Friday 2010-02-25 Development update:Interview by Grégory Lemasson/Discussion Thread

[slm]

Originally Posted by Romanator21

As for training, you can not know the effects that hypoxia will have on your ability to PERCEIVE it until you've gone through it.

Yes, pilots who had not experienced it before didn't know what was causing the gradual change in how flying felt. Because of this I hope lack of oxygen will be modeled so that it's not obvious to the pilot that the problem is oxygen. There are some similar cases in IL2 already:
- when you turn too rapidly you may black out.
- If your plane dives and you try to pull up, plane controls may react slowly because of high speed

I hope oxygen deprivation would be modeled in some similar way, instead of showing the player some text which makes problem solving so much faster and easier.

[Oleg Maddox]

Originally Posted by slm

I hope oxygen deprivation would be modeled in some similar way, instead of showing the player some text which makes problem solving so much faster and easier.

We had this mornig some speech about it. Probably we'll have even graphics representation of the mask. It looks after a small test well.


As for the effect itself. I'm experienced myself in low oxigen situations. I was so many times in mountains and even over the 4000 meters altitudes. So don't worry. To miss the mind on such altitudes is almost impossible... what may happens when you move faster than possible - tachypnea (hope this is right term) and then if you are continue to move fast - even more frequent respiration and then the effect that looks close to blackout if you didn't stop movement even for a short time for the recovering of oxigen in the blood (recovering happens very fast). That is possible just in the first day of moving there at such altitudes. Then the human organism begins to get accustomed... and its already never happens. At least up to 5000 meters. Of course it is depending of the lungs volume. As more smaller lungs - more great time of adaptation. In terms of aviation and oxigen starvation - effect will be very different for different people. Say the good swimmer and trained phisically human will have no problem maybe up to 6000 meters. But these, say like vietnamese people may have the problem already at 2500 m. Some friends of my father (I saw and spoke with them many times during hunting in the forests in the past) told me very long time ago that for Vietnamese pilots there was special order to use mask right from the ground....they were not able to control aircraft in the same conditions as Russian pilots.

So.... we should have, like I pointed above with blackout-redout some average value. Roman knows it. So I expect that we satisfy all.


PS. movement in moutains and work in a cockpit - a different thing. Movement takes more oxigen.

[Urufu_Shinjiro]

Oleg, I know this may be a more technical question better suited for you programmers, can you say what sound API will be used, DirectSound3D, OpenAL or other? Windows Vista and Windows 7 no longer support sound card hardware acceleration for DirectSound3D but do support hardware acceleration with OpenAL.

[philip.ed]

Oleg, if you need any more info on the oxygen mask (RAF) then I am happy to help.

BTW, during the Battle of Britain, the RAF were using the type d-oxygen mask. This was made a wool, similiar to barethea, and the mask itself had no real self-sealing capability on the wearer's face (unlike the later rubber masks).

Now, if you are to model oxygen effects, then the next part becomes very important Because the mask had no real sealing capablilities, a lot of the oxygen espcaped at the sides of the mask. In the event of a fire, if the pilot never turned off his oxygen then the mask would become a human-blow-torch, and the effects of this really speak for themselves; this was the fate of many BoB RAF pilots.
My question to you is, could SoW model this feature? It wouldn't be pretty, but it would be extremely realistic.

[brando]

Originally Posted by philip.ed

Oleg, if you need any more info on the oxygen mask (RAF) then I am happy to help.

BTW, during the Battle of Britain, the RAF were using the type d-oxygen mask. This was made a wool, similiar to barethea, and the mask itself had no real self-sealing capability on the wearer's face (unlike the later rubber masks).

Now, if you are to model oxygen effects, then the next part becomes very important Because the mask had no real sealing capablilities, a lot of the oxygen espcaped at the sides of the mask. In the event of a fire, if the pilot never turned off his oxygen then the mask would become a human-blow-torch, and the effects of this really speak for themselves; this was the fate of many BoB RAF pilots.
My question to you is, could SoW model this feature? It wouldn't be pretty, but it would be extremely realistic.

How ghoulish!

[philip.ed]

Originally Posted by brando

How ghoulish!

It is rather isn't it? But then, so is war

[brando]

Originally Posted by philip.ed

It is rather isn't it? But then, so is war

I don't disagree with your statement. I just don't think it's necessary or desirable to depict such a gross image in a flight simulation. Pilots got burnt on any area of skin that was bare - we mostly know that. In Britain many seriously burnt pilots received pioneering skin-grafts and facial rebuilds from Dr Archibald MacIndoe - we mostly know that too. I just think that requiring to see the human torch effect of the oxygen mask is morbid and macabre. We're not asking for a snuff movie, we just want a flight sim.

[Oleg Maddox]

Originally Posted by philip.ed

My question to you is, could SoW model this feature? It wouldn't be pretty, but it would be extremely realistic.

Probably no.

However.... even the simplest russian oxigen mask of 1930th had two valves - in and out. On the oxigen balloon was the simple reduction of pressure (same as we may see on the British balloon). That is enough when you are not using it - oxigen isn't going.... hovewer possible oxigen seepage in case of bad valves and for this of course is the close cock on the balloon.

[philip.ed]

Originally Posted by Oleg Maddox

Probably no.

However.... even the simplest russian oxigen mask of 1930th had two valves - in and out. On the oxigen balloon was the simple reduction of pressure (same as we may see on the British balloon). That is enough when you are not using it - oxigen isn't going.... hovewer possible oxigen seepage in case of bad valves and for this of course is the close cock on the balloon.

The design of the british mask was so simple it didn't have this feature. The pilot would have to turn the oxygen off in order to stop the 'blowtorch'. I mean, you could call it gruesome, but all it'd have to be is virtual flames in front of your face until you turn off the oxygen, with the message on the screen saying pilot wounded (or similar).
Anyway Oleg, you know my e-mail is open so you can ask me for more info at any time.

This brings me on to ask whether you will model flaming parachutes, Oleg; so if your rear fuselage sets alight and your parachute catches, could the pilot bail out and have his parachute fail?

thanks for answering our questions

[Oleg Maddox]

Originally Posted by Urufu_Shinjiro

Oleg, I know this may be a more technical question better suited for you programmers, can you say what sound API will be used, DirectSound3D, OpenAL or other? Windows Vista and Windows 7 no longer support sound card hardware acceleration for DirectSound3D but do support hardware acceleration with OpenAL.

As told me Rudolf Heiter(our sound engineer) when I noticed him about such a problem, he said that all there will be fine. More precise I can ask him on Monday.