[WIP] KuBiX Pool

[TechNoiZ]

Hi

Something I'm playing with at the moment. Graphics not great but any feedback/advice on the idea most welcome ....

http://www.technoiz.co.uk/KuBiX/KuBiX_Pool.html

>^.^<

[rachil0]

+Originality, it's certainly something you don't see everyday

I think the controls could be a little more intuitive. Once a player picks a target ball, I would go ahead and place the camera AT the center of the cue ball, and looking TOWARDS the center of the target ball. At that point, restrict the user to two degrees of freedom - pitching or yawing the camera away from it's current orientation, which they can control with the arrow keys. (The user can also "backup" a level from here, canceling their target ball selection and going back to pick another).

I think an even better solution, instead of the arrow keys, is a raycasting using the mouse. Once the target ball has been selected and the camera has moved into the "cue towards target" position, now let the user fine tune the shot by clicking on the screen. When a click occurs, cast a ray through the mouse pointer, onto the plane defined by the camera normal and the target ball position. Normalize that, and then use it as the shot direction.

Neither one of these is given the user much help when it comes to bankshots, however.

[TechNoiZ]

Thanks for those rachil0 ... I will certainly have a look at those ideas ... and how they feel to play.

:-)

[Diniden]

Well it was interesting but I could forsee much anger coming from the thought of it being hard to get a grip on where to shoot...as of now there is nothing to orient the user as to where the location of the balls lie in 3D space. I suggest gridding things and mebbe have trace markers that shoot straight to the walls of the play field to help with that. Mebbe make them only appear when the user rolls over any of the balls.

[TechNoiZ]

Hi Diniden

Thanks for the feedback .. :-)

Rotating the cube gives a full view of where the balls are in relation to eachother and the pockets/walls. There should also be a sight line for both where the cue ball travels towards the object ball and the resulting paths of both cue and object ball after the collision.



Are these features not visible? ..... Please let me know (anyone) if they are not showing up on your browser/setup.

[Diniden]

They're showing up but they are not enough IMO. I still feel totally in the black when I try to think where/how to shoot next...

[JerryScript]

Nice. I agree with the others that the control system needs to be a bit more automatic. Aligning the view from the cue to the target ball first, then allowing adjustment via the mouse with fine-tuning via arrow keys is probably the most intuitive.

Showing the path from the cue to the target is probably a must. Showing the resulting path of the target and cue might be an option for easy settings, but probably should be removed for advanced settings.

I realize the collision response algorithm you're using doesn't include spin, but you might want to add some form of english. I belive the same website that posted the algorithm you're using has one for spin, I'll see if I can dig it up.

[TechNoiZ]

Thanks for the feedback ...

Helping with shot selection is something easily rectified by giving the collection of balls some sort of structure; numerical, coloured, points ... etc.

What I don't want to do is reduce the targetting to 2D so it seems that using the mouse must be supplemented with a further control (for the third dimension). If that control comes in the form of changing the view and shooting along the line of sight from the cue ball then there may be issues with the balls obscuring the pockets. If the view is then changed to get round this - this then changes the direction of aim in the 3rd dimension ...... and you would need to adjust for this using ... ???

I guess that this is the nub of what I am trying to do - devise a 3D targetting system - independant of 'viewing angle'. Using the mouse only gives control over 2 dimensions so a third controller must be introduced. Because the cube can be rotated to view from any angle - strictly tieing the mouse to X and Y for example makes no sense if the cube has been rotated and/or inverted ....

This is why I tied the targetting system to the sides of the cube - no matter how it is rotated, the system remains consistent ... It doesn't seem as simple a case as merely shooting at 3D target - selecting the target gives an exact 'depth' dimension - but in the case of 3D pool - this depth dimension needs to be as equally adjustable as the other two; 3 dimensions - 3 controllers. In a shooting game the depth value is not that important ... an 'infinite' depth will do to create a 'line of sight'


Perhaps someone would be kind enough to find a link to a system which works better for them, or demo what they mean ... I'd like to get this right

[JerryScript]

Something I've been thinking of, but haven't implented yet, is a full 3d control via the mouse alone. X and Z being controlled by mouse movement, and Y via the mouse wheel. Of course, you'll still need nudging for fine tuning via keys, but I think you could work out a pretty intuitive control system with just movement and mouse wheel scrolling.

I'll try to throw an example together this weekend if you don't have time to do it yourself before then.

[TechNoiZ]

Sounds good .... this can be done I know but can the wheel be relied upon to be present ....

Mind you .... I guess having both systems would be best - mouse + wheel AND numbers .... gives fine control where needed and an alternative in case of a missing mouse ..

I'll do it. I thought about spin (ball 2 ball as their is no baize) - and will try to incorporate this into the cue-power control.