curious - rear mirrors

[eh]

Originally posted by DamnedRen
eh,

I'm pretty sure I was around during your drug years and I don't ever remember AW, in any version, having a working rear view mirror and when I hit fwd up on my stick I kinda, well, looked...fwd up. Hmmm, if it happened in the 60's I might not have remembered but AW?

Ren
The Damned

Ren, your drug years were obviously better than mine  

AW had the mirrors.

As far as the rest of the arguments go, I have heard the jiggly mirror size and other arguments before, and they don't wash. If reality is the issue, then we should get rid of a couple of views that we are all used to in the game, such as pan, zoom, and icons.  Did a real bomber pilot in the real war have an external pan view? Did a real fighter pilot have an external pan view when all of his wheels were on the runway? Was there a zoom view for any real pilot? Did aircraft come with identifier icons together with  distance counters? Were enemy planes identifiable by the colours of their icons? Nope.

Aces High is a game through and through, and having a mirror view which looks down the rear of your fuselage (just as they did in RL) would be a real asset to the game, just as are all of the other non-real features that are already loaded into Aces High.

If Air Warrior could do it ten years ago, surely all of the expertise associated with this thoroughbred called Aces High could do it as well, if not better!

[BaldEagl]

First of all, all versions of AW had mirriors starting with AWI but, the terrains and the plane graphics were no where near as complex as those in AH thus the frame impacts were minimal.

I also play auto racing games (less and less) which have mirrors in and/or outside the cars.  The mirrors themselves have a totally independent set of graphics settings in order to lessen impact on frame rates including things like how many cars are displayed.  If all mirror settings are maxed the frame impacts are enormous, therefore, mirrors are generally set to the lowest settings possible to still be acceptable while forward views are maxed as to settings.

I think what we have now is the best possible scenario in providing rearward views while not adversly affecting frame rates although it doesn't allow you to simply glance up at a mirror while retaining your forward view.

[B@tfinkV]

another thread where ren owns himself

[Saxman]

Actually, the mirrors on the F4U-1A/C/D would be quite useful, as there's three altogether: One across the top and one on each side. The side mirrors especially would be handy for those blind spots in the bubble-top Hogs you just can't adjust the seat around.

I agree with setting it as an individual preference option. If you want it, use it. If not, turn it off.

Since detail isn't an issue, the lowest-detailed wireframes can be all the mirror displays regardless of range. It'd be there for a quick check without having to change views, so even just a plain ol' dot with a con on it could do the job without eating up the frame rate.

The same case can be done for terrain: Minimal details only. Low-res tiles, minimal detailed wire frames, or perhaps don't show things like trees, buildings, GVs (if you're in an plane), etc in the mirrors at all.

This combined with scalable view ranges or details could help ease the performance burden.

[Souless]

Lock on has this.
The problem that most of us encountered was that u needed a powerful comp and video card to see clearly behind you.If you didnt have this your frame rate dropped so drastically it just wasnt worth it.
Even with a top notch system you encountered a stutter effect.
It was good to see contrails and missile trails but these were large static visuals easily identified.
Forget about seeing a Mig-29 on your six.It just doesnt work as well as you would think.

[Vulcan]

There was an interview kicking around here with a real spit pilot. He said mirrors were a waste of time. First if you saw something in it then it was already too late; Second was that they vibrated to much to give any soft of clear view.

[republic]

Originally posted by Hitech

2. To make a mirror is realy displaying 2 different views at once, hence you almost 1/2 frame rate.

That's just silly.  Server lag, I understand and it makes sense.....but any machine made in this decade should easily be able to handle the mirror image...unless there is something wrong with the game engine itself.  US Navy Fighters circa 1996 is the first flight sim I remember that had rearward mirrors.

[hitech]

Rebublic: Not a good idea to call one of my statements silly, when I might just know a little bit about graphic processing.

So how would you make a mirror, with out creating an extra view frustumthen querying the object list, for all objects in that frustum, and then displaying them?

HiTech

[Saxman]

I may be having a brain fart, here, but one question:

What's a frustum?

[Bronk]

Originally posted by Saxman
I may be having a brain fart, here, but one question:

What's a frustum?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frustum


hehe still no help .


Bronk

[republic]

Originally posted by hitech
Rebublic: Not a good idea to call one of my statements silly, when I might just know a little bit about graphic processing.

So how would you make a mirror, with out creating an extra view frustumthen querying the object list, for all objects in that frustum, and then displaying them?

HiTech

The idea that our framerates would be 1/2ed is the silly part.  Surely the average PC of today is more than capable.

Server lag or increased client side bandwidth is reason enough for not implementing the rear mirror.  Actually, the simple fact that you are the developer and chose not to is reason enough...I meant no offense...but I don't see how it would be a hardware issue given the relatively light requirements of the AH engine.

Again, no offense intended, AH2 is bar none the most addictive and satisfying of the WW2 era flight sims out there...hence some of my previous posts.

[Krusty]

AH requires a lot of PC to run. I could run other games just fine on my old machine but AH wouldn't. Especially not since 2.0 and later versions. Every skin pack, every new aircraft, all require more and more resources. I have a damn decent video card, too. I can handle FEAR with almost full settings with FSAA on and it looks great.

Having said that, I fear the FPS I'd get if AH introduced mirrors.

If you use a real time mirror effect it's impossible -- no PC on earth can really handle that "on the fly" as needed. So the only other way around it is to duplicate the real world into the mirror. Then you have other problems. You can't just mirror PART of the world. What if the mirror changes position (as planes are wont to do)? You have to display everything exactly as it is in the non-mirror world, and you can't "just" show what's visible -- because the compute cycles to determine what should be visible, and when/where/how to turn certain objects on and off again would kill more FPS than just rendering it all.

Trust Hitech on this one. He's quite right. Although, I have no effing clue what his last post meant

[republic]

Oh I trust him, and I feel bad that my comment was taken so badly.  Especially since I'm crazy for AH, and glad someone is spending the time and effort to do it right unlike many others *cough* figher ace*cough* If it could be done with little impact I believe it would have been.

Again, sorry Hitech    

[Flatbar]

I want a front view mirror to use when I'm flying looking backwards OTD.

Those dang trees always seem to jump up and bite me when I'm not looking.

Beware of the Larch!

[53gunner]

Damn I didnt know my post would be so divisive. Guess this would be a bad time to ask for a JU87G:confused:
Glenn