v0.2.4 is live | Gravity field visualization, multiple UI fixes, finalization of map unification
v0.2.4 is live
The first orbital racing game. Free in the browser.
https://slingshotspeeders.com/
Gravity field
Settings has Gravity field. A dense grid of arrows under the map shows which way the bodies push the ship. Orange is a push. Purple is a pull. Where both meet, the color eases between them. Weak cells stay visible and fade. A strong cell is longer, wider, and more opaque. The arrows cover the full pull and fade out at the edge. On a map with a moving body, they stay planted. 9, LB, and FIELD turn them on and off. The choice stays on this device in MapMake, a flight, and VIEW.
Home
Search sits beside Tutorial. Type a map name. The field closes when you open a map, so keys fly the ship. Dailies are Three Up, New Ground, and Drafted. On a phone held upright, the tagline sits above the home tabs. EMOTE sends the face you have equipped.
The menu is GAME and the site. Site pages and your name open in a new tab, so the game stays loaded. PLAY is off the game menu. It only reloaded the page.
Tapes and watch
A tape is kept for every win. A crash or quit is kept only when you spent Δv and flew at least five seconds. A quit ends the tape on that tick. Watch does not keep flying after you leave. Watch names the map and keeps the trajectory line on the flown path after a burn.
VIEW draws every stored run line on that map. Overlapping lines keep a steady stack.
An event is a 48 hour window on one map. The fastest verified time wins. There is no signup grid. Joining Multiplayer Test puts the orbiting body on the sky the other pilot is flying.
MapMake
LENGTH is the full gold line. WAY is one direction or both. VISITS works on a gate, an orbit, and a hold. Order is numbered dots. A hazard kills on the drawn bar. An orbit placed after five holds stays an orbit.
Cargo Delivery is off the shelf. A hold no longer loads extra mass, so the engine pushes the same after a hold.
Also
Usage keeps the all-time total across the week. Maps played is its own chart. The FAQ leads with account, MapMake, pax, how maps are weighted, and cloud hosting. Roadmap is Sign in with Apple. The chip in the corner says v0.2.4.
Full notes: https://slingshotspeeders.com/changelog How to play: https://slingshotspeeders.com/how
6 replies
You can play the new mass driver map here: https://slingshotspeeders.com/m/qs5gd1c4
Popping in to say the gravity vector field is a nice addition! Gotta get some competitive times on the new maps and/or spend some good time in mapmake :)
Okay, so "Escape Upwards Only" is the kind of map I had in mind as an exploit of the map weights system, you can make it arbitrarily long to finish a map, and it has to be full throttle the whole time basically. I wonder how bad it will be if someone else finishes it haha
On a related note! I have reason to believe the mapmake preview play and the actual play don't start on the same frame or something. On that map, if I go to edit it and play, the ship goes to 0.4 m/s, but with playing it only goes down to 0.5 m/s. If it were on the same frame I could make such a map take much longer hahaha
Thanks for making those, interesting test for sure, I really appreciate it (I know the map making tools are janky). Yes the weight of the map is turning out to be larger even though it's a very simple map. But the scores are very low, which impacts the amount it effects overall standings.
The other major factor in weight is whether players actually want to play on it or not, so even if there are three who do, it won't have the weight of other major maps that get dozens of unique player wins. Score and time are the bigger factors, then delta v. I'll add an explaination for the weighting system.
I'll look into that starting frame issue. Also known is a bug that makes the obstacles not appear, which should be fixable by tomorrow in the next update.
Thanks again!
Oh yeah surely this one does not get plays hahahah so I’m sure it won’t have an outsized impact, but I just was curious where the weight would end up on something like that for the thrust alone. I think if it were more fun in the same high fuel style it might be a real outlier though... But yeah no prob, someone has to make the bad maps :). Good ideas later, I’m cooking
Also, Simple Oberth Escape is just supposed to demonstrate the value of the Oberth effect really clearly
Indeed and it does that well. It's really cool to see the major difference in time/fuel usage taking the two different paths, either burning directly up, or sideways to wrap around and carry momentum. As far as map design mechanics, those two things recognized could lead to some awesome combinations. I look forward to seeing what you cook, fun challenges ahead!