1  |   Order by index

Jun 18, 1998, 10:43pm

I know how much some people would like to see virtual reality mimic
"reality" as accurately and realisticly as possible, but... I, for one, am
up for a bit of science fiction... or better yet, "virtual science" in my
cyberspace experiences.

This message thread is intended for ideas that are a bit or the futuristic
side, or that outright defy the laws of nature in the physical world we
experience every day.

I'm going to post a few messages as replies to this one, so that the
interesting ones (if any) can start subthreads. This saves display space on
some news readers, and will hopefully help to form a list of ideas with a
similar theme.

Feel free to respond to this post with ideas that you feel are too far off
in the future to otherwise even think about, or that could make AW more
interesting but may tend to make it less like the familliar surroundings of
Earth.

TechnoZeus

Jun 19, 1998, 10:29pm

This idea could be modified to work with point gravity or probably any other
kind of gravity that may some day be available in Active Worlds (or any
similay VR environment) but the way I plan to present it here is based on
the linear gravity presently used in Active Worlds.

A command could be added that would allow the vertical column belonging to
an object to have gravity that would pull up or down toward a specified
altitude in place of the "always down" gravity in place in the rest of the
world. This would allow people to build upside down houses where gravity
pulls you up to the floor, and all sorts of other "unrealistic" things. I
think it could be very interesting.

The command could be as simple as something like...
gravplane -1.2
to pull the person above or below that object toward an altitude of 12
meters.

Additionally, a world option could be added to set the default gravity plane
for the world, and possibly a separate altitude setting for the ground
object to go along with it.

Please give feedback or suggestions about this idea if it interests you.

TechnoZeus

Jun 19, 1998, 10:35pm

It would be interesting some day, to see something like the ability to
assign mass (or weight) to avatars. This could be particularly interesting
in a space station type setting, where the microgravity of the world is
trivial in comparison to the tiny attraction of one avatar to another. If
done acording to actual gravity formulas, it would even be possible to stage
solar system simulations and other interesting cooperative efforts, where
avatars actually establish orbit around each other in complex patterns.

Please give feedback or suggestions about this idea if it interests you.

TechnoZeus

Jun 19, 1998, 10:44pm

It would be interesting to be able to make some kind of viewport into
another location. Todays computers are probably not ready for it, but the
basic idea would be to render an entire scene into a bitmap of some type,
and display that bitmap as a picture or texture on an object. Even if it
was very infrequently updated, it could be very interesting, but it would be
ideal if it could some day be done with no real loss of frame rate, and
could keep up with the frame rate of the rest of the display. As I said in
the basenote of this thread (or at least had intended to, as I realize now
that I missed a few words), "This message thread is intended for ideas that
are a bit unrealistic or are noteably on the futuristic side." I think this
one qualifies as futuristic... and the next one I'm planning probably even
more so. I hope other people will have a few to add also.

Please give feedback or suggestions about this idea if it interests you.

TechnoZeus

Jun 19, 1998, 10:55pm

This idea is related to the viewport idea I just posted, but has a couple of
key differences. To impliment a stargate command (as I'm envisioning it)
the idea would be to allow a single set of coordinates to act as both
teleport coordinates and viewport coordinates, but unlike the warp and
teleport commands we have now, it would be important to allow an absolute
losation with a relative direction, so that the person approching the
stargate would be able to look through it in 3D as if the actula location it
will take them to is on the other side. Once the location is established,
the startgate could be turned on or off. It might also be nice to allow the
builder to specify bump or activate for the teleporting action while
displaying the view of the intended destination on create. This one needs
some work... but that's okay since it's probably way off in the future
anyway.

As always, please give feedback or suggestions about this idea if it
interests you.

TechnoZeus

Jun 19, 1998, 11:08pm

The only reason I'm including this idea in this thread is because it might
be considered unrealistic by some people since our present Earth technology
has no counterpart to it, however it's propably not all that far fetched,
and could probably be added to Active Worlds if CoF believes it's wanted bad
enough... at least that's what I think.

Here's the idea... To add a simple command to turn gravity on or off.
Although it's probably possible to set locations where it's on and other
locations where it's off, my idea here is to simply add a way to set it on
or off for the person who triggered the command. In other words, a way to
get a person into or out of flying mode. This could be very useful in many
ways. Just to give one example, let's say a world was set to have gravity
off by default (which presently can't be done if I'm not mistaken, but also
wouldn't be that hard to add) and the person was teleported in at a high
altitude. They could hover at that altitude while the initial loading took
place, and the a
create gravity on
command on some object could cause them to fall into a fully (or almost
fully) loaded area.

Again, please give feedback or suggestions about this idea if it interests
you.
Think I've said that enough times? I'm sure you get the idea. :·)

TechnoZeus

Jun 19, 1998, 11:19pm

Here's one that sounds simple, but could be done in many different ways, and
could turn out to be pretty complicated, depending on how it's done.
Imagine if the world owner (or even the browser operator) could set how long
it took to teleport from one place to another.... Not a delay, but a time
durring which you would be in two places at once... or partly in one place,
and partly in another place.

For example, let's say you have your browser set to pick up the chat from
the nearest 30 people, and your teleport fade time is set to one minute.
So, you teleport out of one area (or world) and into another...
every two seconds, there would be one less person allowed to chat with you
where you "were" and one more where you are going to. Also, the display
would either fade from one location to the other, or a simpler way to make
the visual change would be to just treat it like the "stuff" around you had
suddenly changed, and let the changes load as usual... right in front of you
while you watch. There would be many other possible variations on this,
but again, I'm hoping to get other people's views so I'll leave at what I
have there for now.

I just want to see some really interesting things brought up. Stuff that
might get left out if we only go with what we expect to be easily
implimented and easily accepted. I hope I've given that direction a good
start.

TechnoZeus

Jun 20, 1998, 3:34am

Ok I'm sure some may not want something like this
But lets say you make a world option called Weapons
you click it and than your world will be able to do stuff like
lets say you lay a weapon on the ground someone bumps into it a txture
with mask with the front of the fun appears on the render ware window
(kind of like qukes does with guns) and than you make a special texture
for the bullets or lasers that will come out when your shooting. Also
after bumping into the weapon the server will remove that object from
its current spot and put it in some kind of inventory for your account
and than generate anoter gun in a different spot and lets say if you get
hit by a bullet to many times and you die your kicked out of the world
for 5 minutes and lose all of your invenotry I know its a stupid idea
but ti could be cool if worked on till its more clear :)

Jun 20, 1998, 4:27am

Perfect. Just the kind of stuff I was hoping for. Not stupid at all in
my opinion. Needs a lot of work, and doesn't match the way AW "presently"
operates, but that's okay... Anybody's guess what might develop out of such
ideas.

TechnoZeus

[View Quote]

Jun 21, 1998, 6:28pm

I believe in going beyond reality and the farther the better. But you
need to make AW as close to reality as possible first, or at the same
time you strech possibility. People need as much realism in AW as can be
implemented. It is not possible to make AW too real, but it is possible
to make it much more RL than it is today.

All the extras that go beyond reality are EXTRAS! Like teleporting,
flying, knowing someone is in there on some world somewhere... etc.

The more of RL we have the faster AW will grow. If you could hand my
avatar an object that was really a file transfer to my hard drive
imagine how much more realistic AW would become! More people could use
it for Real reasons. People that did not know how to download a file
from a web page would know how to hand your av that same file as an
object... BECAUSE IT WOULD BE NATURAL TO THEM!

Realism is the lifes blood of AW. If something else comes along that is
more Real and catches up with AW then all bets are off.

We need more realism now.

zer0

Jun 21, 1998, 6:42pm

About two years ago before we got "Join" I suggested a way to share a
users viewpoint. What this means is a way to allow others to see what
your av is looking at regardless of their location. Say another
selection for a person on your contact list that is called "Viewpoint"
maybe. You click on it and if they had it enabled, you can ride around
in their head or from their 3rd person view and see what they see. Could
be a very important tool to teach with. One person could have many
attached to their "Viewpoint" as they gave a tour of some AW site for
example. Could help alot with big meetings where you want all to witness
but can't handle hundreds of people chatting their 2 cents worth.

Thought I would mention it again... your "Viewport" idea brought it
back!

:)

zer0

Jun 21, 1998, 6:52pm

This brings up something that is older than AW even. My wife is still a
WC (Worlds Chat) user. Of the few things that are superior to AW in WC
(not many!) the one that would be very nice to see n AW is the fancy way
you teleport in and out of WC. In WC for those that don't know about it,
when you teleport in others around you Avatar see a bright blue light
that flashes away to white and disappears and at the same time they hear
the "teleport" sound happen. Same effect when someone leaves... now it
might get a little noisy at GZ... but Hey! It is GZ and there is alot of
traffic... more REALISTIC!!!!

I think this is completely doable. You might not get to hear or see all
teleports because it is only possible to generate one at a time... but
it would be hard to tell you had missed one.

:)

zer0

Jun 22, 1998, 2:45am

Yes but a bit of fun will be nice too.
I think at least being able to sit in a chair in aw or maybe pick up a
small beer object would be cool :)
[View Quote]

Jun 22, 1998, 6:32am

My intention was not to keep people from posting ideas that can make AW more
realistic. My intention was to provide a small mintibranched thread from
which some brainstorming can take place. One thing you "never" want to do
in a crainstorming session, is to hold back an idea because it's too far
fetched. Let the ideas flow, and watch them evolve into realistic, useable
ideas. Meanwhile, the "out of this world" ideas will be sitting there
waiting as hardware and software technology slowly catch up.

TechnoZeus

[View Quote]

Jun 22, 1998, 6:37am

Cool. I like it. Presently, to get another person's view, I first join
that person, then join myself, then change to their avatar if I want it to
be "exact"... but this method only allows me to see something they held
still for, and not a moving real-time rendering of their view. It would be
nice to have a way to share what you are seeing. Thanks.

TechnoZeus

[View Quote]

Jun 22, 1998, 6:48am

One way to facilitate the "flash" part would be to have a world setting
added that would display a specific object for a specific duration when and
where a person teleports to a location. To make the flash you mentioned,
the object would be a sprite with a filmstrip animation... although this
method may not work perfectly since the load and display time for the
animation may vary. Another possible method would be to simply be able to
specify a texture set name and a number of frames... similar to the animate
command. For example, if the warp texture was set to "flash" and warp
texture frame count was set to 10 then every 5th of a second (or maybe this
could be set too) it would change frames, cycling once through all of the
textures from flash1 to flash10 showing up "covered" by the avatar, so it
would only stick out on the edges.

TechnoZeus

[View Quote]

Jun 22, 1998, 2:26pm

Hi TZ!

I find your concept quite interesting. For me, the biggest draw to it,
which I gather would have to happen under your concept, would be the ability
to rotate objects in *any* direction. How else could someone build upside
down, with some of the current objects? Slanted roof objects, for instance,
would need to be turned upside down in order to fit the size of the house.,
etc. etc.

That into and of itself, would present at least some more challenging design
configurations.

I think however, that the ultimate objective of COF to not provide new
objects.. like geez.. what about basic horizontal building beams??... is so
that one will purchase a world and make their own, ergo increasing
profitability. However, at some point, any business has to realize that not
everyone can be a world owner and that customers that are non world owners
will need something more challenging. Granted, starting new COF worlds adds
to the building challenge, but the universal appeal of some of them,
decidely is not there. Look at the counts of people in various worlds. AW
still draws the most people.

Based on all of the above, I would love to see the ability to rotate any
object in all dimensions.

Zzzzzzzzzzz
[View Quote]

Jun 22, 1998, 2:34pm

Hi Marvin..

Would be great to be able to hand another person an object. Imagine giving
flowers to the one you love and actually being able to *Give* to them!!

Yes, I too agree that need is there for some more reality based things
first, some refinements to the software overall and new objects and
textures! But some other fun stuff can be thrown in along the way.

I still can't understand why basic real world building objects aren't part
of the model set... ie.. crossbeams, TBars, I Bars.. all those types of
things that are indeed used to make a building real world. hahaha. Amazed
that all those unsupported roofs and ceilings have not yet fallen down!!
This is virtual *reality* .. stress on the reality. <g>

Zzzzzzzz

Jun 22, 1998, 6:37pm

I can build a upside down house with the current obs un furnished of
course :)

[View Quote]

Jun 23, 1998, 3:49am

Would be nice though to see the ability to rotate things around another
axis. That's been mentioned before, but I know it's not all that easy to
add. I've written programs to polytopes in spaces of 4 or more dimensions
so I know how much more complicated it gets when you get outside of the 2D
limitations of rotation and on top of that, most of the AW objects have
their origin at the center of the bottom rather than at the 3D center, so to
rotate them arounf a 3D center would mean first moving the object up half
it's height (along it's own Y axis) and then rotating and then moving it
back down (along it's Y axis) into place. Then there's the extra data it
would take.... lots of work. Still, I say go for it... some day at least.
:·)

Another possibility would be to allow simple mirroring of the object in
either of two directions. Not sure how (or if) RenderWare would support
that, but the math should be simpler anyway... maybe a good start, and
would work nicely with the gravplane.

TechnoZeus

[View Quote]

Jun 23, 1998, 3:56am

Actually, I would like to point to this very example to stress one reason
why we need the discussion of things that would normally not be said.
Notice that Marvin mentioned the need to be able to hand someone an object.
Notice also that he posted that in response to my response to Byte Me
posting about a way to pick up an object. If you are going to hand someone
an object, it would be good to be able to pick an object up. Remember...
Fiction is always based on reality, and reality is usually stranger than
fiction. :·)

TechnoZeus

[View Quote]

Jun 24, 1998, 11:02pm

What's wrong with just one more involuntary animation for each avatar?

That should do it..

zer0


[View Quote]

Jun 25, 1998, 7:51am

The avatar animations only cause the avatars to "move" and not to actually
display anything new. An avatar animation couldn't create a flash like that
unless the avatar was specially designed with the flash graphic hidden in
small peices inside of it, and hinged in such a way that the pieces could be
swung into place. This would require redesigning of the avatars and would
be very inefficient. Still, that was a neat thought and if the animations
worked that way it would have been a nice solution. Thanks for the input.

TechnoZeus

[View Quote]

Jul 13, 1998, 11:17am

I suggested this to Roland a few months ago as a security/spy camera and he said it would mean that much more rendering, essentially halving the frame rate. :/

[View Quote] > It would be interesting to be able to make some kind of viewport into
> another location. Todays computers are probably not ready for it, but the
> basic idea would be to render an entire scene into a bitmap of some type,
> and display that bitmap as a picture or texture on an object. Even if it
> was very infrequently updated, it could be very interesting, but it would be
> ideal if it could some day be done with no real loss of frame rate, and
> could keep up with the frame rate of the rest of the display. As I said in
> the basenote of this thread (or at least had intended to, as I realize now
> that I missed a few words), "This message thread is intended for ideas that
> are a bit unrealistic or are noteably on the futuristic side." I think this
> one qualifies as futuristic... and the next one I'm planning probably even
> more so. I hope other people will have a few to add also.

Jul 22, 1998, 2:09am

Yep, a real processor hog. That's why I put it in this thread... for
refinement by helpful and insightful people, or distant future
consideration.

TechnoZeus

[View Quote]

1  |   Order by index