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Author Topic: Alpha 19 Pros & Flaws  (Read 3403 times)

Gregory

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Alpha 19 Pros & Flaws
« on: November 20, 2016, 01:36:42 AM »
Alpha 19 is a Major improvement in US/US2.

With more models, along with better collisions and fragmentation, like tidal fragmentation.

Pros:
More models.
There's an appearance tab where you can change the colors of the celestial bodies.

Tidal Fragmentation is implemented.

Fragments have different appearances based on mass, temperature and consistency.

Flaws:
The atmospheres are still 10x too tall on the planets, Obviously if Earth were 2.54 cm in radius, the atmosphere would only be as thick as a coat of paint (excluding the Ozone layer). Plus look at the atmospheres in Space Engine or Celestia along with NASA images.

The textures are still the same, they haven't upgraded especially for the gas giants and its moons or dwarf planets (besides Pluto).

There is still no oblateness yet.

There's still no tidal bulge, yet if you let something like a Black Hole get near a star, that star would bulge significantly, but that's still not implemented yet.

Also the "sphere" resolutions haven't improved, they certainly need some improvement.
And the Pool Balls haven't had their "sphere" resolution upgraded either.
I hope you guys remembered that.

Yet it would also be good if we got an actual Death Star model along with Star Destroyers and Tie Fighters + The Millennium falcon, or the USS Enterprise.

I hope you take your time, as this is still Alpha, but it might take a lifetime to implement each thing one at a time.

Alpha 19 is great, but like always, things should keep getting better.

I hope for more in the future.
« Last Edit: November 20, 2016, 05:48:50 AM by Gregory »

Angel Armageddon

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Re: Alpha 19 Pros & Flaws
« Reply #1 on: November 20, 2016, 08:00:19 PM »
Bro.
Its not 2051.
This is 2016.
The devs can only do so much.
They deserve a break.
We don't need more star wars junk either.

acvyse

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Re: Alpha 19 Pros & Flaws
« Reply #2 on: November 21, 2016, 10:29:34 AM »
Bro.
Its not 2051.
This is 2016.
The devs can only do so much.
They deserve a break.
We don't need more star wars junk either.

I still don't think most people understand this is a simulation...a learning tool...a model not a game.

Cryo

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Re: Alpha 19 Pros & Flaws
« Reply #3 on: November 21, 2016, 02:19:50 PM »
Bro.
Its not 2051.
This is 2016.
The devs can only do so much.
They deserve a break.
We don't need more star wars junk either.
What do you mean by, "Starwars junk". Did I miss a feature or something?

tesco

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Re: Alpha 19 Pros & Flaws
« Reply #4 on: November 23, 2016, 01:03:15 AM »
Bro.
Its not 2051.
This is 2016.
The devs can only do so much.
They deserve a break.
We don't need more star wars junk either.

I agree with most of your points on other topics. But ur a bit harsh here. You didn't need to say the last sentence.
Yes i am not a star wars fan either but i mean a death star which would be roughly 150km in diameter would be an interesting thing to collide into a planet as an alternative to some asteroids. I don't see a huge problem with it i don't understand why you seem so agitated
« Last Edit: December 02, 2016, 11:00:25 AM by tesco »

Only2ndplace

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Re: Alpha 19 Pros & Flaws
« Reply #5 on: December 01, 2016, 02:25:57 PM »
There is still no oblateness yet.

There's still no tidal bulge, yet if you let something like a Black Hole get near a star, that star would bulge significantly, but that's still not implemented yet.

The oblatness due to rotation of most celestial bodies is pretty much zero (for example 0.3 % of the radius for Earth) so you would only really notice it on insanely fast spinning objects like pulsars (though I don't know if it would be visible even then, with how strong the gravitational force is, that's holding them together).

Things like deformation due to gravitational effects would need smooth particle hydrodynamics, which are still planned for the far future (as far as I know?).

I guess the atmosphere is laid on a bit thick, but I don't see that as that much of a problem. If anything it helps visbility and it's only really visible from close distances.

I do agree, that higher resolution images would be very cool, but then there would also need to be higher resolution shockwaves, impacts, etc. which brings a lot of other problems and probably drops performance.