Sharing that cockpit again

For those who love to fly in multiplayer
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A1C_Elliott
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Joined: 29 Dec 2012, 20:34

Sharing that cockpit again

Post by A1C_Elliott »

I know this topic has been run off the rails multiple times, but lets try doing some brainstorming here.


ok, so heres a little background for people freshly surfing. Currently (And as it stands forever) there is no shared cockpit support for any of the A2A aircraft because of the advanced scripting behind the Accu-sim experience. If you were to join a shared cockpit game there would be some interesting issues you'd run into such as handing controls to your "co-pilot" and them not being able to hand it back, or a completely non-synced aircraft. To explain a little more what non-synced means, as Scott has told me many years ago, it would work like this. Using oil pressure and fuel flow as example...

If you and your friend were to share cockpits, and your flying along lets say in the B377, which i feel this would be more applicable. Your engineer might read that they are seeing an oil pressure that is slightly or completely off, but fuel flow and other gauges might be spot on.

There are multiple reasons for this.

First it could be because "no two planes are created equal" - In other words, your flying habits and your friends flying habits could be completely different which causes very very very little wear and tear in certain parts of your aircraft and in other parts of theirs. Because of that, and the fact Accu-sim doesn't sync. You are now seeing one gauge completely different from the other.

Second it is because its FSX - In the end FSX is a computer program, and there is alot of movie magic in the background, such as when you are on a one on one multiplayer flight and you see the other persons aircraft, its simply just an ai aircraft. MEaning its not really a plane, its just like that auto generated traffic you see at any given time in your single player, the only difference is that its being controlled through networking. FSX ONLY HANDLES AIRCRAFT MOVEMENT, default or default like guages and characteristics are not affected by flying habits over time, you get the same plane with same performance everytime. Therefore, you are not only able to just see their aircraft, but the program is structured to anticipate what all control commands possiblites are at an exact time. Ie.. your fuel flow guage will increase based on percentage of the throttle, if the PIC has his throttle at 75% at all times your GPH will ALWAYS be at 14 at 3500 Feet. No matter what FSX will always be the same. So it can be anticipated and therefore displayed real time.


Why am i stating all this? For starters not everyone understands the complete insides of why it doesnt work. This isnt even completely detailed but its a start for people to understand.

The reason for this post isnt to just run over a dead horse again, Im brainstorming an idea that i will display for maybe some other people with more networking/coding experience can bounce off ideas.


My idea is simple, Accu-Sim is a script written in C++, i havent broken into the details of how ACCU-SIM works via the code (primarily i dont know if im allowed [SCOTT CAN I?]) But the way i see it as it stands it should be a "simple" sending info and receiving info. So basically, you would make a "multiplayer" version of the aircraft that it is simply like an FSX default aircraft in the sense that it ALWAYS starts out with default fresh start conditions, so all conditions may be synced. Then by rewritting the ACCU-SIM script to allow for a server to handle the passing of information.

Again this is very crude i have no idea what the script says, but lets go with something generic.

Basically:
every aspect can be sent based on command input and host Accu-sim, we make a receivable based on the joining player. We let the host accusim be the what runs all connecting clients. So those who are not hosting have a non accusim aircraf, but recieves the information just as though as it would have ACCU-SIM "movie magic". the hosting pilot would start a third party application that would run a server in the background just like the desk-pilot application, the server would handle all conditions that accusim works with. Im not exaclty sure how hard this would be but i can assure that it would be worth while because there wouldnt be a single accusim pilot here that wouldnt want it im sure.


Can i get any weigh in from anyone. Maybe some examples, or something?
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n421nj
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Re: Sharing that cockpit again

Post by n421nj »

Maybe i misread but did you say that each time it would start as a fresh aircraft? Perpetual aircrafts are part of the fun of accusim. I dont know if i'd want a fresh aircraft everytime just for shared cockpits. I dont know how it would work if say the host aircraft is cloned and then ported over to the joining aircraft but then the joining aircraft would be wiped clean. Obviously the aircraft need to be synched so one would have to be changed.
Dont get me wrong, i'd love a three man crew for the b377 just dont see how it would work.
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musicalaviator
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Joined: 11 Sep 2015, 22:14

Re: Sharing that cockpit again

Post by musicalaviator »

You know, I wouldn't mind sharing cockpits with the likes of C172/P28A too. The A2A, Maddog and Aerosoft A320 become such more when you can do that. Flying some manouvers with pilot/student would be a new kind of awesome, even if the perpetual aircraft parts were 'turned off' during the multiplayer session as part of the connection process.

That said, sharing clicks etc between GTN650/750 GNS530/430 etc would be far more difficult, given they aren't even A2A products...

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Aymi
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Re: Sharing that cockpit again

Post by Aymi »

I'd die to fly the strat with shared cockpit. May it be multiplayer or just LAN !
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AerialShorts
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Re: Sharing that cockpit again

Post by AerialShorts »

I can certainly see the draw to sharing cockpits in planes like the 377, 17, or any of the pilot/copilot planes where the cockpit load is high.

But another aspect is doing ridealongs with a good aerobatic team. Holding really good and tight formation is still beyond my skill level but riding along and just seeing what it looks like, especially in VR, is a wild ride. And in ridealongs, you don't really want to share controls unless you are teaching formation flight and aerobatics.

Still would be cool but just flying these planes is really nice too!
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DC3
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Re: Sharing that cockpit again

Post by DC3 »

There is no real reason the starting players aircraft condition could not be captured and shared with the joining player's aircraft. The joining player's aircraft's condition could be saved for later single player flying. The aircraft would not have to start new every time.

Adding the second pilot ability into A2A aircraft would certainly open up a whole new dimension, for example, I could use a good flight engineer on the B377 to boost my career mode ratings. :)

Re-working an existing aircraft such as the B377 would not be a trivial task. In the future it would be interesting if this was designed into A2A aircraft.

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