No, it would play like the boardgame Harpoon. Long range chess with probabilities instead of hard yes or no rules.
The Star Citizen Thread v 3.0
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No, it would play like the boardgame Harpoon. Long range chess with probabilities instead of hard yes or no rules.
No not quite, in realistic space combat there is basically always an optimal choice* which is fairly easy for a computer, but not a human, to calculate (where do I need to aim to hit the space ship), the same goes for twitch games (where do I need to aim to get a headshot), but most twitch based games are usually slow enough that a human can play them (although of course computers still rule supreme, i.e. aimbots).
*it is worth noting that the optimal choice is not necessarily the correct choice due to the light speed delay of information, and the possibility of the target moving in a non-deterministic manner, but there is really no way to compensate for those things, except for target saturation (and whether or not that is the optimal choice depends largely upon distance).
Harpoon! It was some time I didn't hear that name
. Just yesterday I was thinking about great games we had in the past, War Thunder's tank battles have reminded me of Campaign. Back in topic, I would love a really realistic space combat sim, where equipment, positioning and proper battle plan are paramount.Anyway, I think we can agree that neither Star Citizen, Elite: Dangerous or any other game currently on the market have a real realistic space combat but just different permutations of an idealised "hollywoodian" experience.
Harpoon! It was some time I didn't hear that name
Anyway, I think we can agree that neither Star Citizen, Elite: Dangerous or any other game currently on the market have a real realistic space combat but just different permutations of an idealised "hollywoodian" experience.
That reminds me, has there ever been any game, movie, comic book or other visual media (i.e. not counting sci-fi novels), that have portrait space combat realistically, that is with the space ship being controlled largely by computers and no small fighter crafts
Harpoon! It was some time I didn't hear that name
Anyway, I think we can agree that neither Star Citizen, Elite: Dangerous or any other game currently on the market have a real realistic space combat but just different permutations of an idealised "hollywoodian" experience.
I suspect real space battles would be more like War of Tanks than War Thunder - it would be more about who sees who first and range of weapons. With single shots that are highly accurate rather than your kind of machine gun close range styleee. Not to say I 'm unhappy just thinking if I was out there I would be inventing weapons that kept me out of range of my opponents. My opponents would probably be doing the same which would probably lead to engagement at greater and greater distances.
If you want to use the "world of x" games, the closest thing would probably be world of warships actually (not released yet). Also it wouldn't really be about who saw who first, since both parties would have a fairly easy time seeing each other, long before they were within weapon range. As such the only real tactical choice would be whether to engage or to run away, which would basically come down to a comparison of numbers and available firepower, weighted by how many losses you are willing to sustain (space combat should pretty much follow Lanchester's square law).
If you want to see a great try, check out Attack Vector: Tactical by Ad Astra Games
I didn't really consider board games, but that is great example (although also a fairly rare example, even among board games), coincidently Ken Burnside, one of the designers of Attack Vector, is also large contributor to the atomic rockets website, which does a nice job of going over some of the aspects of what realistic space flight entails.
The reason I didn't include boardgames, was mainly because I was wondering whether there was any examples of realistic space combat in a medium which is highly reliant upon it's visuals (board games are of course also visual but in a more static manner), mainly to see if it's actually possible to make realistic space combat visually appealing (I kinda doubt it).
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Faster Than Light
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You gotta be right. Looks like I paid £13 for a Wireframe Skin for a ship that I don't own (and by the rate I earn credits in the game, don't know when I'll be flying it, if at all).
Goes to sit ashamed in a corner.
But hey - I supported FD, and that's worth something for the kick-ass game it already is!
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Not when using a mouse. Just point and click!
Possibly not really realistic but quite different from anything else and really good are the space battles in "Legend of Galactic Heroes".
If you want realistic space combat, look to modern fighter combat. Engagements take place at beyond visual range, executed with missiles, and 90% of the time you aren't even facing your enemy. (In some engagements, fighters will fly away from the enemy to keep out of their engagement range, and when they fire their missile, the missile will double back to the target.) Most modern combat occurs with the pilot staring at the MFD, rather than the hud.
This certainly isn't twitch based. If anything, WWII era combat was twitch based. But this was tempered by the fact that you didn't only have to think of moving yourself to target an enemy. You also had to think of your aircraft as well. For example, one of the Japanese fighters (the A6M Zero, I think) was lighter, quicker, and more maneuverable than its American counterpart, giving it the edge in combat. But the American fighters had more powerful engines and were more stable in a dive. However, due to the American fighters having more powerful engines, the extra torque meant that they had a more difficult time banking counter to the engine rotation, so American pilots tended to favor banking in one direction over the other.
The point is, if you're going to make a vehicle sim, it should be about the vehicle. It should not control like it's a part of your body, because it isn't. It should feel like you are controlling the vehicle itself. Currently, SC does not feel like this. Despite all that CIG says about their ships, and all the stats they keep publishing, none of their ships has any sort of substantial feel. It might as well be an FPS. Play any of the older space-sims (Freespace, Starlancer, X-Wing/TIE Fighter) and you can immediately feel the difference.
This certainly isn't twitch based. If anything, WWII era combat was twitch based. But this was tempered by the fact that you didn't only have to think of moving yourself to target an enemy. You also had to think of your aircraft as well. For example, one of the Japanese fighters (the A6M Zero, I think) was lighter, quicker, and more maneuverable than its American counterpart, giving it the edge in combat. But the American fighters had more powerful engines and were more stable in a dive. However, due to the American fighters having more powerful engines, the extra torque meant that they had a more difficult time banking counter to the engine rotation, so American pilots tended to favor banking in one direction over the other.
The point is, if you're going to make a vehicle sim, it should be about the vehicle. It should not control like it's a part of your body, because it isn't. It should feel like you are controlling the vehicle itself. Currently, SC does not feel like this. Despite all that CIG says about their ships, and all the stats they keep publishing, none of their ships has any sort of substantial feel. It might as well be an FPS. Play any of the older space-sims (Freespace, Starlancer, X-Wing/TIE Fighter) and you can immediately feel the difference.
I think the closest thing to a realistic space combat game right now would be Jane's Fleet Command, despite it being about modern naval/air/subsurface warfare. Remove submarines though, replace top speed with acceleration and remove land, and you pretty much have the most realistic space combat sim. Of course I don't think it really would be similar to actual space combat, not more than putting Ironclads with baloons in the sky and calling it air combat, but I think it would be pretty realistic, at least.
I actually think that having a really realistic hard sci-fi space combat game would be pretty awesome. I imagine that it could be made in this way:
It's played a bit like Aurora or Fleet Command, and you control a task force of vessels, maybe with support. You have time compression. The gameplay goes from radar-hide-and-seek and signalling warfare, to tense manuevers and gambits with missiles, to the crazy moments of macross missile barrages and close-range encounters. It's a strategy game.
I actually think that having a really realistic hard sci-fi space combat game would be pretty awesome. I imagine that it could be made in this way:
It's played a bit like Aurora or Fleet Command, and you control a task force of vessels, maybe with support. You have time compression. The gameplay goes from radar-hide-and-seek and signalling warfare, to tense manuevers and gambits with missiles, to the crazy moments of macross missile barrages and close-range encounters. It's a strategy game.
I guess if you multiply all distances by 100 Eve Online would be quite close . (check list >> lock target >> press button>> next.)
. (check list >> lock target >> press button>> next.)
I've thought this was a well written article on what space combat would be like, but it's not directly relevent to SC.
I'll leave it here if anyone wants to read it (it's long and detailed):
http://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/essay-on-realistic-space-combat-i-wrote.131056/
I'll leave it here if anyone wants to read it (it's long and detailed):
http://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/essay-on-realistic-space-combat-i-wrote.131056/
No, it doesn't need a lot of skill and is most certainly NOT competitive in it's current state.
But I can see how you wouldn't agree with that statement if you haven't had experience with competitive twitch-based games.
Faster Than Light
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You gotta be right. Looks like I paid £13 for a Wireframe Skin for a ship that I don't own (and by the rate I earn credits in the game, don't know when I'll be flying it, if at all).
Goes to sit ashamed in a corner.
But hey - I supported FD, and that's worth something for the kick-ass game it already is!
The Cobra is an undying classic, and the wireframe is a homage to it's 1984 roots. Now you have something cool to work for once the game goes properly live. It's the cheapest "big ship" anyway, so you'll have it before too long.
Counter Strike is also just point and click
Counter Strike isn't trying to be a spaceship dogfighting game.
@RC-Plorer - Just read the Erin Roberts piece.
I found the following statement rather unfortunate and presumably a misquote.
Joseph: So will there the FPS mechanics be used in Squadron 42 or will it purely be dogfighting?
Erin: Oh no, the way to look at Squadron 42 and Star Citizen on a whole, it is basically an FPS game where you’ll use vehicles. So you’ll be in first person all the time, but you can use third person.
I found the following statement rather unfortunate and presumably a misquote.
Joseph: So will there the FPS mechanics be used in Squadron 42 or will it purely be dogfighting?
Erin: Oh no, the way to look at Squadron 42 and Star Citizen on a whole, it is basically an FPS game where you’ll use vehicles. So you’ll be in first person all the time, but you can use third person.
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