Elite / Frontier How ffe impressed me lately

[MPL3D]

Hi all,

I wanted to show a feature that deserves some mention, the oblated stars in ffe.

Here is a pic of Achenar at 1 AU of distance:

As you can see Achenar looks oblated or elliptical (this is usually due to high rotational speeds). Well, the fact that this kind of stars were included with this shape for representation is, in my opinion, an unexpected feature that makes ffe more realistic regarding this kind of stars.

Achenar is in fact, an oblated star. Besides having increased complexity for development, this does not only show an effort to include these kind of details for improved realism, but also reveals a background investigation of scientific data that I guess it was not as easily accesible fifteen years ago as it is today... great job.
Not to mention that, even nowadays, it is hard to find a computer game representing oblated stars.

Have a more artistical picture at closer distance from the star:

 

[Sterlino]

incredible awesome...

btw one question, the mother of all the questions,
did anyone encountered or seen any related info about a possible BLACK HOLE ?

 

[Steve]

Here is a pic of Achenar

It always amused me how FFE is the only instance I can find of this star being called "Achenar". Every other text on the subject spells it "Achernar"

 

[turwhitt]

Interesting. I had always thought that Achenar was one of the made-up names.

 

[Steve]

Interesting. I had always thought that Achenar was one of the made-up names.

No, Achernar is real enough, despite the mis-spelling in FFE.
There's an interesting page here about the star

 

[Sterlino]

wait a little... i noticed now.. what kind of ffe version do you have ?
i never seen a ship's desk like that before..
i've sent you also a pm

 

[MPL3D]

incredible awesome...

btw one question, the mother of all the questions,
did anyone encountered or seen any related info about a possible BLACK HOLE ?

Don't know about that one, it would be very remarkable indeed.

It always amused me how FFE is the only instance I can find of this star being called "Achenar". Every other text on the subject spells it "Achernar"

I should have choosen Regulus for the pic, another oblated one
I have to say that I've seen other places using "Achenar" name, perhaps it has become "Achernar" as it has been used.

By the way, nice page Steve

 

[MPL3D]

wait a little... i noticed now.. what kind of ffe version do you have ?
i never seen a ship's desk like that before..
i've sent you also a pm

It is "glFFE v1.0 - Nic Mod v1.3"

Steve has a nice page about it:

http://www.frontierastro.co.uk/Hires/hiresffe.html

And the download page is:

http://nic.dnsalias.com/FFE.html

I think it is the best around. I also tweaked the config to get 1024x768 resolution and changed the background graphic used in stations.

 

[turwhitt]

wait a little... i noticed now.. what kind of ffe version do you have ?

It's GLFFE.

Looks much nicer IMO.

 

[Sterlino]

damn.. thank u.. it's amazing..
wanna try it now

 

[Steve]

It is "glFFE v1.0 - Nic Mod v1.3"

Steve has a nice page about it:

http://www.frontierastro.co.uk/Hires/hiresffe.html

Glad you like the site. Cheers!

I think it is the best around. I also tweaked the config to get 1024x768 resolution and changed the background graphic used in stations.

Me too, and I changed the panel colouring as well

 

[MPL3D]

Hey that's cool.
I changed the background replacing "96.jpg" file, but how do you put your name on the ship? Hehe, I like these kind of things.

 

[DrBaggy]

incredible awesome...

btw one question, the mother of all the questions,
did anyone encountered or seen any related info about a possible BLACK HOLE ?

Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but I think FFE was out so long ago that Black Holes were theoretical ideas not proven to exist, and certainly not thought to be at the centre of all galaxies as is now believed.
Steve I'm sure you know more about this: can I add my praise on your excellent frontierastro site, I've had many happy hours browsing it, as well as downloading various versions of FE2/FFE

Dark matter/dark energy wasn't known much about then either was it?

 

[Sir.Tj]

Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but I think FFE was out so long ago that Black Holes were theoretical ideas not proven to exist, and certainly not thought to be at the centre of all galaxies as is now believed.
Steve I'm sure you know more about this: can I add my praise on your excellent frontierastro site, I've had many happy hours browsing it, as well as downloading various versions of FE2/FFE

Dark matter/dark energy wasn't known much about then either was it?

If I remember correctly, there was a rumour about a black hole a while ago. But, I'm sure David dismissed that in a interview somewhere. I suppose the mechanic's of creating a black hole in the game would have been challenging to say the least.

 

[DrBaggy]

I think the black hole was Gametek!!!!

 

[Sir.Tj]

I think the black hole was Gametek!!!!

.

 

[DraQ]

@topic:
Heh, you're right about the Ache(r)nar oblation being impressive.
I was personally quite impressed when the discovery of first brown dwarf orbiting a star surprised the scientific community, because I, not being up to date with astrophysics and not knowing of the models predicting no BD's being part of the planetary systems, thought "bwuh? haven't we known this all along?", after seeing many such systems in Frontier.

Alas, FFE lost some of it's astronomical accuracy due to haste, FE2 looks much better in most astronomical aspects, save for non-spherical elipsoid objects.

 

[Steve]

Steve: can I add my praise on your excellent frontierastro site.

You certainly can, up to the point where my head gets too big to fit through the door

I've had many happy hours browsing it, as well as downloading various versions of FE2/FFE

Seriously though, it's great to know folks enjoy the site. Cheers!

 

[GazNewt]

I think the black hole was Gametek!!!!

Ha ha I like it!