Thoughts on re-entry heating

[Kerbart]

16 hours ago, AngryBaer said:

I've seen a lot of comments about how important the feature is for many. While I can see that it looks cool and is immersive I haven't really understood why it's such a big deal at this stage.

(...)

 The essential part for me is atmosperic drag, which already exists and serves it's purpose during flight and de-orbiting. Why is this particular item such an emotionally charged topic? Is re-entry the favourite part of the mission? Was there really doubt that it wouldn't be included? 

Short memories for some. Remember what happened with... was it 0.95? Or 1.0? One version re-entry was just visual effects, the next version your ship blew up. There were a lot of complaints about that, as people had missions going on  where they expected a return from Duna, preferably with a 90° atmospheric entry angle,  to be possible without bothering with a heat shield. Or that you couldn't use parachutes at Mach 10 to slow down.

A lot of players will design their ships around what the game allows them to get away with, and complain that the game is "broken" when it no longer lets them get away with it.  Don't say that's not the case; we know it happened in the past. The sooner those kind of mechanics get implemented the better.

[AngryBaer]

35 minutes ago, PicoSpace said:

So it makes sense if science gathering is implemented so is reheating because that makes science collection more of a challenge.

This is a good point, and I would see this as an argument for combining the heating and science into one update and making sure they work together. Plus re-entry is inseperable from heating in general.

3 minutes ago, Kerbart said:

One version re-entry was just visual effects, the next version your ship blew up

Very good argument for not separating the visual effect from the heating dynamic! This could just as well be turned around when your craft is surrounded by flames and you're asking yourself "Why is my ship not blowing up?"

I also have a number of questions about the visual implementation, because it's not just re-entry but high speeds in an atmosphere in general. Real vapour cones would be neat.

[PicoSpace]

1 hour ago, AngryBaer said:

This is a good point, and I would see this as an argument for combining the heating and science into one update and making sure they work together. Plus re-entry is inseperable from heating in general.

Very good argument for not separating the visual effect from the heating dynamic! This could just as well be turned around when your craft is surrounded by flames and you're asking yourself "Why is my ship not blowing up?"

I also have a number of questions about the visual implementation, because it's not just re-entry but high speeds in an atmosphere in general. Real vapour cones would be neat.

I for one would love to see a vapour cone etc trailing off things as they re-enter. I’d also like to see the colour of the re-entry flame change based on atmospheric composition. And burn marks, I want burnmarks so you can tell a space craft (or part) has been well (re-used).

 

ultimately, they could always make settings that allow you to turn off things like “heat” like you could in KSP1.

[AngryBaer]

1 hour ago, PicoSpace said:

I want burnmarks so you can tell a space craft (or part) has been well (re-used)

yes

[Alexoff]

20 hours ago, AngryBaer said:

While I can see that it looks cool and is immersive I haven't really understood why it's such a big deal at this stage.

No, this is not the most important part in the game. We just learned quite a lot of details. Most likely, if we were told in the same detail about the science in the game, it would have a much greater effect.

[VlonaldKerman]

On 7/25/2023 at 2:32 AM, Periple said:

But that’s the thing, they’re not acting like everything is fine. They’ve revamped their communications strategy, they shifted focus from developing new features to fixing bugs, and they’ve materially improved their processes — being able to hotfix without screwing everything else up isn’t all that simple.

While I appreciate that they’ve increased communication and transparency about the current state of the game, I don’t think that addresses the driver of the negativity on the forums.

Put simply, the game is not worth $50 right now. This means that it must one day be worth $50 for your money to count (actually, with inflation + time value of money it should one day be worth more than $50). The past allows you to predict the future, so early adopters, especially when the game is this early, are naturally curious as to how the game is at this early or a stage after years and years of dev time, and after several statements that were certainly misleading (take a shot for every time they said, “we’re taking our time to do it right”), and a large marketing campaign alongside a high-production-value trailer that all seemed to indicate the game would be in a better state (yeah I know the trailer said something like “join the adventure” but is that really a fair warning?).

The question is clearly “why”. Why so unfinished, why the big price, why the big marketing, why the gaslighting when they say, “It’s early access” despite the fact that a reasonable person could’ve easily expected more. Crucially, why are so few of the fundamental back-end system revamps which will allow the game to fulfill its ambition in place? From a bureaucracy standpoint, I don’t expect them to be allowed to answer the question, so I don’t have it out for the devs themselves. But I’m still frustrated.

All in all, I hope the game succeeds, and I’ll continue to cheer on the devs when I think they’re doing the right things, etc. But I think our collective memories might be too short, and that is causing us to forget all of the pre-release footage detailing better planet surfaces, in-implemented features, core system updates, etc., and the constant implication that when it came to releasing the game, quality took precedent over expediency. It seems like most people forgot, that they claimed the game would release in 2020, and they never said the words early access until some time in 2022! There’s no way to spin that.

On 7/25/2023 at 12:51 PM, Kerbart said:

Short memories for some. Remember what happened with... was it 0.95? Or 1.0?

I can find mentions of part heating systems in the changelog for KSP v0.13, and I think reentry visuals were added in 0.19.2. So a little earlier in the process…

[Spicat]

The "why" are easily answered, I don't know why some people are making it a big deal:

25 minutes ago, VlonaldKerman said:

Why so unfinished

Not enough time to make the game (because developement hell and bad management)

25 minutes ago, VlonaldKerman said:

why the big price

Because they want big bucks.

25 minutes ago, VlonaldKerman said:

why the big marketing

To make big bucks.

25 minutes ago, VlonaldKerman said:

why the gaslighting when they say, “It’s early access” despite the fact that a reasonable person could’ve easily expected more.

They? Some people are saying that but the devs are not defending themselves with that, big difference.

Edited July 27, 2023 by Spicat

[Kerbart]

18 minutes ago, VlonaldKerman said:

I can find mentions of part heating systems in the changelog for KSP v0.13, and I think reentry visuals were added in 0.19.2. So a little earlier in the process…

 First of all, I did mention that the visuals were there. But visuals by itself don't do a lot. Visually KSP2 is great. That doesn't make it a great game right now.

For all intents and purposes, reentry was not a factor in the game until the souposphere was dropped in favor of a more realistic atmospheric model. It might have been there, but it didn't do anything; you could enter the atmosphere at a 90° angle doing 3000 m/s and slow down to 200 m/s at 1km without ill consequences. Maybe the heating was there but the consequences certainly were not. Then the model was changed—either when it went to alpha or after that—to something that behaved a lot more like most players perceive reality and that was followed by some critique on how the game was now "broken."

[cocoscacao]

26 minutes ago, VlonaldKerman said:

I don’t expect them to be allowed to answer the question

Then why ask "why" and demand an answer in the first place 

[jost]

7 minutes ago, Spicat said:

They? Some people are saying that but the devs are not defending themselves with that, big difference.

Well some people think that the KSP2 team shouldn't have vacation due to the current state. So while I agree with your points I'm not surprised the same camp makes such a big Deal  out of buisness as  usual in capitalism

[Alexoff]

7 hours ago, Kerbart said:

Visually KSP2 is great.

This is a rather controversial statement. Usually the level of graphics of modern games for 50 bucks is slightly higher. It is better than KSP1, but KSP1 graphics look outdated even for 2011 levels.

[Snark]

Some content has been removed.  Please try to stay on-topic, folks.

• The topic of this thread is:  the re-entry heating feature and how the company is handling it.
• The topic of this thread is not:  what you think of how other people choose to post, either here in the KSP forums or elsewhere

Thank you for your understanding.

[VlonaldKerman]

On 7/27/2023 at 8:09 AM, Spicat said:

They? Some people are saying that but the devs are not defending themselves with that, big difference.

Go back to a lot of the dev communications from when EA was released… they absolutely said that. 

On 7/27/2023 at 8:13 AM, cocoscacao said:

Then why ask "why" and demand an answer in the first place 

It was a rhetorical question- I wasn’t demanding an answer. Just because they are stuck between a rock and a hard place and can’t answer the question doesn’t mean people can’t be frustrated with it. They made a mistake when releasing the game as it is/was, and the can’t stop people from being rightfully mad about that until they fix it. That’s life.

 

On 7/27/2023 at 8:12 AM, Kerbart said:

For all intents and purposes, reentry was not a factor in the game until the souposphere was dropped in favor of a more realistic atmospheric model.

Point taken, you may be correct. At that time, I was only watching KSP videos, because I couldn’t afford a PC. Also, it seems like their new heat model is much better than even the current KSP one, so it’s not directly comparable.

On 7/27/2023 at 8:09 AM, Spicat said:

On 7/27/2023 at 7:45 AM, VlonaldKerman said:

Why so unfinished

Not enough time to make the game (because developement hell and bad management)

This would’ve been good to know before the EA release, was my point.

 

All in all, I just hope that they are rid of the problems that led to the EA launch. Hopefully we’ll have reentry heating soon. I am, however, skeptical of the feasibility of some of the features in the heating dev blog, like shadows affecting heat, proximity to lava, etc.

[PDCWolf]

I do think re-entry mechanics are a core feature, specially since it's probably one of the most well-known parts of spaceflight for the mainstream public. Not having that is confusing for people who read about KSP being a simulator, and they use that extensively in the marketing for both games.

On 7/25/2023 at 3:45 PM, PicoSpace said:

I for one would love to see a vapour cone etc trailing off things as they re-enter. I’d also like to see the colour of the re-entry flame change based on atmospheric composition. And burn marks, I want burnmarks so you can tell a space craft (or part) has been well (re-used).

And particle ejection from ablative shielding/melt , vapor cones on pressure differentials, better heat blur, cloud variety, and so much more the game is so far falling short on. It looks so plasticky and amateurish right now.

[Periple]

10 hours ago, VlonaldKerman said:

They made a mistake when releasing the game as it is/was, and the can’t stop people from being rightfully mad about that until they fix it. That’s life.

I may be quibbling here but in my opinion releasing the game in this state wasn’t necessarily a mistake. EA games can be very rough and very incomplete. The mistake was releasing it in this state, at this price, and with these expectations.

The problem was that they talked it up a lot — Paul Furio’s engineering and quality focused development update in particular set a high bar — and the reality didn’t start to come through until after the ESA event when it was clear that the game was pretty flaky and janky even on top-tier hardware. The lack of clarity about the Uber/IG reset and its implications for the schedule didn’t help either.

Until the ESA event I also expected something at near release quality but a limited feature set — something an update or two from what it’s now, perhaps. What we actually got was an alpha. I think the reception would have been totally different if expectations had been managed better, even at this price point.

It also took them a while to adjust. Nate’s “short while” about re-entry heating was just around the initial release, and they clearly hadn’t gotten their messaging together yet.  I think they’re on the right track now on this front as well, but it did take a while and they’re paying a big price for those missteps. 

Also “under-promise and over-deliver” is an easy thing to say but surprisingly hard to put into practice!

[K33N]

You're framing it very provocatively for some reason.

It is a game about engineering space space missions and re-entry mechanics / challenges are a fundamental part of engineering space missions.

There is also the unfortunate issue of the developers communicating that re-entry mechanics were coming very soon after launch. 

Edited July 30, 2023 by K33N

[AngryBaer]

On 7/30/2023 at 12:31 AM, K33N said:

You're framing it very provocatively for some reason.

Certainly not on purpose, but it seems to stirr a reaction that I find exaggerated. Why do you feel provoked? How would you communicate that features are delayed in a way that would make you less upset?

After reading the comments here I gather that expectations weren't managed well, even if I didn't seem to have said expectations after consuming the same promo material. Messages from the devs like "we're having fun playing multiplayer" don't give me the expectation that there will be multiplayer in version 0.1 of EA. The same goes for re-entry heating. "re-entry will be very soon after launch" doesn't create any expections for me other than that it's not an afterthought, which I don't think anyone had any doubts about.

On 7/30/2023 at 12:31 AM, K33N said:

It is a game about engineering space space missions and re-entry mechanics / challenges are a fundamental part of engineering space missions.

There is also the unfortunate issue of the developers communicating that re-entry mechanics were coming very soon after launch

I agree, in a finished game I would have that expection too. The most reasonable response in this thread I've heard is that it needs to be implemented as early as possible because otherwise people would pick up bad habits of not protecting their craft (which apparently happened in KSP1). I still find that odd though because my expectation for this title is that it will undergo massive changes throughout development, which is kind of the point of EA and the community participation. Once heating is implemented we'll have to build things accordingly, no surprise there. There may well be changes that will force us to rethink some of our builds.

You're right that "very soon" might be a bit euphemistic but if it's in the next update that would still be very early on the EA roadmap. What makes something "very soon" according to you? What words should they use so this is not immediately regarded as deception? What makes it wrong? How many weeks or months after EA makes it not "very soon". In the spectrum of EA titles the first year could still be "very soon". I ask this because I seem to have a very different interpretation and I'm curious how this can be communicated and managed in a better way because I deal with client expectations at work too. I see a lot of 95% done is the same as 0% done according to the clients no matter what you say. "Just don't delay" is a practical impossibility.