Earth module?

[mhe]

I recently got around to watch a nice interview with ED's Simon Pearson that is a few months old right now:

 

 

At 47:17 Simon says "Of course we're doing the mission editor, we're doing all the ground units as well and we're doing the weather and we're doing the voice chat and we're doing the new Earth module."

 

Anybody know what he was referring to? I don't think he meant the Apache that got announced at the end of the year in the trailer, as I would think he'd rather call that a ground warfare module or something similar. I don't want to start a hype train here, but the way it was called is indeed intriguing. Maybe some kind of procedural generation terrain engine that can later be refined with handcrafted high detail terrain areas, similar to what that other big civilian sim does?

 

@BIGNEWY maybe can clarify for the curious bunch that we are?

[BIGNEWY]

Whole world is something we are investigating but dont have any news to share at the moment. 

 

thank you

[LooseSeal]

Given the length of time it takes to make maps like Syria or even an island map like the Marianas... it's kind of hard to believe it's feasible. Unless of course they were to embrace procedural generation, but then you get into the territory of a certain other flight sim where everything looks amazing at 30,000ft but when you get down to the ground it looks like Minecraft had a stroke.

 

Not only that, my PC gets very angry with me when flying over Damascus, can't even imagine what a Tokyo or Jakarta would do to it.

 

Something nice to dream about though!

[Cunctator]

With the file size of current DCS maps that seems to be the only way. Some basic scenery automatically generated from geodata to connect the high fidelity areas. Some sims had a global scenery since the 90ties, thus it is certainly do able without the budget and access to aerial images as a certain other sim.

[Xilon_x]

the real military pilots from all over the world in addition to flying actually do training in the global simulator.

what kind of global simulator do they use?

where do they get the 3D roofed images of the entire globe?

[Northstar98]

For a whole world map, I would imagine we'd have some basic, low detail terrain, with basic airfields and then our current maps would replace certain areas - exactly like many other flight simulators.

 

Only thing is, it would mandate having our current maps be transformed into a spherical surface element instead of being flat.

 

1 hour ago, BIGNEWY said:

Whole world is something we are investigating but dont have any news to share at the moment. 

 

thank you

 

Do you know if anything has been investigated or planned in terms of bending our current flat maps such that they are instead shaped as a surface element of a sphere?

 

Something like this (on the right):

 

 

I asked about it in the Marianas map section, asking whether or not the map would be shaped to fit on a sphere, but so far haven't heard anything about it.

Edited March 18, 2021 by Northstar98

[BIGNEWY]

I have no comments to make at the moment sorry, only that the team are investigating the possibility.

 

thank you 

[Northstar98]

3 minutes ago, BIGNEWY said:

I have no comments to make at the moment sorry, only that the team are investigating the possibility.

 

thank you 

 

Okay, no problem, thank-you for answering.

 

It just seems like this would be a mandatory step if a world map is the goal (as well as being more accurate anyway - especially for larger maps).

Edited March 18, 2021 by Northstar98

[Xilon_x]

military pilots use a global network to train in real war scenarios anywhere in the world.

 

https://www.leonardocompany.com/en/products/gbts

 

where do the images of the planet earth in 3d come from?

[Northstar98]

1 minute ago, Xilon_x said:

military pilots use a global network to train in real war scenarios anywhere in the world.

 

https://www.leonardocompany.com/en/products/gbts

 

where do the images of the planet earth in 3d come from?

 

Satellites - the model of the Earth itself that's used is WGS-84

Edited March 18, 2021 by Northstar98

[Fri13]

1 hour ago, mhe said:

At 47:17 Simon says "Of course we're doing the mission editor, we're doing all the ground units as well and we're doing the weather and we're doing the voice chat and we're doing the new Earth module."

 

Anybody know what he was referring to?

 

Maybe he meant terrain module? Or maybe even a "the new terrain engine"? As ED is working for a new terrain engine (TE) that is used for the new free map... 

 

I wouldn't go for the "whole earth terrain module" yet, even when it is a ultimate dream for Eagle Dynamics. 

[rkk01]

Personally, can’t say I’m over bothered about a global map...

 

... I suspect it would sacrifice too much in terms of detail and landscape “character”

 

Sure, it would allow the use of strategic assets - but I’d guess it’s a fairly small pool of users that would routinely fly extended missions

[Northstar98]

16 minutes ago, rkk01 said:

Personally, can’t say I’m over bothered about a global map...

 

... I suspect it would sacrifice too much in terms of detail and landscape “character”

 

Sure, it would allow the use of strategic assets - but I’d guess it’s a fairly small pool of users that would routinely fly extended missions

 

It would also give us every possible theatre, provided we can at least get those areas in detail.

 

Personally I'm more interested in going from flat maps, to ones that fit on a sphere - mainly for accuracy.

Edited March 18, 2021 by Northstar98

[Northstar98]

10 minutes ago, Desert Fox said:

Really love the idea. Whole world would probably be low mesh (with maybe just some generic settlements in the right place?) like the not-modeled parts of our current terrains when you leave the actual "map".

It could be extended like a puzzle with big pieces that can be taken out separately and filled with a finer detailed structure. Or only have some small area around some airbase modeled from where you can fly over a lot of low-res terrain to a high-res terrain area to simulate realistic missions and distances.

 

Would be a huge project, LOTS of work since all maps would need to be converted/redone/integrated too (spherical map, all the geometry would change) but HUGE possibilities with that. If this was to become reality, my guess would be 2027+ earliest.

 

That's exactly what I was thinking of - a basic mesh and satellite textures, preferably having airbases but maybe using generic buildings. Maybe a similar autogen thing for cities and forests etc, but where somebody owns a dedicated map for a particular area, have that area replace the generic one.

 

The exact same setup is done in numerous flight sims, which have a basic base world map and then developers produce addons that improve certain areas, be they cities, airports/fields, countries etc.

 

When it comes to changing DCS from flat to spherical, this is something I'm very interested in particularly if there's a way to project a flat map made with a cartesian coordinate system onto a sphere, without having to redo the geometry. 

Edited March 18, 2021 by Northstar98

[Exorcet]

Just having barren flat terrain littered with airports would be nice if we could just stick the current maps on to the globe. If we had some lower detailed landscapes and cities, even better. Size just adds to flexibility and replayability.

[amalahama]

Artic scenery anyone?

[Northstar98]

3 minutes ago, amalahama said:

Artic scenery anyone?

 

Yes please!

[Xilon_x]

I also agree on the spherical map. it would be enough to have the whole world not detailed and create a piece of the whole puzzle very detailed.
one piece at a time until the whole puzzle is completed.

 

SYSTEM of military cartografy: italian lengagge translate.

 

https://www.fieitalia.com/fie/wp-content/uploads/2_CARTOGRAFIA-IGM.pdf

[jwflowersii]

I would pay a good amount of money for a whole earth module.  The ability to train and run missions anywhere in the world would be great.  Procedural generation would be required, but just having the DEM and airports would be great as well.  A partnership with Google Earth would be excellent.  I sure hope this comes to fruition.