[HN Gopher] Thorium - A Starship Bridge Simulator
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Thorium - A Starship Bridge Simulator
Author : matijash
Score : 191 points
Date : 2023-03-01 17:13 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (thoriumsim.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (thoriumsim.com)
| anononaut wrote:
| Maaan! Bridge sims like Star Trek, Artemis, and Empty Epsilon
| have been some of the most fun I've ever had playing games with
| my friends in my entire life. Mind you, we play it as a drinking
| game with plenty of space shanty singing and other LARP parodies.
| As a genre, it has my highest recommendation above all others,
| but it's hard to get it together.
| bovermyer wrote:
| I've played Artemis before. Thorium's promise of a "game master"
| and a narrative outside of combat sounds interesting.
|
| Incidentally, here's a link to the latest alpha:
|
| https://github.com/Thorium-Sim/thorium-nova/releases/tag/v1....
| starkparker wrote:
| Thorium is great; it's closer to a virtual tabletop for starship
| RPGs than a standalone game, built around creating interactive
| narratives. That sets it apart from the more straightforward
| game-style bridge sims, like Artemis[1] and EmptyEpsilon[2],
| which have scriptable scenarios with narrative elements but have
| more fundamentally game-focused mechanics.
|
| All of these get used in a lot of fun ways for live events beyond
| their design, too. Thorium's "family tree" comes from interactive
| events at planetariums, and EmptyEpsilon, being open-source with
| an HTTP API and game-master screen for directly manipulating live
| game state and pretending to be ships, became a popular front-end
| for European LARPs.[3]
|
| 1: https://www.artemisspaceshipbridge.com/#/
|
| 2: https://daid.github.io/EmptyEpsilon/
|
| 3: https://www.odysseuslarp.com/blog/steering-the-starship-
| empt...
| matijash wrote:
| an important question - what did you build Thorium in? How happy
| are you with it?
| shaunxcode wrote:
| My first thought was - this reminds me of the space center I went
| to when I was a kid! It was in pleasant grove utah and built on
| mac classics with hypercard for the software! Then I scroll down
| "Alex started working on starship bridge simulators when he
| worked at the McAuliffe Space Education Center in Pleasant Grove,
| Utah". Small world!
| andrecarini wrote:
| I'm interested but I have no idea what this actually is, after
| reading the whole page.
|
| > You can play it as part of a larger event, or with your friends
| in your living room.
|
| So this is a video game with couch co-op?
|
| > part of a larger event
|
| There's an online mode?
|
| > The USS Voyager Mk II
|
| Is this a simulator that requires you to be in that room from the
| picture?
|
| ---
|
| Is this like Space Station 13?
| surfsvammel wrote:
| I truly hope this project live long and prosper. (And I am saying
| that honestly, not trying to be Reddit-isch)
| kjuulh wrote:
| Sounds super fun!
|
| Nitpick: the padding on the bullet points are a bit messed up =D
| WFHRenaissance wrote:
| NGL this seems like an Ender's Game scenario waiting to happen
| ashton314 wrote:
| Ah... I've been on that space ship simulator. (Voyager) I sat in
| that elevated nook--the engineer's position, naturally. So much
| fun. Going to the space center was the most coveted birthday
| party experience.
|
| I was mildly disappointed to learn that the whole thing was not
| an iron-clad simulator (i.e. everything I did as engineer was
| just busy work--ship systems could still function if the GM
| decided they would) but once I got into D&D later as an adult, I
| appreciated the setup much much more.
|
| I'm going to have to try this out some time...
| alexanderson wrote:
| That ship is still the gold-standard of simulator design. The
| two decks, the many levels on the bridge itself, the nooks and
| crannies, the two viewscreens, the separate brig and sickbay -
| ah, it takes me back.
|
| The goal for Thorium Nova is to create that iron-clad simulator
| that you're looking for, where every crew member's job has a
| real impact on the overall simulation. Right now I'm working on
| the power grid simulation, which will have huge effects on the
| rest of the ship. The quartermaster will have to keep fuel and
| coolant stocked in the reactor room, the engineer will have to
| monitor the reactor's usage and heat to make sure there's
| enough capacity for an emergency, and someone else will be in
| charge of answering the captain's call to "reroute all power to
| the engines!"
|
| Building these simulations is an interesting balance of realism
| and gameplay enjoyment. Hopefully I get each of those right.
| shadowgovt wrote:
| It'll definitely be important to allow that to be overridden
| (either by just flagging a station "does the right thing" or
| by building some AIs to fill in) so the game is usable with
| fewer than the required number of players. But that can come
| later (last I checked, most bridge simulators don't have that
| so plenty of time to get around to it).
|
| Regarding engines: A random tidbit I picked up about nuclear
| submarines is that the reactors actually require quite a bit
| of manual tuning and observation. This was intentional:
| especially back in the day of the first nuclear subs,
| automation hardware would have been bulky and (spacewise)
| expensive, and the alternative was to leave the systems
| manually-tuned and train sailors to do the job. From a safety
| perspective, one of course chooses automation... But war has
| a different safety perspective, and the great thing about a
| sailor is that when they aren't busy running the reactor they
| can do something else. They can also react to a captain's
| needs and get creative in a way that an automated system
| can't (a major concern for the design was that a captain
| could be hamstrung in a sea battle trying to get the sub to
| do something that the safety interlocks disallowed).
|
| That aspect of real vessels, that it's possible to "redline"
| them and run them in a configuration that is temporarily
| viable but risks damage or makes them more vulnerable in some
| other way, is an interesting piece to play with in a game
| environment as a risk players can choose to take.
| alexanderson wrote:
| Yeah, the intention is the station count is adaptive. You
| choose the number of players and the ship you'll play with,
| and it automatically generates an appropriate station
| configuration.
|
| So if you have fewer players, you can play on a smaller
| ship that doesn't have any non-player crew members. Or,
| conversely, a large group will have additional stations to
| spread the work out a little bit.
|
| Hopefully everything feels meaningful and impactful at
| every crew and ship size and nothing feels like busywork.
| unixhero wrote:
| Some screenshots and pricing would be nice!
| rbanffy wrote:
| It's open source. I believe you can self-host it.
| unixhero wrote:
| Sure, but I won't self host something, and basically
| contribute as a tester, without knowing what it will look
| like. This is due to how I value my time.
| alexanderson wrote:
| Self-host might not be the right way to think about it.
| It's more of a video game with a built-in web server, like
| Age of Empires where one player hosts the game for everyone
| else.
|
| The only difference is all the other players only need a
| web browser to connect. But you can play the game from a
| single computer if you want.
| alexanderson wrote:
| It's under development, so screenshots are few at this point.
|
| It's also open-source, so it's free to download! Alpha are in
| the Github releases page.
| stuntkite wrote:
| I used to have a pretty sweet Artemis setup. Projector main
| screen, a central dedicated server and a few tablets. That was
| really fun. You could get anyone of any age to play. I should set
| that up again. And I guess make some friends.
| alexanderson wrote:
| Hey friends. Thorium's developer here. Happy to answer any
| questions or give more insights.
|
| Thorium Classic has been in development since 2016 and is
| primarily intended to be used in brick-and-mortar space centers
| out in Utah, like the Space Place[1] and CMSC[2]. As such, there
| isn't a lot of content and documentation to get newcomers up-and-
| running with it.
|
| Thorium Nova is currently under development and is intended to be
| used by a broader audience. It will include much more content,
| pre-built missions, and more integrated tutorials.
|
| The project is open-source, so anyone is welcome to contribute[3]
| and follow along with the progress of each alpha.
|
| 1: https://www.thespaceplace.org
|
| 2: https://spacecenter.alpineschools.org
|
| 3: https://thoriumsim.com/blog/contributing-to-thorium-nova
| myself248 wrote:
| This looks like a lot of fun, I've played some Artemis but not
| explored the other offerings in the space.
|
| One thing that's always struck me as weirdly difficult with the
| spaceship-bridge genre, but wholeheartedly embraced by generic
| flight-sims, is custom control surfaces! Everyone wants pedals
| and knobs and sliders and a big red button in the middle of the
| console. Kerbal players are notorious for hooking up the most
| bizarre junk they can find as in-game controls, and the game is
| richer for it. I saw mention of DMX lighting, but nothing about
| mapping random HID controls...
|
| Another thing we did playing Artemis, was put the "engineering"
| station in another room, with walkie-talkies so you had to
| actually "call down to engineering" to ask them to do things.
| That should be Teamspeak or something now, I suppose, but
| having the various parts of the ship in physically separate
| places (perhaps across the internet?) really adds something,
| IMHO.
| starkparker wrote:
| EmptyEpsilon has support for a bunch of DMX flavors as well
| as Hue lights and custom control surfaces, as well as an
| optional exposable API that can run Lua scripts on game
| state.
|
| Odysseus LARP paired that functionality with a bunch of RPi
| Zero W-powered hardware puzzles to represent ship systems,[1]
| so Engineers had to physically tinker with things in order to
| get systems back up and running after they broke. That
| included things like going through crawlspaces and ladders to
| access certain components, digging through a printed manual
| when computer systems were "down".
|
| 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IE7j1SgUpKs
| alexanderson wrote:
| I've actually got WebGamepad support built into the pilot
| station. Start up the game, start a flight, and load up the
| pilot station. Then plug in your gamepad, wiggle it so the
| browser recognizes it, and a config icon will appear in the
| bottom right. From there you should be able to configure
| every control on that screen to work with the buttons and
| sticks on your gamepad.
|
| DMX and other show-control features will come much later,
| after the main gameplay features are completed. But they're
| my favorite part, so I'll definitely get to them eventually.
| matthewfcarlson wrote:
| While I haven't played any bridge simulator, I am personally a
| huge fan of collaborative experiences that tech can enable.
| There are some many interesting things that can be done when
| you augment a human's storytelling capability with an
| environment that can change with their story, offering a way
| for the audience to interact in a meaningful way with each
| other and the story itself.
|
| This seems like a wonderful project with a lot of love. Keep
| going :)
| alexanderson wrote:
| Thanks for the encouragement, and the reminder of what makes
| this project special.
| Apocryphon wrote:
| Any details about each role's responsibilities? Curious what's
| involved for Tactical.
| alexanderson wrote:
| Very much up in the air at the moment, but it will likely be
| what you typically find in bridge simulators. For tactical, a
| beam weapon, a projectile weapon, some kind of point-defense,
| shields, and a targeting scheme for all of them.
|
| If you want to help guide what's included and how they fit
| together, I'm happy to entertain proposals in the Github
| discussions or Discord.
|
| I should add that Thorium Nova will include a lot more inter-
| ship controls. Things like security officers, system
| maintenance, medical teams, cargo transfer, power grid
| distribution - that kind of thing. Adding all of that will
| effectively double the max-crew size of the typical 6 you see
| in other bridge sims.
| Apocryphon wrote:
| Could the ship carry fighter wings? :p
| alexanderson wrote:
| I'm hoping for it! The engine supports multiple player
| ships, so if one of those player ships happened to spawn
| from another player ship, and if that ship happened to be
| smaller and have a single player station, the engine
| doesn't really care.
| bee_rider wrote:
| Dual seat fighters with a pilot and a weapons officer are
| also very cool.
| fknorangesite wrote:
| If we're not careful this comment section is going to
| scope creep itself into Star Citizen.
| [deleted]
| japhib wrote:
| Going to the Christa McAuliffe Space Center is hands-down the
| best field trip I went on in elementary/middle school. We even
| went back as high schoolers. This project seems incredible!
| alexanderson wrote:
| psst. If you're still living in the area, they do group
| missions for adults too. If you've got the time and willing
| friends, definitely opt for a 5-hour mission. It'll be just
| as much fun as you remember.
| ethangarofolo wrote:
| 5-hour mission? Surely something so awesome can't actually
| exist...
| caseysoftware wrote:
| I did one of these at THAT Conference a few years back with a few
| friends. In our case, we had the main display and then each
| person had their own console with their area - weapons, nav,
| engineering, and science - and the captain had to call out
| commands and make the whole thing work.
|
| We walked in thinking it would be fun but almost silly.. and
| walked out drained because it was intense. You don't have time to
| do anything than monitor your own display and make sure you're
| ready for a variety of things that could happen next.
|
| Obviously, there were zero stakes (other than embarrassing
| yourself) but had a new perspective on what naval battle _may_ be
| like.
|
| If you have the chance to do it - especially in person with the
| big displays - do it.
| bee_rider wrote:
| The one takeaway I've gotten from bridge simulators VS normal
| video games is how hard it is to coordinate people doing
| different tasks and looking at different interfaces. Even in a
| game like PUBG that requires quite a bit of communication,
| you've all got the same type of view from different angles.
| Having a totally different view makes communication much
| harder.
|
| I can't imagine how they run a bridge in real life -- although
| as professionals they must have a ton of skills and training at
| it.
| starkparker wrote:
| The training can look unsurprisingly a lot like a spaceship
| bridgesim: https://youtu.be/oUCoDIrdR_4?t=33
| bee_rider wrote:
| Oh yeah -- I got to tour a bridge simulator while
| interviewing at some defense contractor (didn't get hired,
| though, maybe they could tell I'd want to load a spaceship
| bridge simulator up on the thing).
|
| It is kind of funny, I actually got a "seasick" feeling on
| it. The simulated "deck" didn't move, but the image through
| the "windows" did, I think having grown up near the coast
| I'd been on enough boats that my brain expected the floor
| to start moving to keep up with the horizon.
| LoganDark wrote:
| I guess I'm sort of lucky that it's impossible for me to
| get seasick. Though I don't think it'll ever be useful in
| a situation like that.
|
| p.s. first time I've seen a real em-dash in someone
| else's HN comment, very nice :3
| Aeolun wrote:
| > The simulated "deck" didn't move
|
| I have absolutely no experience with ships beyond small
| sailboats, but watching the video gave me a very strong
| 'that's not a ship' feeling, and it all comes down to it
| being a rock solid environment.
| Animats wrote:
| It's possible to go much further.[1] This is the "USS
| Trayer", at the U.S. Navy's Great Lakes Naval Training
| Center. All U.S. Navy recruits go through an all-night test
| onboard. It looks like a real ship at night, outside and
| inside. It's even in water, moored alongside a pier. The
| ship can be navigated, go into combat, and take damage,
| including flooding and fires. It's deliberately very
| stressful.
|
| All this is indoors and inland. It's in a water tank. It's
| a big simulator for an entire crew, a hundred or so at
| once.
|
| The U.S. Navy does have bridge training simulators, but not
| enough of them. That's come out after some ship accidents
| due to bad coordination and ship-driving on the bridge.
|
| [1] https://youtu.be/jibm7kyIGcM
| huevosabio wrote:
| I would love this with the setup of the Expanse and somehow
| combined with the combat of Children of a Dead Earth.
| alexanderson wrote:
| The game is under active development, and I'm trying to keep an
| open governance model, where anyone can contribute ideas and
| shape the direction of development. If you want, feel free to
| pop into the Github discussions to propose how to build these
| kinds of mechanics into the game!
| stuff4ben wrote:
| HAH! I did exactly this with my daughters when they were like 8
| or 9. Except I just printed out maps on a piece of paper and we
| used everyday items for the spaceship. I had a golfclub I used to
| steer the ship, we had walkie talkies that were scanners too when
| we explored planets, and I think one of them used a collander as
| a radar. We cozied up in one of their twin beds with the blankets
| surrounding us. I basically DM'd the entire thing and they loved
| it. Weekend mornings while their mom slept in, they'd say "Daddy,
| can we play space ship?" and then they'd go around the house
| grabbing things to use as controls for it. Such great memories!
|
| Edit: forgot to mention, I would have loved to have Thorium when
| we were playing. But then again, I loved their imagination.
| mysterydip wrote:
| When my daughter was ~3, we would use her pop-up fire engine
| tent as our spaceship, then hop out onto a planet after landing
| and pick some random stuffed animals to represent aliens.
| "pickle planet puppy" was a favorite recurring character. lots
| of earthquakes and volcanoes to create urgency to get back to
| the ship. Little kids' imaginations are powerful!
| Aeolun wrote:
| > Little kids' imaginations are powerful!
|
| So are the parents' when they put their mind to it. I'm
| having a lot of fun playing 'find the invisible boy' every
| morning.
| matijash wrote:
| This is an awesome idea, stealing it :)
| dontbesquare wrote:
| This sounds like such an awesome project!
|
| "Bridge Simulators, like Thorium Nova, are cooperative live-
| action role-playing games set in space. Players act out the roles
| of a spaceship bridge crew, such as communications officer,
| navigator, or captain. They work together to complete a set of
| mission objectives.
|
| Thorium Nova adds a flight director, who sits behind the scenes
| to act as a game master, controlling what happens inside the
| simulation, acting out the roles of aliens the crew encounters,
| and guiding the crew through the storyline.
|
| Many bridge simulators, like Artemis or Empty Epsilon, focus only
| on arcade action. Thorium Nova attempts to bridge the gap by
| offering rich stories in a dynamic environment, while staying
| simple enough for anyone to enjoy among friends in their living
| room."
| ryanianian wrote:
| I haven't played Thorium, but bridge sims are a lot of fun.
| Especially when playing with colleagues or other engineers. I've
| found non-tech people can get frustrated and bored with them, but
| my 70yo non-techie mother is in love with the engineering station
| of Artemis. It is a lot of work to play the Captain role, and in
| any event the game is tiring after about an hour.
|
| What's really fun is having everyone in the room engaged with a
| central game (played on the big TV in the room) on their own
| phones/computers. Usually group games aren't cooperative or
| interactive to the entire group at once. Jackbox has a few coop
| BYOD party games, but I really wish this product-space had more
| options.
|
| There's also the case of venues having realistic bridge-sims that
| are kinda like an escape room (in setting/biz model). Show up to
| the set and cooperate to solve the task. This seems to be the
| use-case for Thorium classic (the predecessor to TFA). I've seen
| these at flight museums. They're a load of fun, but probably
| rather expensive to setup and run (and still tiring).
| skittlebrau wrote:
| Spaceteam is kind of a "Jackbox bridge simulator" if you
| haven't tried it. It's definitely silly and not serious, and in
| my experience can be enjoyed by a pretty wide audience.
| https://spaceteam.ca/
| alexanderson wrote:
| Definitely one of my inspirations. Spaceteam is an entirely
| different kind of chaos. I love it.
| acidburnNSA wrote:
| Looks awesome, congrats to the devs.
|
| Sidenote as a nuclear engineer: thanks for messing up all my
| scouring "news" alerts with that name choice.
| alexanderson wrote:
| True story: When I was coming up with the name I found a HN
| article about Thorium reactors, thought it was cool, and it
| conveniently fit into the naming scheme for other simulator
| controls I've worked on.
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