[airstrike] ground collisions

[Ulf Ekström]

On Wed, Oct 30, 2002 at 10:18:09AM +0200, ungarlando at libero.it wrote:
> I feel that less elastic ground collisions should be really fun. I 

That would be pretty easy. I'll try to add a config file parameter for
'ground bouncyness'

> mean, unless you touchdown with the lower part of the plane, it should 
> bounce a bit, but start rotating crazily. Then it could maybe takeoff 
> again... Also if inverted :)
> Being the physic model that great, maybe it is sufficient to tinker 
> with some parameters?

I think you overestimate the greatness of the physics model..  To be
able to do what you describe above there are two things that must be
implemented:

1) Friction. This is needed anyway, and should be pretty easy.
2) Rotating objects. Objects can rotate now, but only when 'told to', ie 
   not when they hit something.

The reason that this is not yet implemented is that I'm not really sure
how it will work. Currently all parts of a sprite have the same properties,
so for example there is no way of telling the engine that the wheels of 
the plane should have lower friction than if you land upside down.

Sure, you can split sprites into different parts and assign different 
propertied to them, but this adds a lot of complexity to both the engine
and the sprite creation. You cannot just fire up povray and create a sprite, 
you need to manually edit _each frame_, and mark the different areas etc.

Maybe there is some middle ground, like having a separate wheel sprite
(which can then fall off.. Maybe this is not such a bad idea), but I think it
can wait until the game is playable.

I'll see what I can do. This kind if programming is the fun part, IMO.

Ulf