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Tank handling/controls (tech demo)

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MentalFS's picture
21. July 2009 - 13:32 — MentalFS

Hi,

one of the main purposes of the tech demo is to get a feeling for handling/controls of the tank. This does not only mean the button mapping, more important is how the tank moves and behaves.

We tried our best to get a useful result, but how do you think? What should be tweaked, what is good, what is wrong?

6. November 2009 - 2:32 — bosta (not verified)
bosta's picture

Yap Tank weight seems too

Yap Tank weight seems too small for me, as it fly and rotate like empty barrel.

28. July 2009 - 16:15 — 115Volt
115Volt's picture

i still like the idea of

  1. i still like the idea of simulating real tracks in box2d very much unfortunatly i haven't managed to yet, it's kind of difficult to calculate the startpositions and angles of the different track pieces. I thing it's worth a test if the performance ist so bad

  2. we made the wheels so heavy to keep the center of mass as low as possible to minimize tank flipping (as mentioned in the other topic) at the moment the center wheels are more heavy then the outer ones, that could leed to this behavior.

  3. I understand it too, it collides with the input concept of tankyou. we have commands that are executed (startet) and ended at a well defined point in time, we need this to transfer it over the network. I can't think of a way to combine the systems but i'll think it over.

26. July 2009 - 22:10 — MentalFS
MentalFS's picture

Concerning the graphics, we

  1. Concerning the graphics, we are going to replace the current one (that's actually some kindo debug view) with an animated sprite that won't show wheels, but tracks. So the wheels would only exist logic-wise.

    I'm afraid that if we add real tracks (that would mean a chain of jointed rectangles), it would cost too much performance. We want to be able to display, let's say, over a dozen of tanks a time. And sometimes, depending on the game mode, all of them could be moving. I also saw a demo in Flash with Box2D with a real track chain, but it can happen that the tank loses the track and it then lays around in the level somewhere.

    That would add up to the oddities that already happen with wheels (getting cought in land). I just hope we get that one solved.

  2. That could be because we made the wheels/tracks extraordinally heavy in comparison to the hull of the tank. I think we'll tweak that a bit and make the hull heavier and see if it feels more "tank-like".

  3. I think I understand what you mean. Presing both keys should equal out each outer, and releasing one should then make the tank move again. I think that is a good suggestion.

26. July 2009 - 20:51 — kusoksna
kusoksna's picture

Controls are not ok :) If you

Controls are not ok :) If you press A then D, tank will go right. When you release D tank will stop. Same for other buttons.

I prefer it in a way that if you release D, then tank will go left (as you still press A). Idea is that instead of adding acceleration on button press, you create flags, and change them according to pressed buttons. E.g. mooving left and right.

  directionX = 0;
  if(input.isKeyDown(Input.KEY_A)){
    directionX--;
  }
  if(input.isKeyDown(Input.KEY_D)){
    directionX++;
  }
//so direction could be only -1,0 or 1
  ...
  acceleration = acceleration*directionX; //probably rotation here in tank case

PS: I could explain better if required.

26. July 2009 - 15:23 — kusoksna
kusoksna's picture

Wheels. i don't know engine

  1. Wheels. i don't know engine (jbox) yet, but wheels alone not suit here. I think it should be like in real tank. I'm going to make some tests, but it will take week or so to learn jbox.
  2. Tank weight seems too small for me, as it fly and rotate like empty barrel.
  3. Controls are ok.