Add more vehicle functions

[Ywa]

Hi,

 

I'm currently working on a project involving vehicles. And I noticed Leadwerks misses some important vehicle functions, while Newton 1.35 does support them. So I guess it would be just a matter of 5 minutes to add them.

 

These are the functions Newton supports:

NewtonVehicleAddTire

 

NewtonVehicleGetFirstTireID

 

NewtonVehicleGetNextTireID

 

NewtonVehicleGetTireLateralSpeed

 

NewtonVehicleGetTireLongitudinalSpeed

 

NewtonVehicleGetTireMatrix

 

NewtonVehicleGetTireNormalLoad

 

NewtonVehicleGetTireOmega

 

NewtonVehicleGetTireSteerAngle

 

NewtonVehicleGetTireUserData

 

NewtonVehicleRemoveTire

 

NewtonVehicleReset

 

NewtonVehicleSetTireCallback

 

NewtonVehicleSetTireLongitudinalSlideCoeficient

 

NewtonVehicleSetTireMaxLongitudinalSlideSpeed

 

NewtonVehicleSetTireMaxSideSleepSpeed

 

NewtonVehicleSetTireSideSleepCoeficient

 

NewtonVehicleSetTireSteerAngle

 

NewtonVehicleSetTireTorque

 

NewtonVehicleTireCalculateMaxBrakeAcceleration

 

NewtonVehicleTireIsAirBorne

 

NewtonVehicleTireLostSideGrip

 

NewtonVehicleTireLostTraction

 

NewtonVehicleTireSetBrakeAcceleration

 

Josh, I really need some of these functions. So I was wondering if you could make a new 2.40 build or make a separate release for me?

 

Thanks in advance!

 

- Ywa

[VeTaL]

Not only for you: i'm also interested in this... Looking like Alessandro also interested in it.

[Alessandro]

Hello,

I think basic vehicle is nice, but it definitively needs more functions.

They are useful even to be able to create really different vehicles. Without a proper fine-tuning, we risk that every vehicle will have the same behavior of any other one.

It is hard to create two different cars if one cannot manage MANY car parameters.

One thing more: when a vehicle is created, I cannot find a way to change certain parameters (like suspension height). It means if I want to let the player change some car characteristics, I'm obliged to destroy then recreate the vehicle self every time!

If this basic vehicle cannot be extended any more, then please implement a vehicle using Newton, or another physics engine like PhysX or Bullet.

Other engines already have good vehicle implementations (e.g. 3DGS and Unity). I know them, since I used both

 

For me, a good vehicle management is a key-feature, since my game is based on vehicles!

 

Thank you!

[Ywa]

Bump. I kinda need this.

 

Edit: I emailed Josh about it.

Edited September 22, 2010 by Ywa

[BLaBZ]

" "

 

Agreed,

[VeTaL]

If this basic vehicle cannot be extended any more, then please implement a vehicle using Newton, or another physics engine like PhysX or Bullet.

 

No need of PhysX or Bullet: Newton has 2 vehicles, and if they both would be implemented in LE, it would be enough: "raycast" car for simple and fast solutions and "multibody" car for more complex variants.

[kennar]

When time permits, please do expose these functions. It would be most appreciated.

[paramecij]

+1

 

I have been patiently waiting for a more fleshed out vehicle implementation since the day I've bought the SDK, meanwhile working on my game thinking it would be implemented in some future update.. (was poking around the headers and saw the commented out functions ) ..

[Ywa]

Bump..

 

Come on Josh. Don't ignore this thread and our e-mails. We know you're busy with LE3. But this is something a lot of people need at this moment.

[Alessandro]

yes, I like this engine, but I think realistic vehicles are really useful, since they embrace a good part of today games!

[Ywa]

There we go again. I really need some of these functions at this moment.

[Ywa]

This stuff gets annoying.

 

Josh, please reply that you actually read it and if you want to make time for this (yes/no).

[Canardia]

I'm working on a vehicle game also, and I noticed you can have quite difference car behaviours when adjusting the wheel radius and the front/rear wheel distance. Now I got a car which gets totally instable at higher speed because its front/read wheels are quite narrow together. With a car with bigger front/rear wheel distance, it behaves very stable. One annoying thing is that the car stops when making a sharp turn, but I think I can simulate a roll-over and explosion when the steering angle gets too high.

[Josh]

Both the Newton vehicle implementations are not working. I implemented my own raycast technique.

 

Newton is fantastic for rigid bodies and joints, but it doesn't seem to be developing any further. I will be investigating alternatives. Bullet is probably the best choice, although I am not completely informed enough to make that decision yet. I hope we can find something that has the precision and stability we have had with Newton joints.

[diedir]

well that is the great news !

bullet would be great !

cars need love !

thank you Josh for reconsidering physics

[Alessandro]

Thank you, this is a good news.

Have you any plans/roadmap about it?

LE 3.0? 3.5? or.... ?

[kennar]

Thank you, this is a good news.

Have you any plans/roadmap about it?

LE 3.0? 3.5? or.... ?

 

Or, LE2.5.

[VeTaL]

Or, LE2.5.

That would be nice.

[paramecij]

Both the Newton vehicle implementations are not working. I implemented my own raycast technique.

 

Newton is fantastic for rigid bodies and joints, but it doesn't seem to be developing any further. I will be investigating alternatives. Bullet is probably the best choice, although I am not completely informed enough to make that decision yet. I hope we can find something that has the precision and stability we have had with Newton joints.

 

What about Physx or Havok? (formerly from Ageia now Nvidia) A few years back I evaluated different physics middleware (bullet, tokamak, newton,..) for my engine and PhysX SDK was the best choice by far (excluding Havok) ..

 

and isn't Havok free now? ..from http://www.havok.com/index.php?page=middleware

You can freely download and develop compatibility with your middleware products, so that your end-users can easily download Havok components directly from Havok to finish their games. There will be no fee associated with this because the license fee has been covered by Intel® under a commercial agreement with Havok. You cannot redistribute the Havok libraries directly, but you may implement compatible function calls within your middleware components that rely on Havok, leaving a simple installation and recompilation step for your end-users to complete.

[VeTaL]

with Havok Physics and Havok Animation run-time systems.

Sounds good.