Need ideas for Space Orbinomics II

[ar81]

For those who do not remember Space Orbinomics, it was an external software I made, a game, where you could run
a charter/cargo vessel using a Delta Glider III or a Shuttle A.  It opened Orbiter when it was time to fly and it created
a scenario so you fly.  So basically it was a concept to add economics to Orbiter.

Space Orbinomics was the most messy piece of code I have ever made (for programmers), for it was my first software
in my transition from DOS programming to Windows programming.  So it was a great lesson to me as I discovered
what was good and bad, and it helped me to work on other apps I have made.

Space Orbinomics was somehow limited, not only by DGIII and SH-A capabilities, but also by my programming skills back then.  It implemented the gaming rules created by Badream.

Now I came to the idea of revamping the concept.
I think I am finally capable of remaking it.
I finally came to an idea for a more decent user interfase.

What I need to know is the following.
You own a DGIV. What kind of missions, situations or "stories" could be played with a DGIV.
Two are obvious from the first Space Orbinomics:
-Transport cargo from here to there
-Transport passengers from here to there

I need to develop this game as flexible as possible to let some room for interesting situations.
But to do that I need input from you, to figure out how am I going to be dealing with it.

Any ideas?



Post Edited ( 02-08-08 15:19 )

[MJR]

You could transport cargo from Europe to Cape Canaveral, then load it to another vessel and launch it to the
ISS.

[ar81]

Why not to launch from Europe to ISS directly?
In either case, it is the previous "transport cargo from here to there" that was already implemented in Space Orbinomics.  

Any non conventional, creative, "out of the box" idea?



Post Edited ( 02-08-08 15:20 )

[EtherDragon]

Firstly, I really think you should make this an MFD within orbiter - rather than a seperate application. Although, your
old orbinomics was pretty good at lunching orbiter...

Since you are using the DG4 you have lots of wicked awesome things you can do regarding the Ummu and Cargo bay.

Delivery missions have some variety:
Move passengers (in the form of UMMUs) to another base or station.
Move Cargo Containers to a base, station or specified orbit.
-To Base = simple cargo delivery mission
-To Station = simple cargo delivery mission
-To Orbit = Satelite deployment mission

Other Mission ideas for Orbinomics:
Survey mission: Just fly to a destination - no cargo or passengers needed. -These could be the easiest entry level
missions. "Go survey X,Y location on the moon"
Rescue mission: (Passenger mission in disguise) Go to ship X and deliver the crew to station Y.
Repair mission: Go to an orbiting satelite and EVA to it.

[Urwumpe]

First, I would prefer an economics module working as custom function among Orbiter (like the scenario editor). Its just no
flight critical item, so does not need a MFD and an external application is always hard to reach when you operating in full
screen mode.

Second: What working towards a plot generator? Create countries, agencies and companies, and let them not only generate
cargo, but also generate a history and quests. Include random special events. For example a mining accident on mars. You have
to haul large amounts of mining equipment with a Shuttle-A to the mars, as well a few smaller DG-IV containers being around
with medical equipment, all requiring to arrive on mars in less than 150 days, as the stations on Mars are suddenly short on
supplies. But all cargo also for a much higher price as usually.

Now the accident also has an impact on the economy: Because of the lack of mined special minerals from space (for example
He3), the other mines start to increase their production rates, producing more cargo at higher values as well as buying more
machines from earth...

which again has an impact on the machine building companies on earth...

[ar81]

What you describe is closer to Artlav's sdvig addon model than to Space Orbinomics model.
Artlav's addon would allow you to create a script, but it is still work in progress.
I made a tutorial (which only he has) about a previous version of this addon, but since it changed a lot, the tutorial
might not be valid any longer in the specific aspects of syntax and so.

So Artlav probably would be working on that and releasing when it is about to be somehow finished.  And it is then
when I would updat the tutorial to adapt it to the new syntax and commands.

sdvig is more like a programming language to create space adventures.
And it belongs to the major leagues of programming.

However the idea remains intriguing for a not so experienced programmer like me.
I will see what I can do and you bet I will try to do my best to please you people.
It may start a bit simpler, but I will try to see how to model the code, so it could accept such cool suggestions.  Just keep having the ideas flowing...



Post Edited ( 02-08-08 23:02 )

[Urwumpe]

Read about rogue like games.... they look ugly as a car crash, but have true beauty in the game engine powering it. And they
are rarely done by professional coders- the coders become professional during the development.

Dwarf fortress for example is a rogue-like strategy game, which has a very complex modeling of the geology underground.

[ar81]

When I first made Space Orbinomics, it was just a test on how to use VB controls.
Originally it was planned to be smaller, but as it grew up it gained more and more features.

I was a bit annoyed by the fact that I had to use many forms.  Having those many forms not only made things not so
smotth for gamers, but also it made things complex for me as programmer.

This time I wanted those "unfeatures" to be gone.

So the coding already started.  It may take long because there are many things to do, and I am trying to make it as
eye candy as possible.  I also changed the approach to handle entities like planets, people and moons, so internally it
is handled similar to Suface Base Wizard.

I also want to make time passing code (when you advance one day or many) to be more efficient.  Hope I can do it.
But what seems very challenging is to dig into scenarios to check and verify certain conditions.  Also, the addition
of "missions", and not just freight/charter flights, seems to be somehow challenging.

Adding more complex behaviors like the ones you describe are a good challenge.

Right now I am focused on coding the existing features of game from scratch, since it was poorly coded as it was
before.  Now what I have coded uses less code and it is a bit more optimized.

What led me to remake it was that having worked for a bank gives you the insight of financial reality: banks never
lose, so at most you may try to lose as less as possible when making business with a bank.

[Urwumpe]

ar81 a écrit:
What led me to remake it was that having worked for a bank gives you the insight of financial reality: banks never
lose, so at most you may try to lose as less as possible when making business with a bank.

"What is the burgling of a bank to the founding of a bank?" (Bertholt Brecht)



(But I like his line from the "Life of Galileo" more: "The world of knowledge takes a crazy turn|When teachers themselves are
taught to learn.")

[ar81]

To the Galileo quote I would add that "A teacher who does not learn new things is more concerned about pretending
to know it all, instead of knowing it all".  

Learn, learn, knowledge, knowledge, yummy, yummy!!

[ar81]

Wanna be inspired?
This is my current progress, those are only preliminary previews of my current development.
Screens may change at any moment.
It will require 1024x768 at least.

Splash screen


Navigation computer


Credits section




Post Edited ( 02-11-08 15:56 )

[EtherDragon]

One of the benefits of doing Orbinomics as either an MFD or Custom Function (like scenario editor) is that it can watch
your status periodically and reward you right when you meet the required condition.

For instance - rather than leaving orbiter and saying "I landed at Olympus" in an external application - a custom
function would know right when you've landed at olympus and give you feedback right then.

In software design, you want your user's actions to give imediate feedback - and the user's actions should be as
simple as possible.

In the case of completing a mission - the user's task should be to land their ship. With an external application - the
user's task is to land the ship, then exit orbiter, then report that they have landed.

Also, with a custom function, you would immediately know if the pilot crashed - and could present a nice "game over" function... kind of like what AMSO does if you bite it. =P

All that said - what you have going so far looks pretty sweet. Can't wait to try it out for you.



Post Edited ( 02-14-08 01:31 )

[ar81]

Well, indeed the feature that I have planned is that you report accidents when you want to trigger a failure
intentionally, just to see how your handle things, or to report damage if you use let's say a Shuttle A that has no
damage, but if you crash landed your DGIV vessel, my program will know when you report arrival at destination.

At the very beginning only DGIV will be supported.

The problem I have to do that is that what I master a bit is Visual Basic and it is not compatible with Orbiter, so it is
an external app.  The pros of having an external app is that I would not suffer too many compatibility issues, unless
scenario syntax is changed by Dan or Martin.

Space Orbinomics is basically an automated board game where you play with Orbiter.
This was the original idea of Badream and it keeps being like that, bit with some automation.

However I have in mind to add some scenario data extraction which is a bit challenging to me at this point (for I have
not yet implemented it).

If you arrive at the wrong destination, I intend to make the program to know it.
If you met an objective I intend to make the program to detect it when you report arrival.
But some other mission objectives are not linked to landing or docking, so you basically would ask the program to
update the current status of your objectives when you exit Orbiter and press the objectives button.

The refuelling request will basically add ships to your scenario at the departire and destination, so you can refuel.  Of
course, you need to pilot those rescue craft.

Later in the manual I would explain a bit more, if I get to have it implemented.

There will be a time when I learn C++ and get a good compiler to practice C++ to all the extent, but in the meantime I
need to do things in VB for this is what I know.  Same would have happened to me if I knew Delphi or Java or
anything else.

And I can tell you that I really appreciate your feedback.

[ar81]

Indeed I think that declaring what you do, in an external app is really Ok.
If you take off, you specify your destination in your flight plan.
If you request a rescue, you would be using the radio.
If you land, you basically acknowledge landing and groundoff taxiing.
So this is what you do when you press these buttons in Space Orbinomics after playing Orbiter.
In Orbiter there is no ATC chatter, no log of what you have done or where you were.
Therefore you must do it in this external application.

[Urwumpe]

ar81 a écrit:
In Orbiter there is no ATC chatter, no log of what you have done or where you were.
Therefore you must do it in this external application.

Say "Not yet, comrades, not yet".

All you miss can be done in Orbiter, ATC chatter could even be made to work in multiplayer games. The question is just, what
justifies it. Until we have no good multiplayer client, and VSAs playing Kindergarten, there will be no demand for a general
ATC client.

For example, for the Shuttle, we current think about using radio communications with LCC and MCC to have effects in game.  It
would be a special solution for the Shuttle, but technically, its pretty possible, so you can assume its also possible to
make a generic ATC system for Orbiter based on the same ideas.

[ar81]

Hmmm, I have an idea of how to get rid of the "arrive" or "objective achieved" button, I will have to analyze how
feasible this idea is.  Anyway I will leave them so people can do it manually if they want.

[Urwumpe]

ar81 a écrit:
Hmmm, I have an idea of how to get rid of the "arrive" or "objective achieved" button, I will have to
analyze how
feasible this idea is.  Anyway I will leave them so people can do it manually if they want.

You should also read about the LUA support in the next Orbiter Version. Its unlikely it will not be included and could make
scripted events like "Landed on pad" simpler to include.

Well, also about your programming language problems... ever thought about switching to Visual Studio 2008 Express?

[ar81]

Where do I get it?
Where do I learn about it?

I tried to move my apps to VB2005 and it ended up having no support for arrays of controls, so I dropped the idea.
I could not export my code.

[Urwumpe]

Getting it is simple: Download it for free from Microsoft. You could even download a 3.2-GB DVD image, if you want the full
pack including a 2008 express version of VB and lots of documentation and have too much time.

http://www.microsoft.com/express/vc/

[ar81]

Time is something I lack.
To make my stuff, I usually steal hours from my sleep.
I tried VB2005 and I found that VB5 was more usable, and easy to understand.

Yesterday I started to work on the setup/settings program, where you specify Orbiter directory, and now it detects if the drive you selected is removable media, or if you have no dot as decimal symbol.

It also will be using directX8 sound.  Setup utility will help you to select sound device...



Post Edited ( 02-15-08 14:27 )

[g2g591]

a nice slim IDE (free too) - KATE (ok, its more of a text editor with syntax highlighting (stable windows version will be
released in about July, but there are unstable (not very) snapshots available) , easy to use ( but command line) c (or c++)
compiler - gcc (aka mingw if you want a windows version) .

[ar81]

I would be interested in a C++ compiler, for Crimson editor has already ye syntax highlighting.
Once I had that, I should start to learn C++ and start to make some simple things as exercise to gain the skills to
make more complex stuff.  In the meantime I am working in VB5.

This Space Orbinomics II is pushing all I have learned in past tools and apps, to the very limit.
The earlier version was simpler and required less features, less knowledge.
Right now I am working on the earlier features, but having design cosiderations that leave the room open to the new
features I want to implement.  The sole fact of having delivery of a sat, for example, makes the design to change.  
Seizing all the DGIV features seems a challenge.

[James.Denholm]

On the side of the actual program interface (if you decide to go with the external program option), can I just suggest
a compact, non-flashy, no-frills user interface? Or at least a mode or something allowing that? Not everyone likes
programs that take up ten times the amount of screen space they need to display something. The senario editor is a
good example of what I am suggesting for Space Orbinomics 2. Compact, but not to much so. Just a personal opinion.

[ar81]

So you do not want full screen?

I was thinking about full screen because of the immersion factor.
And indeed I was thinking of a flashy user interfase that would give you the feeling of playing a commercial game, not
just an enhanced scenario editor.

Using an external app, like a scenario editor is more like a tool, not really a game.
Making like a game, makes the program to be part of the experience.

If all the features end up as expected, I think that you may love the "flashy user interfase".
It may not be boring at all...

Considering my current progress, the feature you suggest would involve to rework it a bit.  I might add it to the list,
but last in the queue, because one of the problems I had was with the precise size of user interfase to implement all
the features and probably new ones.

What is certain is that you will not have multiple windows like in the previous version.  It not only caused user to be
bothered, but also it made the coding messy.

The good side about this new version is that it is actually being subject to a design process, before implementing.
In the previous version I was coding along the way.  How could anyone be so amateurish?
Well, I am a hobbyist programmer...



Post Edited ( 02-21-08 16:30 )

[James.Denholm]

Good point, the non-full-screen idea would detract from the "immersion" factor... scratch the idea if you want.