How realistic is spaceflight in video games?
Video games are a great way for us to explore outer space, but how realistic are video games within video games?
As one of mankind’s greatest curiosities, video game developers often uncover great unknowns in their games. Whether it’s early attempts at single-line space graphics, such as Space Invaders or Asteroids, or the fully immersive experience that some Best space VR game have to offer, it has been the aim of many game studios to explore the endless boundaries of space. However, while many games allow you to explore the big unknown, they approach the subject of astrophysics with varying degrees of serious thought.
For some games like Mario Galaxy, Astrobot: Rescue Mission and most the best Star Wars Game, the science of space travel is safely thrown out the window to make way for exciting visuals, engaging storylines, and fun gameplay. While others like Elite Dangerous and No Man’s Sky create stories that completely encapsulate what they have theoretically studied, based on our current knowledge of all physics. difference of the universe.
So let’s examine the wide range of spaceflight possibilities in the game; what we’ve tried and tested with the science that’s here in real life, and what we believe is possible, down to the absurd sci-fi some games that use it all in the name of entertain. So, if while playing your favorite astral shooter, you’ve ever wondered if it’s even possible, read on to find out.
Spaceship shape and size
Our current efforts to get into the space are limited by size issues. It takes a lot of energy to get stuff into space with rockets, so we need to keep things as light and streamlined as possible. That’s not the case once you actually fly into space. With no stress or force acting on the spacecraft, it could theoretically be any size or shape you want.
The space is also pretty cold, so you’ll need some warmth in the cabin to keep everyone happy. On the other hand, spacecraft with large power sources also need a way to keep cool. In space, the only way to Heat loss is through radiation, a rather slow process. To prevent the crew of a large capacity spacecraft from being cooked, the spacecraft needs advanced solutions. This appears in the Mass Effects series, where Socialist Republic of Normandy has an advanced concealment device, but it cannot be used indefinitely due to heat build up. It had to turn it off and let the heatsink cool down to avoid crew cooking.
While people question the shape of crafts like the iconic Star Wars Death Star, a perfect sphere isn’t as far-fetched as you might think. Since space has a near-zero drag on objects passing through it, a sphere is like any other shape. In fact, it has positive points compared to other ships like Dead Space’s USG Ishimura. While the skeleton structure looks awesome, all that debris around has the potential to cause problems when hit by quite a few infinite pieces of debris floating around there. Boosters and jets will be placed along with any shaped craft to prevent it from spinning out and giving your ship direction. Although players may prefer to enter the USS Enterprise in one of the Best PSVR space game, the exposed motives are just asking to be owned.
While you might laugh at Kingdom Hearts’ blocky design of Gummi’s ship, it really isn’t impossible. From a technical point of view, the right angle is not optimal for structural integrity, however, the small size and the ability to place the thruster with your equipment, certainly coincide with the science. There’s another thing our humble Gummi Ship got right. It never goes very far.
Go far
When you’re looking to power your spacecraft, there are two things to consider: powering its flight through space, and actually getting it into space in the first place. Currently, we use rockets to get things into space, but this is not the ideal solution for large objects.
Rocket very large, but they carry only a relatively small payload into space for their size. This is what NASA scientists call “tyranny of the rocket equation“In short, the more stuff you want to put into space, the more fuel you need. This means more fuel storage, more mass, which means more fuel you need. So, to increase the size of the useful things you put into space, you have to dramatically increase the number of spacecraft dedicated to takeoff (That’s why NASA’s Saturn V Moon rocket is so big) so.)
Now, you can solve this problem by building your spacecraft in space from scratch, so it never needs to take off. Of course, you still need to have all the parts to build it there, unless you use something like asteroid mining to build the core structure. We can also use the space elevator, like the one seen in Halo 3 and Halo ODST, to transport parts to orbit and build the ship there.
When it comes to fuel and weight questions, most games tend to ignore it. However, some games like the Pikmin series keep you in a very limited space. Pikmin goes even further to show you gathering resources from the local area to refuel. However, there are games that take the reality of space travel even shorter distances.
The Kerbal Space Program attempts to closely recreate the reality of building a spaceship. You start by simply orbiting your planet and many ships explode on your first attempts. Hohmann orbiting, a method of traveling between two planets while conserving fuel by taking advantage of the proximity of the two planets’ orbits, is the method used by experts today and the one most widely used. used by Kerbals titration.
If you want to maintain physical realism during spaceflight, you usually have to be in your solar system. This is because figuring out how to keep humans alive for long distances, let alone how to get there in the ever-expanding universe poses even more theoretical problems. However, where is the stored joy for your solar system? Let’s see what games have come up to transport life beyond the Milky Way.
Frozen in time
Cryosleep, stasis, reanimation…whatever you want to call it, if you travel large distances in your space game, chances are you use one of these methods to stop the crew yours is dead. Not only does it prevent their cells from aging in the long run, but it also saves vital resources like water, food, and oxygen for other parts of the trip. The Halo Game use it, and Alien Isolation is famous for its stagnant shell but this is just a sci-fi game right?
In the 1960s, scientists were really hard at work on concept of cryonics – Freeze and restore living bodies. By injecting the rodents with a freezing agent and an antifreeze at the same time, they were able to freeze them completely as if they were dead. They initially used hot spoons to wake our frozen friends, but they often suffered severe burns in the process. However, after a lot of research and failed tests, scientists have managed to rehabilitate the hamster almost 100% successfully through the microwave without any health concerns even after many rounds of freezing. cold. Our surviving friends were later allowed to retire.
Unfortunately for interstellar explorers, they were unable to reproduce these experiments on larger celestial bodies. Anything larger than a hamster will die before the cells freeze. There is great promise in medically induced coma, which greatly reduces the need for resources, however, the longer someone stays in this condition the greater the impact on their health. . Assigning someone for a few days can lead to problems with speech and movement. So if you can’t freeze people, you need to make the ship go fast.
Faster than light travel
If you can’t freeze them, speed them up. With the universe expanding faster than the speed of light, you also need to travel faster than the speed of light to be able to move forward, not just drift further and further away. However, Einstein fans will know you can’t travel through space faster than light.
Worm pit and the idea of space folding is popular, but I wanted to focus on spaceships rather than what space is doing. However, there are a few theories, the most plausible one seems to be the idea of space motion, not a ship. This involves creating less space in front of you and moving space behind you instead. This theory is common in the universe The Mass Effect uses the fictional Element 0, a matter with negative mass to create this effect.
Although the developers are working on theoretical physics for inspiration, the method is still just science fiction in reality. First, the problem of time dilation remains. The universe around them would still age even if the crew remained intact making many of their missions moot. Also, we can’t say for sure what effect the space warping will have on post-motion objects, but it can be said that having the texture of reality warped in it probably wouldn’t be good for friend.
The best of the worst
For the worst representation of the universe in video games; that prize must go to Pokémon Omega Ruby / Alpha Sapphire where in the game you summon Mega-Rayquaza before riding it into space and banging your head against an oncoming meteor. Let’s ignore the fact that a 10-year-old has the ability to summon the strongest Pokémon in existence and meteorites will crush your child’s body. We will accept those as much as we can in the given universe.
However, the rate at which Rayquaza penetrates Earth’s atmosphere will create such drag in the atmosphere that it’s unlikely your body won’t be ripped apart by the monster. Even if there’s some kind of harness device not seen in the cut, your body will be pulled through all available holes. Even if you survive after that, the shards will likely rip through your spacesuit at that speed exposing and killing you. It’s a myth that a game where you enter a volcano without protection can fly in the face of realism like this. In short, you’re dead. Sorry.
While this is just a glimpse at spatial lighting in the game, you can use a few of the ideas you’ve explored to review crafting techniques in your favorite games and find See if any of those things might ruin your immersion and experience.
https://www.space.com/how-realistic-is-spaceflight-in-video-games How realistic is spaceflight in video games?
