- Joined
- Jun 16, 2011
- Messages
- 3,586
- Reaction score
- 1
- Points
- 61
- Location
- Huntsville, AL
- Preferred Pronouns
- He/Him
And I certainly, certainly don't see the need to make it more World-of-Warcraft like. Orbiter...is a different kind of fun. It's more...sophisticated somehow.
You seem to be misunderstanding the OP's request. By "RPG", he doesn't mean some fantasy MMO, or a repetitive level-fest with arbitrary rewards. Think more along the lines of Falcon 4.0, or Il-2, with their pilot career modes. It doesn't soften or cheapen the simulation at all, but it gives the user a sort of persistent avatar, or in Orbiter's case, crew to "inhabit".
I'm thinking more about a teacher that wants to install Orbiter on a school computer, which IMHO is quite legitimate. But schools usually have a "no game" policy. So now the distinction isn't arbitrary. The administration does a google search for Orbiter and turns up Star Trek, "resource management" schemes, etc. Are they going to think that Orbiter is a game, or a simulation?
The website itself has a wealth of information about what exactly Orbiter is, and it makes it abundantly clear that it is not a "game". Orbiter can be a fantastic tool to educate both students and laymen about orbital mechanics and the intricacies of spaceflight, but it is also a sandbox with a vibrant community who create and use addons of their choosing, and by extension give a near constant breath of fresh air to Orbiter itself. As great as Orbiter is as a standalone, how many people would continue to use Orbiter on a regular basis for years, without addons? I think it is currently, and will continue to be fine as a combination of both an educational tool, and a recreational sandbox. There's no need to sacrifice one for the other.