASA has the navball.

 

 

PLEASE Devs, for the love of God, do not pander to this group. Make the game proper, and let them have options to customize it however they want. maybe toss in some tutorials on how to use the navball, if they aren't already in KSP2?

Edited November 12, 2023 by Meecrob

[LoSBoL]

1 hour ago, Meecrob said:

PLEASE Devs, for the love of God, do not pander to this group. Make the game proper, and let them have options to customize it however they want. maybe toss in some tutorials on how to use the navball, if they aren't already in KSP2?

 

They've already emphasized on it in the very first AMA, below Nate's respond.

 

Quote

This is a good example of an area that’s being developed iteratively. I think the first goal is to give players the ability to rescale the flight HUD, but making it modular and giving both players and modders more control over how things look is a key priority for the UX/UI team.

 

[NH4Cl Enthusiast]

13 hours ago, PDCWolf said:

Here, since we're posting game media, here's me landing on KSP1 (I recorded this some time ago for someone on reddit). At least you'll understand how the navball really doesn't bother me at all.

https://streamable.com/cuhvcv

Also it'd be really cool if the forum embedded Streamable.

Edit for data: this is recorded natively at 1080p.

Funnily the second I saw you aligned with runway I just naturally kept my eye on the navball to see the craft orientation, AoA and so on to follow how it was going. I would usually have mechjeb readouts on the left and right side of the navball for landing planes and spacecraft alike and to dock. This to me is really the safest and by far the easiest way to land or dock anywhere. Seeing the craft is nice and all but the most important stuff is in the in navball and other readouts. In fact I find KSP1 graphics bad enough that I find it sometimes more distracting than helpful. Like personally I don't see how anyone can tell if the landing gear is 2 meters from the ground or actually touching it? 

On the topic the only flight sim I play is IL-2 and you can pretty much do an instrument landing even with a crummy early WW2 fighter plane aside from the approach where you do need to look out of the cockpit. But once levelled out you usually have a huge engine blocking the frontal view and since you're sitting on top of the wings you can barely see to the sides.  And surprise surprise, even 80 years ago they realised that this information needs to be front and center...

I'm just saying that anyone is free to argue that you need to see as much of the craft as possible but it's in no way some ultimate truth, it's just a preference to play that way. Having the navball at the center is not some KSP1 muscle memory nostalgia thing, it's that way in KSP1 because it's that way in aviation in general and has always been that way.

The problem with KSP2 is just that the UI layout is set in stone and at least for a number of people horrible to look at and unintuitive. Since this game was supposed to be an improvement on the first one and not a downgrade it understandably is annoying. Besides I thought we were supposed to move away from the trashcan aesthetic, why not give a modern, slick, easy to read and futuristic HUD from the beginning?

[Spicat]

1 hour ago, Meecrob said:

You didn't look hard enough for the Dragon displays, and you mistakenly proved my point by showing that there is, if possible, a navball for quick reference wherever they can put one. Additionally the Orion example is valid. Look at the picture again, pretend to be in the pilot seat. That navball is pretty much where it would be if you were looking at KSP1. And that is my point. KSP1 has the navball EXACTLY where NASA has the navball.

I look at the Dragon display that I sent, and yes there is a navball at the side of the screen, not center.

For the Orion capsule, there is a navball at the top left corner of the screen, still not center.

Edited November 12, 2023 by Spicat

[Wheehaw Kerman]

10 hours ago, DoomsdayDuck555 said:

I don’t want read all 5 pages are people still arguing about where the nav ball should go?

I love this bar.

[Meecrob]

27 minutes ago, Spicat said:

I look at the Dragon display that I sent, and yes there is a navball at the side of the screen, not center.

For the Orion capsule, there is a navball at the top left corner of the screen, still not center.

I do not mean the front and centre of the display, I mean front and centre of where the pilot is looking. The Dragon one you sent is a displaying a different mode. There is no analogue in KSP. It still has a navball for quick reference while the pilot is concentrating on information that is temporarily more important than the navball.

40 minutes ago, LoSBoL said:

They've already emphasized on it in the very first AMA, below Nate's respond

Thanks for the heads up, bro! This makes me happy.

[LoSBoL]

How about those IVA's? looks good to me, looking forward to IVA view. 

Don't mind the wide view, peripheral vision is something that can be trained

[Meecrob]

@LoSBoL Ooh! Those are looking pretty slick!

[The Aziz]

Yeah who doesn't like 8 navballs in their cockpits.

[Meecrob]

Just now, The Aziz said:

Yeah who doesn't like 8 navballs in their cockpits.

I assume its a work in progress. If its a gag at my expense, that's pretty funny!

[LoSBoL]

10 minutes ago, Meecrob said:

@LoSBoL Ooh! Those are looking pretty slick!

I thought so as well, to bad it's going to be a waiting game till they designed the command capsules IVA's, that's probably as to why there's isn't 1st person view yet.

3 minutes ago, The Aziz said:

Yeah who doesn't like 8 navballs in their cockpits.

They'll be of good use when an Raster Prop Monitor equivalent for KSP2 is developed. At least there's one in the middle like (mostly) in real life.

Edited November 12, 2023 by LoSBoL

[Guest]

2 hours ago, Meecrob said:

PLEASE Devs, for the love of God, do not pander to this group. Make the game proper, and let them have options to customize it however they want. maybe toss in some tutorials on how to use the navball, if they aren't already in KSP2?

What group?

You're fighting against windmills, everyone bere unanimously agrees about making the UI more customizable.

Again, for the nth time, the argument here is whether or not moving it to the side has merit, not about how everyone else should be forced to play.

 

Another thing I've not seen proposed so far is the ability to have UI elements split on their own separate windows. Then yes, I would immediately move the navball back to the middle, on a secondary 5-7 inch monitor placed right below the main.

 

Oh, and BTW, another detail that everyone seem to have forgotten in the past half a page, in KSP you don't usually land planes on paved runways following a rehearsed standard procedure, but vertically land rockets and landers in random places, with random obstacles at a random slope.

Outside of the KSC, the best landing in KSP is comparable to the worst emergency helicopter landing in any other sim.

[PDCWolf]

1 hour ago, NH4Cl Enthusiast said:

Funnily the second I saw you aligned with runway I just naturally kept my eye on the navball to see the craft orientation, AoA and so on to follow how it was going. I would usually have mechjeb readouts on the left and right side of the navball for landing planes and spacecraft alike and to dock. This to me is really the safest and by far the easiest way to land or dock anywhere. Seeing the craft is nice and all but the most important stuff is in the in navball and other readouts. In fact I find KSP1 graphics bad enough that I find it sometimes more distracting than helpful. Like personally I don't see how anyone can tell if the landing gear is 2 meters from the ground or actually touching it?

I don't enjoy mechjeb, but yeah, you just don't hear pilots say "the cockpit is obstructing my view", no, the cockpit is doing a better job of guiding you to a safe landing than whatever your eyes could, specially in bad weather. The cockpit is your view, it's where your eyes should be because even in 3rd person you don't have the correct information. This is why those hyperbolic claims of docking with the camera are not even addressable. Either you're being bad at it and wasting time on alignment, or you aligned everything with instruments before anyways.

1 hour ago, NH4Cl Enthusiast said:

The problem with KSP2 is just that the UI layout is set in stone and at least for a number of people horrible to look at and unintuitive. Since this game was supposed to be an improvement on the first one and not a downgrade it understandably is annoying. Besides I thought we were supposed to move away from the trashcan aesthetic, why not give a modern, slick, easy to read and futuristic HUD from the beginning?

Set in stone for now. Hopefully they make it movable first, and mod-able second. As for KSP2 being an improvement over 1... yeah, let's just say not yet, on anything.

6 minutes ago, Master39 said:

Oh, and BTW, another detail that everyone seem to have forgotten in the past half a page, in KSP you don't usually land planes on paved runways following a rehearsed standard procedure, but vertically land rockets and landers in random places, with random obstacles at a random slope.

Outside of the KSC, the best landing in KSP is comparable to the worst emergency helicopter landing in any other sim.

Set altimeter to ground, pick a flat-ish spot and go down slowly... Unless you're going for a fully manual 500m/s to 0 type suicide burn, there's no reason to slam yourself into the ground at any point.

[Wheehaw Kerman]

1 hour ago, Master39 said:

What group?

You're fighting against windmills, everyone bere unanimously agrees about making the UI more customizable.

Again, for the nth time, the argument here is whether or not moving it to the side has merit, not about how everyone else should be forced to play.

 

Another thing I've not seen proposed so far is the ability to have UI elements split on their own separate windows. Then yes, I would immediately move the navball back to the middle, on a secondary 5-7 inch monitor placed right below the main.

 

Oh, and BTW, another detail that everyone seem to have forgotten in the past half a page, in KSP you don't usually land planes on paved runways following a rehearsed standard procedure, but vertically land rockets and landers in random places, with random obstacles at a random slope.

Outside of the KSC, the best landing in KSP is comparable to the worst emergency helicopter landing in any other sim.

If we’re arguing on how we should force people to play, I think hostages, cattle prods, and airhorns are the way to go.

[Bej Kerman]

2 hours ago, Meecrob said:

I do not mean the front and centre of the display, I mean front and centre of where the pilot is looking

Is this one of those roving goalposts?

The pilots are going to be looking at their screen, not out the windows. The screen is effectively their FOV and it's off to the side.

[Pthigrivi]

2 hours ago, Master39 said:

Oh, and BTW, another detail that everyone seem to have forgotten in the past half a page, in KSP you don't usually land planes on paved runways following a rehearsed standard procedure, but vertically land rockets and landers in random places, with random obstacles at a random slope.

The other thing that I do all the time in KSP1 is set a lander or new module down just a few meters from an existing base. In that instance one of the biggest worries is landing physically on top of your base and having that clear view below your vessel is really important.  With colonies and collidable terrain down the road this kind of thing is going to be more and more important. As players you really need BOTH pieces of information, and given that standard monitors are wider than the they are tall this means you get the best viewing area for each by putting them side by side. If I could rotate my monitor vertically that might even be the best solution, but on a laptop thats just not an option.

But again this whole conversation is kind of silly because it's a clearly a matter of personal preference and it should just be adjustable, all agree. 

Edited November 12, 2023 by Pthigrivi

[Bej Kerman]

1 hour ago, PDCWolf said:

This is why those hyperbolic claims of docking with the camera are not even addressable.

They are addressable, even if it hurts your case because it exposes you to situations in the game where you need the navball on screen without it obstructing your view.

2 hours ago, PDCWolf said:

Either you're being bad at it and wasting time on alignment, or you aligned everything with instruments before anyways.

Again you're back to blaming the player instead of simply addressing the player's situation. Here's an example, maybe the player is docking a lander inside a tight cargo bay and needs to see the clearance around the lander - and the navball being in the middle would prevent them from making sure they don't scrape the engine on the back of the cargo bay. Are you going to blame the player for daring to save construction resources on smaller cargo bays, or maybe, just maybe, having the navball on the bottom is detrimental.

1 hour ago, PDCWolf said:

Set altimeter to ground, pick a flat-ish spot and go down slowly...

It doesn't matter if the ground is seemingly (keyword: seemingly) flat, it'd still be irritating to only be able to see a few feet below your lander like in the example from Lowne's gameplay.

1 minute ago, Pthigrivi said:

it's a clearly a matter of personal preference

It is, though I wouldn't want the developers to change the current default in an attempt to reduce complaints.

[LoSBoL]

25 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

It is, though I wouldn't want the developers to change the current default in an attempt to reduce complaints.

I wouldn't worry to much about it, they made the right descision. I mean, there is no space in the middle, look at how a 16:9 screen (picture stolen from @Mikki   )is filled with UI elements, It's gotten even worse with the last update where they spread the bottom elements accross the whole bottom instead of grouping them like before. 

I really feel for you guys fiddling with a filled UI elements 16:9 screens. 

 

ehm... nope...

Aga

Nope again...

 

 

 

Yes   Only need to kick those bottom ellements back to the left when modularity is implemented.  

 

Edited November 12, 2023 by LoSBoL

[Pthigrivi]

I also found this which is interesting--the LEM cockpit. It's a little hard to see but each crewman is standing side by side lined up on the window. You can see the joystick set for the right hand and aligned with the Navball. Again I think this is because having a visual reference as you guide yourself into a nice, flat, debris free LZ is so important. They'll also want to know speed and range and staying level obviously so they're glancing right to left to maintain awareness of all of that information. You'll also notice the crewman optical alignment site which is primarily used for docking. 

Edited November 12, 2023 by Pthigrivi

[PDCWolf]

22 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

They are addressable, even if it hurts your case because it exposes you to situations in the game where you need the navball on screen without it obstructing your view.

The navball is your view, it's the thing that tells you if you're on alignment, going straight at your target or slanted, and how fast.

24 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

Again you're back to blaming the player instead of simply addressing the player's situation. Here's an example, maybe the player is docking a lander inside a tight cargo bay and needs to see the clearance around the lander - and the navball being in the middle would prevent them from making sure they don't scrape the engine on the back of the cargo bay. Are you going to blame the player for daring to save construction resources on smaller cargo bays, or maybe, just maybe, having the navball on the bottom is detrimental.

If you're so zoomed in, who's to blame? Still, the navball is the main instrument you're docking with. The navball is the thing you look at, specially on a case where you need an alignment to be established pre approach and for the approach to be strictly straight as to not bang against something.

You're setting examples of people specifically shooting themselves in the foot by not knowing how to use instruments and ignoring them, and them crying that they're obstructing the view. No bro, that's the one thing you should be looking at.

28 minutes ago, Bej Kerman said:

It doesn't matter if the ground is seemingly (keyword: seemingly) flat, it'd still be irritating to only be able to see a few feet below your lander like in the example from Lowne's gameplay.

Based on your example, if you zoom in enough you wouldn't see the ground anyways, so why would zooming out and in be an option in one example but not the other? hmm...

1 minute ago, Pthigrivi said:

I also found this which is interesting--the LEM cockpit.
 

Yep, and in both cases the navball is as close to the window as possible for the construction limitations the LEM has. In fact, they took care to put the navball right by their vision in both stations, which is why they're at the edge of the window no matter which side you take.