Gameplay variety

[misha.physics]

Ideas for variety of gameplay and make it more intense:

Add more space stations and place them at a small distance for short vessel flights between stations in real time.

Astronaut spacewalk for ship and station repair/building. Good spacesuit interface. Flexible cable connecting the astronaut to the ship/station. Astronaut flights between nearby ships and stations.

Astronaut walks on the ground, space base maintenance.

Free astronaut movement/walk inside stations (and big ships) with internal working 3D cockpit, so we just could go to the station panel and run some command, check and research something, send data to Earth. Moving with both gravity on and off at the station.

More ships with complex systems for manual launch and setup.

More controllable rovers on celestial bodies surfaces.

Flights and transfers (by rovers) between nearby land bases.

Something like the "Mission Control Center". Automatic (unmanned) ships, satellites, rovers.

UPDATED

 

[nbcfrosty]

I am working on something to have more diverse gameplay/goals/missions. There's a lot to do in Orbiter, but you face the empty canvas problem. I am basically using this:

Project - Orbiter Interactive Scenarios

Hello all. I thought it'd be fun if Orbiter had more interactive content. Like replays, but ones where you can actually do the flying. Where there is more of a directed, progressive, game like feel. I have a little plugin missions.dll that reads JSON files like this: { "mission_title"...

www.orbiter-forum.com

Along with an LLM to dynamically produce missions/storyline/playing content. Goal is to entwine the Orbiter gameplay loop of launching, doing orbital operations, transfers, etc with an engaging and funny storyline.

 

[N_Molson]

Don't forget Orbiter 2016 allows to script 'missions', there are a few examples in the basic install package. I think those are LUA scripts, so you don't need a compiler. Notepad++ is more than enough. Sadly it never took off (so to speak).

These are the 'Challenges' you have in the 'Scenario' folder. Note you have a line like in the .scn file : 'Script challenges/challenge2' (tells the scenario to run a script).

And then in the 'Scripts' folder you have a 'Challenges' folder with the LUA scripts themselves.

 

[Boxx]

IMO, crew survivability is a must that is still missing in Orbiter: 1) accelerations / shocks / weightlessness, 2) air, 3) water, 4) food... at least these 4 criteria should be implemented.

(personnaly working on it, with a LifeMFD addon)

 

[Urwumpe]

Something like the "Mission Control Center". Automatic (unmanned) ships, satellites, rovers.

I quite like the latter one, the first person perspective without time delay makes Orbiter a lot easier than the real thing. Add incomplete telemetry and hidden variables and you can never be sure if your spacecraft will achieve its mission.

I considered making the old Ranger probe family with a very early mission control, I lack good pictures of JPLs mission control at that era or better: Meshes

 

[N_Molson]

I lack good pictures of JPLs mission control at that era or better: Meshese

That's funny, because that's something that's been around in my mind for years. But I was thinking it is going to look funny unless we can have mission controllers that at not marble statues, scratch their heads, leave their seat when their shift is over, that kind of things.

 

[Urwumpe]

That's funny, because that's something that's been around in my mind for years. But I was thinking it is going to look funny unless we can have mission controllers that at not marble statues, scratch their heads, leave their seat when their shift is over, that kind of things.

well, first of all, it would be just about handling the mission and others to provide the data or execute the commands, but you are right, a completely empty SFOF would be like a JPL mission without peanuts.

In theory, the task could also be done by just a flat 2D panel "workplace", but thats of course a different player perspective then, more like almost flying first person again.

Also, and that was the next stage there: If you have a JPL SFOF once, you could use it for more and more complex missions....

 

[Gondos]

Personnally I'm more into the unmanned robotic probes from JPL's "golden era" than in the manned programs so having something like that would be a nice start.
However, depending on the level of detail you want, this could prove quite challenging. Pre mariner 6 missions were usually controlled by sending direct commands to the spacecraft to back up hardwired event activated by an onboard sequencer. I doubt the commands were sent by the press of a button on some console, more likely through a DSN computer somewhere at Goldstone which was fed punched tapes.
I guess most panels in SFOF would be for telemetry readouts, not necessarily the most entertaining thing for most people.
Now, if you simulate spacecraft failures that need to be investigated/worked around then it would be quite necessary.
For Mariner 6+ missions, there's a programmable computer to take into account, could be fun to mess with if you're into the Zachtronics kind of games ;-)

Speaking of which, does anyone has access to a copy of the JBIS vol 29 no 4 from april 1976? There is one for sell online but the 51$ shipping fee is a bit much as I'm not even sure about the content... I'm interested in the "Mariner 10 inflight utilisation" part.

 

[Urwumpe]

Well, I thought about giving the player just the space flight operations director role or SFOD, which is the person who has to last word and accountability of all steps and actions in the SFOF. So, no watching of telemetry displays until your eyes bleed, but more distributing the work. That way, the workload of the player could be manageable and it would be more about reacting to deviations from the plan. For example, they still had a fairly inaccurate measure of Earths mass, which influenced the early Rangers and Mariner 1s trajectory stronger than today. There is actually a plot how NASA refined the value and used more correct values for flight planning.

With failures, this could especially interesting then, since you would need to make the right decisions to get as much mission as possible done with a quickly degrading spacecraft.

 

[Gondos]

Yeah contrary to real life, there's more fun when there are problems to solve. Look at the story of Mariner 10, they had trouble from the get go but managed to nurse the craft till the 3rd mercury encounter. I bet the guys back then would have prefered a flawless run but they really outdid themselves on that one. Not every mission can go as smoothly as Surveyor I.
One technical note : if you want to simulate remote cameras, there is a limitation with the current custom cameras in that the ship must not be too far from your current position (I guess because of the way tile loading works). So if your SFOF is on earth, you won't be able to "take pictures" from the moon surface.

 

[Urwumpe]

Yeah contrary to real life, there's more fun when there are problems to solve. Look at the story of Mariner 10, they had trouble from the get go but managed to nurse the craft till the 3rd mercury encounter. I bet the guys back then would have prefered a flawless run but they really outdid themselves on that one. Not every mission can go as smoothly as Surveyor I.

Yeah, the Surveyor missions are a different kind of beast there, thats when JPL finally knew how to operate probes, while Ranger and the early Mariner were still a lot of trail and error. Also the control was different, Ranger still needed the commands to be send at the right time, while Surveyor mostly knew how to fly its missions and only needed timing and velocity change updates to get to the moon. Of course, surface operations needed teleoperation again.

And well, a real life without problems is a problem, too.

Also, for doing the early JPL probes, maybe a Atlas family add-on should be made or upgraded.

One technical note : if you want to simulate remote cameras, there is a limitation with the current custom cameras in that the ship must not be too far from your current position (I guess because of the way tile loading works). So if your SFOF is on earth, you won't be able to "take pictures" from the moon surface.

Thats of course a problem that needs solving.

BUT: We could of course always move the inside of the JPL on the moon then.

 

[misha.physics]

I suppose it would be nice and must be possible to create script missions with checkpoints. (Maybe something like missions (contracts) in KSP.) And it would also be nice to have a mission editor (also something like in KSP).

 

[Urwumpe]

I suppose it would be nice and must be possible to create script missions with checkpoints. (Maybe something like missions (contracts) in KSP.) And it would also be nice to have a mission editor (also something like in KSP).

Should be possible already. Better if the vessel supports Lua itself. If we could give UACS a standard Lua binding for all vessels, it would be even easier to inspect vessels to contain certain cargo or astronauts.

Damn, that could turn into a nice topic for a small research paper...

 

[N_Molson]

I suppose it would be nice and must be possible to create script missions with checkpoints. (Maybe something like missions (contracts) in KSP.) And it would also be nice to have a mission editor (also something like in KSP).

As said above, all the tools needed are there. There are two ways to do it :

1. Through a good old fashioned .dll module coded and compiled in C++.
2. Through a LUA script, which doesn't require a compiler, only a text editor. Start with printing on the screen a 'Hello World!' message, then try (always 'step-by-step') more complex (and interesting) things as you get more confident.

 

[Urwumpe]

Maybe also an idea for Orbiter:

NASA Exhibit Puts Visitors in Test Conductor Seat - NASA

NASA’s Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, is helping the Artemis Generation learn how to power space dreams with an interactive exhibit at

www.nasa.gov