datter
03-13-2008, 11:33 AM
ok, here's a thought I had for a game/sim awhile ago. I've long since passed the point of contemplating the likelyhood of making this myself in any way, shape or form so here it is as a free range idea. The basic thought is a sandbox/building/flight sim combination. I know what you're thinking, they'll line up in droves for that but wait it gets even more niche-elitist.
The idea is to give the player a space in which to build and test aircraft of their own designs, both offline and online in a way that's more like character creator we've seen in the Spore vids than anything else.
Perhaps there's different levels of entry such that there might be a "Free Build" mode which give you access to all the bits and pieces for making an airplane. A huge assortment of wings, bodies, tails, cockpits, engines etc all of which have a certain weight cost to them as well as different properties that would add or take away from a proposed airframe. The "sim" aspect would need to tally the proper weight distribution, thrust available, wing lift etc in real time so that if a real world version of a players aircraft would be tail heavy and unstable, it would also be so within the sim. So say I take bits and pieces to make a Cessna type aircraft, but the wing I've chosen just doesn't generate enough lift. Perhaps there's an option for an in-game helper to teach you this stuff, but better yet you find out when you do the flight testing, which is the next bit.
So you've gone through the build process and created your very own airplane from the initial design and construction (picking and attaching the parts together... to the level of should the wings be farther forward or farther aft etc) and in through a cosmetic phase where you can paint your aircraft (Forza style). At that point, according to everything you've gleaned from flight theory in game (via helpers or other in-game info) you decide your aircraft should fly rather nicely. Next comes the flight testing where you leave build mode and find yourself on the runway in the aircraft you've developed. Things now switch to a more true flight sim aspect, requiring a joystick (preferrably) and the ability to fly your plane... or not, depending on how well it was designed. Maybe the engine isn't powerful enough? Maybe the wings don't generate enough lift? You'll find out any problems with the airplane, by actually flying it and again maybe via in-game helpers hinting at what the issues might be as you test it out. Ideally the sim would recreate proper wing forces and lift (sort of like X-Plane does) so that it's a literal real world simulation. Maybe the plane flies pretty well, but the wings aren't strong enough to hold during a loop causing a structural failure. You can reset to the ground at any point and go back to the hangar to modify and alter your aircraft and tweak it to your standards in any way you like. It's not unlike building a paper airplane, but you're using real world airplane pieces and building/testing a proper airplane you can get into and fly via the game.
So with all this we've given players the ability to design, test and fly their own aircraft based on real world physics and aerodynamics. Beyond that you can factor in other things to make it a bit more interesting. How about different weather schemes so you could test your plane in varying conditions? A map maker so you could design your own airport what have you? Maybe along with engines, wings and whatnot there's also an assortment of guns and bombs to be had so you could build yourself a fighter of some kind. An online component so you could take this fighter plane you built and connect to a friend for some dogfighting? How about a central server somewhere that anyone could connect to with their homemade airplanes to show them off and fly around with their friends. Combat servers, free flight servers, relaxed mode servers. A server might even have tasks such as building a basic fighter airplane with a given set of pieces in 15 min, followed by a multiplayer dogfight to see whose design holds up. This "task" idea can carry back into the single player as well.
"Free build" is where you can just get in and create something in a very "Garry's Mod", no-reprecussions kind of way. Just building airplanes and testing/flying them for the fun of it. Another "mode" might be a task, or challenge sort of situation where all the airplane parts available are assigned a real world dollar value, and the player is given a certain amount of cash. A challenge might be to "Using less than $10,000... create a biplane that can carry a single 250lb bomb from point A to point B and destroy the target" The player would then have a specific task to work towards, and once complete the airplane they built would get added to their hangar for later flying, or edits.
Further you could even get into full "Dynasty" mode where you start as a young entrepreneur with a given amount of task and have to build aircraft and advance through the years to build your howard Hughes-esque aviation empire... minus the insanity driven reclusiveness towards the end.
I realize that's a lot of info, and it might be a monster of a game to build for what might be a niche market... but there it it regardless. I personally would play it.
Thoughts?
The idea is to give the player a space in which to build and test aircraft of their own designs, both offline and online in a way that's more like character creator we've seen in the Spore vids than anything else.
Perhaps there's different levels of entry such that there might be a "Free Build" mode which give you access to all the bits and pieces for making an airplane. A huge assortment of wings, bodies, tails, cockpits, engines etc all of which have a certain weight cost to them as well as different properties that would add or take away from a proposed airframe. The "sim" aspect would need to tally the proper weight distribution, thrust available, wing lift etc in real time so that if a real world version of a players aircraft would be tail heavy and unstable, it would also be so within the sim. So say I take bits and pieces to make a Cessna type aircraft, but the wing I've chosen just doesn't generate enough lift. Perhaps there's an option for an in-game helper to teach you this stuff, but better yet you find out when you do the flight testing, which is the next bit.
So you've gone through the build process and created your very own airplane from the initial design and construction (picking and attaching the parts together... to the level of should the wings be farther forward or farther aft etc) and in through a cosmetic phase where you can paint your aircraft (Forza style). At that point, according to everything you've gleaned from flight theory in game (via helpers or other in-game info) you decide your aircraft should fly rather nicely. Next comes the flight testing where you leave build mode and find yourself on the runway in the aircraft you've developed. Things now switch to a more true flight sim aspect, requiring a joystick (preferrably) and the ability to fly your plane... or not, depending on how well it was designed. Maybe the engine isn't powerful enough? Maybe the wings don't generate enough lift? You'll find out any problems with the airplane, by actually flying it and again maybe via in-game helpers hinting at what the issues might be as you test it out. Ideally the sim would recreate proper wing forces and lift (sort of like X-Plane does) so that it's a literal real world simulation. Maybe the plane flies pretty well, but the wings aren't strong enough to hold during a loop causing a structural failure. You can reset to the ground at any point and go back to the hangar to modify and alter your aircraft and tweak it to your standards in any way you like. It's not unlike building a paper airplane, but you're using real world airplane pieces and building/testing a proper airplane you can get into and fly via the game.
So with all this we've given players the ability to design, test and fly their own aircraft based on real world physics and aerodynamics. Beyond that you can factor in other things to make it a bit more interesting. How about different weather schemes so you could test your plane in varying conditions? A map maker so you could design your own airport what have you? Maybe along with engines, wings and whatnot there's also an assortment of guns and bombs to be had so you could build yourself a fighter of some kind. An online component so you could take this fighter plane you built and connect to a friend for some dogfighting? How about a central server somewhere that anyone could connect to with their homemade airplanes to show them off and fly around with their friends. Combat servers, free flight servers, relaxed mode servers. A server might even have tasks such as building a basic fighter airplane with a given set of pieces in 15 min, followed by a multiplayer dogfight to see whose design holds up. This "task" idea can carry back into the single player as well.
"Free build" is where you can just get in and create something in a very "Garry's Mod", no-reprecussions kind of way. Just building airplanes and testing/flying them for the fun of it. Another "mode" might be a task, or challenge sort of situation where all the airplane parts available are assigned a real world dollar value, and the player is given a certain amount of cash. A challenge might be to "Using less than $10,000... create a biplane that can carry a single 250lb bomb from point A to point B and destroy the target" The player would then have a specific task to work towards, and once complete the airplane they built would get added to their hangar for later flying, or edits.
Further you could even get into full "Dynasty" mode where you start as a young entrepreneur with a given amount of task and have to build aircraft and advance through the years to build your howard Hughes-esque aviation empire... minus the insanity driven reclusiveness towards the end.
I realize that's a lot of info, and it might be a monster of a game to build for what might be a niche market... but there it it regardless. I personally would play it.
Thoughts?