It really bothered me in Terraria and Minecraft that "blocks" could sustain their position in the air when their support blocks had been displaced, and we seem to defy physics. Knowing that Starbound is NOT a game that has to follow any credentials in our, real-world physics, it is just something that is annoying and ugly. And since I recently heard that there was a new physics system added to the game's build, why not apply it to all-to-most blocks? At least maybe try? I believe that sand and other fluids/ mixture concentrations may have this concept already, but I would like to see whether or not it is implemented to other blocks, or "whole" blocks. By floating blocks, I mean the blocks that should be in-line with real-world physics. *EDIT* The title may be misleading for some people. I did not mean to negate floating blocks completely. I meant it as a simple fact that blocks that shouldn't float in the air, shouldn't float in the air. Such as a brick-block without means to support itself. *EDIT* 7/10/13 READ THE POST ALL THE WAY BEFORE COMMENTING, YOU SHOULD DO THIS ON EVERY POST ANYWAY.
CAVE-INS GALORE I can't imagine this being very easy on the processor, especially if you dig deep and carve horizontally.
Hmmm... this would be interesting to see, but also would have a complex physics system. Players would really have to work to get a flying castle or such...
So what you're saying is: No caves, because they have floating blocks. No awesome sky bases, because they have floating blocks. Let's make this game realistic when it's just a video game! Let's ruin half the gameplay!
Yeah a no from me, while I got no problems with trying to design something that is stable enough to stand. but not a lot of people would even want to do that. Gameplay before realism always.
I found having falling blocks to be really fun. That experience came from King Arthur's Gold: It functions in such a way that if you build upwards and have the underneath blocks removed, then the whole structure will fall down, and the falling blocks can crush the player. You can also use background walls to support the structure, which is a really good strategy if you are building towers because it takes longer to destroy all the background walls that way since they are not a primary target of the tower. Blah blah blah... Okay, so the point is that I found it to be very amusing. I hope that Starbound will have the physics functioning in a similar way to King Arthur's Gold. It would probably take a long time to program though, to get it working just right, so I wouldn't expect such things before the release of the full game, assuming that the full game will release in 2013.
There are enough reasonable explanations (anti-grav, propellers, some sort of hi-tech balloon etc) that could be an decorative item. Also, some people actually like floating islands (Defensible and looks cool in general). So honestly, adding an all new physics engine that's most likely going to lag the game (Most of them do, especially when its a bigger area falling) just because you don't like it isn't all that worth it. Other people like different things, we need a middle ground, not an extreme.
Yes, I agree with this, a middle ground would be perfect. There could be floating blocks in the game, like "cloud blocks" for example, if the "cloud blocks" are underneath then the above would be able to float mid-air. "Cloud blocks" would not make much sense, but I think it would be awesome to have in the game. And propellers could be used to keep a structure floating mid-air with a certain amount of blocks, the rest of the blocks could break and fall down if there are not enough propellers to support the blocks, etc. I would love to see floating islands in the game, although I would want it to make some sort of sense though. Having every block being able to float mid-air without any logic behind it is a little unattractive imo.
maybe some specific blocks that can fall, but I don't think all of them should... Like player created ones (unless specified they should fall) shouldn't fall.
If that level of physics were added, you'd go from seeing that the game is "smooth on a macbook air" to, "bring your video card". While this works in KAG because of the tiny maps, consider a server of 50 people across a universe.
After reading many of the posts both sides of the argument make sense and I don't think they are mutually exclusive. Some floating blocks could be attached to the background which makes sense to me for the caves having floating blocks. Also no floating blocks below ground could break gameplay. A floating building in the sky does seem kinda dumb too (without special abilities to make it fly). So like in Ace of Spades when blocks are above ground floating they should fall and when below ground they are attached to the background.
Since there already blocks that are affected by gravity (I.e sand and gravel), creating a mod that adds this property to all blocks should be trivial.
Starbound only generates stuff around your screen's range, you wouldn't see a massive amount of blocks falling down constantly anyways, that's why I don't see a big problem with adding more depth to the physics in the game. In addition to that, cluster servers are very likely to be available in the future of Starbound, which would decrease lag by a lot. So I believe it's quite possible for Starbound to have more depth with the physics without messing the game up completely. Just that it would take a long time to get everything functioning properly. So I don't think it would make it in for a beta release in 2013, it would likely take months to implement properly, so that would be after new year sometime in 2014. So what I'm saying is that I'm not sure if the developers will take the extra time for more depth to the physics, when that time could be used on everything that is left to be done on the roadmap. I would hope for more depth to the physics, but it's very improbable for 2013. Yeah, but this part is very important, below ground and above ground differences are important to notice. It would be much less likely for blocks to fall from below ground level, because there would be background walls to support the blocks. Above ground level however, you would need something to support the blocks so they can stay in place. This would mean you would have to think before building something above ground level as it's more likely to fall down. But as long as you connect the above ground level structure to the below ground level solidity with very strong blocks, there should not be much of a problem. Just some thoughts.
Yeah that bothers me a lot, but it would be difficult on the devs to implement. For floating cities the platform blocks could be bioshock infinite- like with rotors and such. Or maybe a special platform that floats, but then too much weight and it would collapse. I like the idea, but that is one BIG change to make.
Sorry, but physics are annoying. There's probably going to be some physics blocks, but not all the blocks will be affected. And floating blocks are only ugly if you make them ugly.
