[Falcon]

I think I said something about this before. Will Freespace 2 ever have a 3D cockpit? Also Im wondering if pilot .ani files will be in full color too.

Bah I gottat learn how to code soon so much stuff rushing through my head so many ideas

[Bobboau]

it's been sugested, but nobody who codes wants it, so it isn't getting done at the moment.

[Knight Templar]

We have a hud. The hud is a little thing on top of the center console on the cockpit. See the intro movie from FS1 to see what I mean.

In short, a cockpit and the hud set up would be weird to see at the same time.

[Unknown Target]

Uhh...KT, I'm gonna go out on a limb here, buuut, if they put in a cockpit...wouldn't they make the HUD smaller?

[Arculis]

He probably had something in mind similar to what you'd see in Rogue Leader, the Star Wars game for GameCube. If you've ever messed with it, you can fly the ship from inside the cockpit, and you can also use the secondary control stick to look around inside the cockpit (which means you can look to your left or right, above and sometimes below you without actually rotating the ship, from within the cockpit). Its a nice idea, but I don't think FreeSpace 2 would support it very well. (Especially considering all the additional cockpits you'd have to create for every ship.)

[WMCoolmon]

A 3D cockpit would cause performance loss, and the same thing could be done with a 2D image. BUT it would obstruct view, and looking around would require much coding work. Like Arculis said, you would also have to make a different cockpit for ships.

Though it would add an interesting way to balance ships, it doesn't seem like a really major feature.

[Black Wolf]

Originally posted by Falcon
Also Im wondering if pilot .ani files will be in full color too.  

My personal opinion is that that would be...****ty. V could have made them full colour - it's not like full colour anis were impossible in FS1. They chose not to. It was a good choice. IMO anyway.

[Knight Templar]

Originally posted by Unknown Target
Uhh...KT, I'm gonna go out on a limb here, buuut, if they put in a cockpit...wouldn't they make the HUD smaller?

Indeed. Small to the point where it wouldn't be of much use.

[Lynx]

Originally posted by Knight Templar
In short, a cockpit and the hud set up would be weird to see at the same time.

Prophecy had it and it was still cool. It could be explained that parts of the HUD are projected on the visor of the pilots helmet.

[Taristin]

But FS1/2 cocpit huds weren't projected from the helmet. It was displayed on a screen in the dash.

[Lynx]

Think of the total conversions too, please.

[Nico]

Originally posted by Raa Tor'h
But FS1/2 cocpit huds weren't projected from the helmet. It was displayed on a screen in the dash.

it was just lazyness from volition. like hell the pilot could read the text on the hud. even more difficult since half the informations are half cut by the edges of the said hud

[Taristin]

Don't need text, when there's radios.

[Falcon]

To those who wouldn't like huds on screen. You could instead make an option to activate that feature either chose the new or stick with the old or make it so that if a certain key were pressed the hud would retract giving you a full open view. Like in the Need for Speed series there was a in car view or the bumper cam if Im right about the name.

[Falcon]

Originally posted by Raa Tor'h
Don't need text, when there's radios.

What if there was a deaf man playing?  

[Lightspeed]

the actual FS hud was all the controls arranged around the pilot. They simply used the in-game HUD as a texture for the window.

[TopAce]

I haven't read through the whole thread, so if I post Mr. Obvious, forgive me.

I think it is absolutely unneccesary to add cockpit. Only makes the gameplay slower. The older 2D HUD is suitable for what it is there.

[Lynx]

But a cockpit would make the game more I-M-M-E-R-S-I-V-E. And if there's one thing a game should be it's immersive. Have you ever played I-War2? The 3d cockpits there were absolutely sweet. It was the same as it would be here-the HUD was just flaoting on the screen while the cockpit was just eyecandy, but it made the whole game more immersive, at least to me. And different cockpits would make it more attractive to switch to another craft, too. Almost every other spacesim has a 3d cockpit so it can't be a bad thing, or not?

[TopAce]

The only game that had 3D cockpit in my life was X-wing Alliance. And I found its 3D cockpits only a waste of Frame/ per seconds. X-wing vs. TF cockpits looked good enough.

[Lynx]

The performance hit would be negligible, unless someone decides to put in a cocpit model with ten thousands of polys, but that would be unecessary, since it's entirely possible to make a good looking cockpit with a few hundred polys, and that's high. A standard 3d cockpit would have around 100 polies i think. And it's harder to simply draw a 2d cockpit than to model it and render it, so you could simply put the 3d mesh into the game. You wouldn't have to make a cockpit graphic for each resolution. 3d cocpits are correctly lit when you move, whereas 2d ones are not. 3d cockpits just look better and are easier to do.