I'm an ex-long time "AAA" game programmer, now solo indie developer making GearBlocks, a game all about creative building, interactive machines, and gears - lots of gears!
Hey everyone, time for a long overdue update!
By this point, I was hoping to have combustion engines done. I tried a purely physics based approach, using separate cylinder, piston, con-rod, & crank rigidbodies, and applying a force to the piston based on the current angle of the crank. This worked reasonably well, but had problems with "phantom forces" whereby the engine got torque applied to it, sometimes flipping over the vehicle it's in. Also, using physics for all the parts like this has RPM limitations, and doesn't scale that well for sim performance.
So I've decided to change tack slightly, I still want to keep the appearance of the moving parts (i.e. pistons and con-rods), but my plan is now to procedurally animate these in code. There's not really any need to use physics as these parts can't collide with anything when inside an engine. To apply torque to the crankshaft, I'm working on something similar to the electric motors, but with a different torque curve.
Hopefully I'll be able to get this done soon, but in the meantime I thought it would be good to get a small update out. Here's what's in it...
There are now some slider versions of the 1-Hole and 2-Hole connectors, some new "angle axle" connectors, and a larger centrifugal clutch.
Also, the rounded beams can now be resized one unit smaller than before.
I've improved how the invert option works for parts with a single key bind (e.g. brakes), adding a separate invert option for the joystick axis.
You can now type in values for any part behaviour slider, by right clicking it. Even values beyond the normal slider range can be entered (but no guarantees the physics won't blow up with higher RPMs or torques!)
For those who want to bypass part collisions in their builds, I've added a new "PartCollision" script mod tool that can be used to disable part collisions. Parts with their collision disabled will still collide with the ground, but nothing else.
Here are the full release notes:-
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For all Unity developers and developers-to-be, both beginners and professionals!
Indie developer of GearBlocks - a game about creative building, interactive machines, and gears - lots of gears.
For us folks who like to stay Free and use the Blender 3d program over every other costly options!
I really would like to add something to the game. For example, new part) Just how to do it, I don't know(
Hi sam! I very like you game)