Speed boat simulator in development

[ToddW]

Hi, folks. I'm developing a speed boat simulator that some people here might find interesting:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Os07IiyGYnA

More information and videos here:

http://speedboatsim.com

While it's not for sale and there's no demo yet, hopefully in the next few months I'll have something people with a decent gaming rig can try for free and buy at a reasonable price.

I'd love to get some feedback from you guys. Let me know what you think, you might even influence how it develops! Feel free to leave comments and questions in this thread or on the web site itself.

Mods: If this isn't the right forum for this, let me know and I'll delete and repost this somewhere else (or you can just move it as you see fit). I figured the "general boating discussion" might be as good a place as any.

[shadowcat]

very cool- great work-love it

[ToddW]

Thanks!

[ToddW]

I've created a forum at the site for discussion on the speedboat simulator: http://www.performancesimulations.com/wp/forums/forum/speedboat-simulator/

I'm new to the forum software so am not sure how it works yet, but it looks like you might be able to sign up and subscribe to the forum so you're notified upon the simulator's release.

[Steve Litzell]

Just need to change the motor sound to Two stroke sound or change the motor on boat. Four cyle sounds on a out board sound funky, Steve

[ToddW]

Yeah, I agree. Thanks for saying so.

It's tough to find suitable samples and very expensive to record a specific engine. Ideally I'd go for a Merc 300XS, but we couldn't manage to find one to record.

I've got one other sample that's a four cylinder, still a four stroke but it might at least sound a bit closer to an outboard if it's sped up to the proper frequency. One of these days I'll make a comparison video with both sounds and let people chime on which one they prefer. If the sound guy ever locates a proper engine and it can be recorded for the right price, I'd replace this one and save it for other boat types.

[Ketzer]

Cool. You might add some standard hazards: stumps, wakes, wind, gators, jumping fish, and the like.

[ice_spy]

I like the idea of variables.
This is awesome !. I've been waiting for a game like this for ever. More so one that also has racing and in cockpit view. Must include formula tunnel hulls !!. Lol.
You could win credits to upgrade your boat & motor. Even incorporating tow vehicle and trailer for at the ramp launch scenes. Hull & engine, choice, paint jobs and engine modifications with after market parts Including performance props.

When the prop blows out getting up on the plane, the engine sound needs to rev higher every time the roost kicks up.
You could have a damage meter for hitting debris both on the prop and the hull Effecting speed. This could also include blowing motor from over revs or Heat etc.
Maps are usually what make or brake a game. So I think a selection of good maps and race course venues would be needed.
Start entry level low budget. Race to win coin and upgrade your rig or achieve next level.
Get Mercury to sponsor the game and they could give you all the Merc on heat sounds you need ;) or tell them your going to OMC . Lol

[ToddW]

Thanks, I'm glad you like it.

Cockpit view is the main draw, that's the most important one. Once I'd added that I really wanted to see some flybys, especially to see how the boat was flying and so forth. That turned out to look pretty cool so I kept it as part of the simulator. It's very useful as it turns out for tuning the hull.

These videos don't show it yet, but you can do force vector visualizations and see the waterline drawn around the hull so you can see exactly what the boat is doing. You can see it all right through the hull from any angle. (I meant to make a video of that, thanks for the reminder.) It's quite useful for tweaking the pad height/width/length (and a bunch of other things) to get the wetted area minimized for maximum speed. That's best done from outside the boat of course. I figure a few tech nerds like me will enjoy that.

I'm doing this alone so can't get too carried away with bells and whistles like career modes, multiplayer or AI racing, and all that kind of stuff or it'll take years to release something. The physics are so processor intensive (thousands of forces per boat) that you can't really do a lot of boats anyway. The current plan is to release a version fairly close to what it is now, just a pure simulator with no racing in it. The idea right now is to tinker with the hull design and see what it does.

If sales justify it then I'll look into doing more, maybe add a financially driven game mode like you talked about where you buy parts and so forth. I'm not sure yet. I do have rent to pay like everyone else, after all, so I may just start with what customers want the most and go from there.

Maps: Yes, I do want to have a lot of lakes and rivers to run on. Probably I'll release a free demo that runs on the Oculus Rift and regular monitors with one lake in it only (probably the one in the video which is the lake I grew up on), maybe restrict some of the boat settings or something like that. Not totally sure just yet what I'll do, but I appreciate the ideas.

Tunnel hulls: Yes, that's something I'm interested in. Some sort of F1 style boat would be great fun. It takes a really long time to write a procedural boat mesh generator like this though for a separate hull type, so the first release will probably just be the v-bottom outboards like shown in the videos. It's customizeable though, you can change length, width, deadrise angle at the front and rear, etc., I think about 19 different parameters. I added jackplate setback too the other day which affects the boats quite a bit, so maybe it's 20 parameters now.

I put some Mercury 300XS decals on the engine and it looked great. Licensing is an issue though. Working with manufacturers can be very expensive and cause huge delays depending on who gets involved (they have a tendency of telling you what you can and can't do, must and must not do, etc.). It's usually a recipe for major headaches, so I'll probably avoid that. I've done that in another project I worked on and it wasn't really worth it. It depends on the particular people involved, it can work or it can just be a horrible, expensive experience.

Anyway, this leads me to ask all you guys a question: I'm thinking of probably a $25-$30 price tag for the first version for those that enjoy the free demo, basically what you see here plus more lakes and rivers, the ability to at least color the boat maybe. Without any other boats to race against, it's just you playing with your own boat designs on the water alone to see how they work, would you be inclined to go for it?

The trouble is if it needs racing it could take many, many more months, maybe an extra year of development. So I can't get too carried away here. The price would reflect that though.

Thoughts?

[ToddW]

Oh, one other thing you mentioned was the prop RPM. Yes, I agree, I would really like the prop to ventilate there and especially when it planes initially. This is easier said than done so I'm not sure if the first release will have that, but it's definitely something I want. As a kid, our family had a custom 18' fiberglass Switzercraft, silver and red metalflake, with a 175 HP Merc. It would ventilate hard when it planed while trimmed up at all, rpm would go way up, then it would hook hard when the stern got over the bow wave and shoot off like a rocket. I'd really like to capture that again. This is of course the same thing that you're talking about with the rooster tail. I agree it'd be very cool and it's up very close to the top of my list on the physics side. Just got to figure out a way to do it...

[ice_spy]

It's great so far, I would buy it now for $25.
Keep up the great work. It's the best boat game/ sim I've seen available. :)

[ToddW]

Forces view showing aerodynamic and hydrodynamic force vectors. This also shows a blue outline where the boat touches the water to visualize the wetted surface area of the hull. This is handy for tuning the hull shape to get it really flying.

http://www.performancesimulations.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/boat-sim-forces-view.png

59675

[Gene East]

I don't play video games; however, since other readers are offering opinions on how to change/improve your idea I'm offering my 2 cents worth.
PUT A HELMET ON THE DRIVER!!!!!!

[ToddW]

:d :d :d

[ToddW]

Can I ask you guys which engine sound you prefer? The red boat or the blue boat? Neither one is really a set of recordings from a 2-stroke outboard, but these are my only options right now so it'll have to be one or the other.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYhMNj21LBM&feature=youtu.be

[ice_spy]

I would say blue sounds more like a 2smoke outboard. Any idea of a release date?

[ToddW]

I would say blue sounds more like a 2smoke outboard. Any idea of a release date?

Not sure of a release date. I'm hoping to begin alpha testing in the next couple of weeks. Depending on feedback, I'll see where it goes from there.

[ToddW]

Ok, how about this one?


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7hG47hpvD4A&feature=youtu.be

[ToddW]

Forums are up and working at the new site now:

http://speedboatsim.com

Anyone interested in this project can register and sign up for the forum. I'll try to figure out a way to send everybody there an email when it's released so you're among the first to know.

[ToddW]

Hmm... I'm trying to post a picture but it's saying "nope, sorry. Not happening."

[ToddW]

A Facebook page for Design it, Drive it: Speedboats has just been started. Those with any interest in the boat simulator will get more information there as development continues.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/405024603032224/

[ToddW]

Ha! Ok, this was a fun first. I got collisions working, so naturally the first thing I did was run the boat over a little point that sticks out in the lake. It jumped a lot better than I thought it would. :D


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vjj7zggUfCw&feature=youtu.be

[Master Oil Racing Team]

That's very cool. Can't imagine how you can do stuff like that. Keep up the good work.

[ToddW]

Thanks. :)


Here's my first shot at a trailer:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KrvYVpmLwU&feature=youtu.be


Also started a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/designitdriveitspeedboats

[ToddW]

How's this for reflections on the boat?

https://www.facebook.com/designitdriveitspeedboats/photos/a.1635881206660245.1073741828.1630619293853103/1635881169993582/?type=1&theater

[ToddW]

New trailer:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28nNwPr32tA

[ToddW]

Released! :D

http://www.speedboatsim.com/

http://www.speedboatsim.com/products

[daveswaves]

I can say that I have played with the finished version and it does PLAY well, I need a better steering wheel to utilize the full program. Todd has done a great job of analyzing the forces and vectors involved in marine propulsion and as a result, the hulls behave much like a real hull. Changing the width and length of pads for example affect chine walk, speed etc with the same engine.

[ToddW]

Thanks, Dave. I've been getting good feedback from people so far. Boaters seem to like it. :)

[ToddW]

This company contacted me yesterday about adding support for their motion platforms. Definitely interested!

http://www.simcraft.com/

[ToddW]

I wrote an article about chine walk. Discuss!

http://www.speedboatsim.com/chine-walk-tech/

[ToddW]

Three minutes running the sim on the Oculus Rift:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKO6R1tg_HQ

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Very amazing at what you have done. The bow seems a little high to me but the reactions look good. One thing I might suggest is that even though you are on calm water, you might try to plug in crossing your own wake after you did the turn. There should have been two or three bumps and some turning prior to the first wake and then correcting as you crossed it back into smooth water. I haven't followed this thread all the way through, so this might have been brought up earlier, but in the interest of being realistic I thought I should mention it. Besides that, I think you are doing a remarkable job with your simulation.

[ToddW]

Thanks. :)

Waves are a very computationally expensive thing to do, especially waves that are created by the boat itself. It's something I've got some ideas on, but it'll take time and I'm not entirely sure it'll work. What I'd really like to see is the boat creating its own bow wave during planing so the prop will lift up out of the water and ventilate when it goes over the hump. Very expensive computationally and a difficult thing to do though, especially a wake that extends across a large area like an entire lake that you can cross back over on the return trip. This all has to run in real time and not require a supercomputer to solve, after all. Whether it happens or not, it's in my "maybe some day" mental checklist at least for the time being. :)

[ToddW]

Probably upwards of 10-12 years ago I did experiment with it briefly. This is terribly ugly graphics here, but it shows some physics in the water at least with something moving through it. Something like this might be possible on today's hardware if it's constrained to a small area of water that moves with the boat. I.e., doing it for an entire lake might be a problem, but perhaps it might work for the area around the boat. Some day I would like to try it though.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRNdI7c7_1M

[ToddW]

This next one is much more recent using the prettier graphics. These waves are done with real time physics, it's not some prerendered animation trick. So.... Maybe some day but it won't be anytime soon.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XBID4a_xo8Y

[ToddW]

The bow seems a little high to me but the reactions look good.

Keep an eye on the trim gauge (each tick is 2 degrees). I was intentionally hanging the bow up about as high as it could go without blowing over in a lot of that video to make it more interesting and get some chine walk going. Just going for mad air. At max speed the angle of attack is not normally that high of course.

[Master Oil Racing Team]

Thanks for the info Todd. My kids and grandkids do video games and can see all the pointers and stuff going on, but I can't follow it. When I was racing, I never looked at any gauges and just drove by feel, had no gauges or anything to look at. Like I said, I had followed this thread at first and then I got busy and had not seen some of the in between tweaks and advances you had made, but I could see you have been doing an excellent job of mimicking a V bottom although I have never driven one in competition. Seems like doing a V bottom would be harder than other boats, and I guess that's why you chose that one. Hat's off to you.

[ToddW]

Added support for twin and triple outboard setups today. Here's a new trailer showing that off:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=83ZolAnVoiM

[ToddW]

Leaderboards for top speed shootout runs have been added. Here's a blast down the mile on the Rift:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZSbWl7L-ik

[ToddW]

Tunnel boats are here! This was developed with help from a US Formula 1 boat owner/driver.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5c61WcnVwec

Store:
http://store.steampowered.com/app/501090