What if KSP runs on EGA

[Pecan]

Be awed by the improvement from CGA to EGA, Thrill to the possibilities.

Of course, for the authentic 1950s/1960s feel you'd need to knock everything down much further, disable mouse, etc. etc. (Which would all pretty much eliminate any lag issues on modern computers too).

KSP does look good but, thankfully, it offers so much more than flashy graphics.

Anyone else still got 'Ascii art' flight-sims?

[KerbMav]

I tip my head.

[_Aramchek_]

Pffft, I want text based, with stats and dice rolls.

[User Unrelated]

Pffft, I want text based, with stats and dice rolls.

let's do this.

"Roll to determine the structural integrity of the linkage between LT-2 Landing strut and Mobile Processing Lab MPL-LG-2"

'uuuh... 8, plus knowledge engineering... so 12.'

"The linkage fails. You touch down on the Mun at 7.8m/s, and the landing leg separates from the vessel with a loud and echoing CRACK. Your lander flops on it's side in a cloud of dust and failure."

...

'I wish to radially attach this Rockomax Jumbo-64 fuel tank to that TT-70 Radial Decoupler, in 4x symmetry.'

"Roll knowledge strutting, with a -4 symmetry penalty"

hahahahaha

I would so play the turds out of a KSP tabletop. I probably couldn't find anyone to play with, though... my friends are all obsessed with roleplay-heavy future-mech campaigns

Edited February 4, 2014 by User Unrelated

[rdfox]

For the TRUE 50s/60s feel, you'd need to eliminate all graphics and just give you telemetry data, updated once or twice a second at most, with realistic communications lag and imagery available only 3-4 days after the launch for the launch/ascent phase (to give time for the films and photos of the launch and ascent to be developed), or a similar amount of time after recovery of the onboard cameras for stuff beyond the limits of ground-bound cameras. Also, no external views unless there was someone in a position to take them (meaning EVA photography only if you want to see your vehicle from the outside).

You might, by the time you're unlocking lander parts, get live TV footage of the launch and ascent to a certain slant range from KSC (like you got in real life space launches), but after it's far enough away to be effectively out of visual range, you're back to telemetry and, if you're willing to spend money, weight, electricity, and data bandwidth on it, maybe grainy, low-res SSTV footage from onboard cameras (think the look of the few bits of the Apollo 11 EVA where they were able to find some visual records of the original broadcast quality, as opposed to the n'th-generation duplicates we've all seen a million times). But any high-quality footage would have to come from film that gets developed after the return of the vehicle, and any "impossible" camera angle footage would have to be done as "pre-prepared animations" (go to YouTube and check out any of the live coverage of Apollo 11's flight; you'll see plenty of this on the network news coverage so that it's not just talking heads for most of the flight) that represents what it's expected that things would look like, as opposed to what they *actually* look like...

User Unrelated: Why couldn't you have a roleplay-heavy future mech campaign in a KSP tabletop? I mean, we've seen people build mechs in the game already--just use a KSP tabletop system as a core ruleset for a campaign involving, say, Jeb and Rockomax finally having had it with each other, so they start building mechs to fight it out and see which one ends up in control... XD

[Pecan]

For the TRUE 50s/60s feel, you'd need to eliminate all graphics and just give you telemetry data, updated once or twice a second at most...

I love the idea of a tabletop KSP but this is what I meant - thanks to you all.

The telemetry that the space programs of the 50s and 60s were based on was minimal at best. In general it was 'light the blue touch paper and stand well back' then wait to see what the results were if anyone/thing came back. The 3 (?) other 'what if KSP ran on xxx' engines seem to prefer the question of pretty pictures to the one of space flight control. Just making the point here that the numbers are what determine whether it works, even if you don't care about them. ;-)

Which is not to say that chucking stuff into the sky and watching awesome explosions can't be fun too, hehe.

[Rowsdower]

Someone please try this and send pics.

[SkyRender]

Well it's not fully authentic EGA-style, but here are a few of my older KSP screenshots redone in 16-color 320x200 (upscaled 4x so you can see the detail in all its retro glory):

EDIT: That first one wouldn't look out of place as a title screen on an old PC game. In fact, I think I remember a title screen similar to that back in the day...

Edited February 6, 2014 by SkyRender

[Lazro]

It looks like BARIS... I wonder if you could make a skin for BARIS with KSP images?

[earth]

Well it's not fully authentic EGA-style, but here are a few of my older KSP screenshots redone in 16-color 320x200 (upscaled 4x so you can see the detail in all its retro glory):

http://www.skyrender.net/lp2/ksp/duna05_retro.png

http://www.skyrender.net/lp2/ksp/eeloo_retro.png

http://www.skyrender.net/lp2/ksp/geo_station_retro.png

EDIT: That first one wouldn't look out of place as a title screen on an old PC game. In fact, I think I remember a title screen similar to that back in the day...

<3 i love you

[razark]

Pffft, I want text based, with stats and dice rolls.

Sorry, no dice, but:

[Pecan]

Excellent! I have Inform 7 ready ...

[manskal]

Well it's not fully authentic EGA-style, but here are a few of my older KSP screenshots redone in 16-color 320x200 (upscaled 4x so you can see the detail in all its retro glory):

http://www.skyrender.net/lp2/ksp/duna05_retro.png

http://www.skyrender.net/lp2/ksp/eeloo_retro.png

http://www.skyrender.net/lp2/ksp/geo_station_retro.png

EDIT: That first one wouldn't look out of place as a title screen on an old PC game. In fact, I think I remember a title screen similar to that back in the day...

Wow! Reminds me of old DOS games, particularly BARIS and the excellent X-Wing & Tie Fighter Series.

KSP certainly fits well if done in the theme and styling of early 90's PC games. It has that pioneering spirit befitting those games that broke new ground for the video games industry, which KSP is also doing.

Exciting stuff, really puts things into perspective.

[Umlüx]

Well it's not fully authentic EGA-style, but here are a few of my older KSP screenshots redone in 16-color 320x200 (upscaled 4x so you can see the detail in all its retro glory):

http://www.skyrender.net/lp2/ksp/duna05_retro.png

http://www.skyrender.net/lp2/ksp/eeloo_retro.png

http://www.skyrender.net/lp2/ksp/geo_station_retro.png

EDIT: That first one wouldn't look out of place as a title screen on an old PC game. In fact, I think I remember a title screen similar to that back in the day...

glorious!

i feel soooo old right now...

[Bobnova]

The funny part is that those graphics are still much better than anything from my early gaming phases. You'd have to replace all the 3D stuff with sprites, then you'd be about right

Is it weird that I kind of want to play in 320x240 (upscaled to full screen) 16 color mode?

[JimmyAgent007]

8-Bit KSP for the win. thought for tabletop, i suppose d20 future would work, or some form of GURPS. or to make it easy, the Window system would be simple enough to just make things up as you go.

[SkyRender]

The funny part is that those graphics are still much better than anything from my early gaming phases. You'd have to replace all the 3D stuff with sprites, then you'd be about right

Is it weird that I kind of want to play in 320x240 (upscaled to full screen) 16 color mode?

As I mentioned, they look more like the pre-rendered static shots you saw on title screens of PC games back in the day. And no, you aren't the only one who thinks a retro filter for KSP would be kinda nifty.

[Anton P. Nym]

Anyone else still got 'Ascii art' flight-sims?

I did play a version on a VAX back when I was a kid... had a printed transcript of the crash, too, but I haven't seen it in more than 30 years. Ah, memories.

-- Steve

[Pontiac]

New project... Record a launch, orbit, re-entry, and landing, get the Premier out, downscale colors, downscale size, encode, re-size encoded to viewable size on our 1080p displays, distribute to YouTube, become a YouTube sensation......

[NoPanShabuShabu]

As I mentioned, they look more like the pre-rendered static shots you saw on title screens of PC games back in the day. And no, you aren't the only one who thinks a retro filter for KSP would be kinda nifty.

I can just see KSP starting up and after a minute of disk reading one of those pictures pops up and some PC speaker music starts. And that's for you lucky dudes, I had CGA for quite a while, AND I LIKED IT!

[Specialist290]

I can see it now. The game comes packaged with several floppy disks, and every time you go through a Sphere of Influence transition, it pauses the game and gives you a prompt to "INSERT DISK 5 (or whatever) TO CONTINUE."

I remember the days of floppies...

[LameLefty]

Sorry, no dice, but:

http://i.imgur.com/goqfeIz.jpg

This is GENIUS. Time to break out DOSBox or something and go play Zork.

[LameLefty]

Anyone else still got 'Ascii art' flight-sims?

No, but the first flight sim I ever played was on a Sinclair ZX-81; it loaded from cassette (the only "mass storage" available of course) and absolutely required the 16KB memory expansion module.

[Pecan]

As it happens I have DOSBox and a bunch of retro games. I also have Zork, but for anyone who remembers text-based adventures - since rebranded as 'interactive fiction' - the best place to look for thousands of them, old and new, is The InterActive Fiction Archive. If anyone feels like writing a piece of KSP interactive fiction then Inform 7 is a brilliantly easy tool to use. As an interpreter it's a lesson for programmers everywhere too.

The ZX-81 flight-sim was just the sort of thing I was thinking of too; although of course it was pre-ASCII for home computers :-0 Were you rich enough to buy a whole one or did you have to build it from kit, like me?

[boxman]

I bet it would be like this space sim game on the amiga but with even worse graphics:

I like how it even has interior view and similar camera to KSP. It nearly looks like what KSP would be if it was a shuttle simulator and ran on 80-90s computers.

Edited February 7, 2014 by boxman