Relativity, lightspeed and COMPUTER GAMES!

Lode · 2002-06-11T21:48:43

I''ve got a big problem! I''m going to make a space combat game that has a huge space with lots of stars. But I want it to be physically accurate (constant velocity, engines and gravitation will accelerate your ship, and so on). I''m also going to implement relativity. Please try to understand what I''m saying now because this is a part of my question: In my game, there will be NO ABSOLUTE REFERENCE POINT! All the stars will be moving, each star with it''s own velocity. The velocity of your ship can only be measured RELATIVE to one of the stars or an enemy ship, and because each star/ship is moving, your speed will be different compared to each star. The computer will use an absolute coordinate system internally, but this will be HIDDEN for the player, the player will never know where he is or when he''s standing still according to the absolute computer coordinate system. A player can only stand still according to one star, but then again he''s moving according to another star because that star has another velocity. There will be different races in my game, humans, aliens, I haven''t invented names yet so I''ll take an example race A and race B. Both races need to invent a way to determinate their position in space, and they both do this RELATIVE to a certain star, but again this star is moving so their coordinate system isn''t absolute but what else can they do in a relative world? And, race A and race B use a different star for their coordinate system so this is another proof that there''s nothing absolute. I repeat one more time: everything is relative, you can only measure your velocity relative to a star that is moving by itself already, and nothing can stand still because you always have to compare it to other things that all move in different directions. Now, I want to implement a maximum LIGHTSPEED in my game. The closer you go to lightspeed, the more energy the engines of your ship require to accelerate, the slower your time goes (you''ll see the enemies going faster because your time goes slower), and you will become longer (or: you''ll see space being contracted). BUT HERE IS MY PROBLEM!!! Against what do I have to compare this lightspeed!! Every star is moving and there''s no absolute reference point, so how do I have to see when lightspeed is reached? Because, as I said above, you can''t measure your speed, you can only measure it against another object, a star, planet or enemy ship, so in other words I have to choose a certain object (e.g. enemy ship) to compare my speed at, but then the movement of this ship will determinate lightspeed and if I''d have chosen another ship or star there would have been another lightspeed. I want this to be like in real space and, heh, against what is lightspeed compared there? I hope you understand this! Please, is there someone with Einstein-ambitions who can help me? Thanks a lot!!!!! (Sorry for all the capitals and exclamations)

Math and Physics Programming

Started by Lode May 31, 2002 02:33 PM

21 comments, last by Lode 21 years, 10 months ago

jjmontes

158

June 11, 2002 05:37 PM

I''ve read that what they saw were light travelling faster than lightspeed. What they couldn''t demostrate is that information can be sent that way. In fact, that would contradice Einstein theory.

-=[ J ]=-I always forget to change the tagline.

Hardguy

244

June 11, 2002 05:53 PM

The way the scientist made something "travel" faster than light was to bombard a an obstacle with particles and wait for one of them to "tunnel" through the obstacle (this is called the tunnel-effect in quantum mechanics). When the particle made this little trick (which was instantanious) it travled a certain lenght faster than light would have done. There is however two problems with this:

1. The particle never had a speed above the speed of light.

2. You never know what particle will make the tunneling, so you cannot send any information this way.

So Enstein is till correct! :-)

-------
Me Hardguy.
and here is my game...