Slipstream

🗃️ Specifications

📰 Title:	Slipstream	🕹️ / 🛠️ Type:	Game
🗃️ Genre:	Sport	🚦 Status:	06. To be re-tested (status)
🏷️ Category:	Sport ➤ Motorsport ➤ Motorcycle racing	🌍️ Browser version:
🔖 Tags:		📦️ Package Name:
🐣️ Approx. start:		📦️ Arch package:
🐓️ Latest:	2012-05-25	📦️ RPM package:
📍️ Version:	0.2	📦️ Deb package:
🏛️ License type:	🕊️ Libre	📦️ Flatpak package:
🏛️ License:	GPL-3+	📦️ AppImage package:
🏝️ Perspective:	Third person	📦️ Snap package:
👁️ Visual:	2D	⚙️ Generic binary:
⏱️ Pacing:	Real Time	📄️ Source:
👫️ Played:	Single	📱️ PDA support:
🎖️ This record:		🕳️ Not used:
🎀️ Game design:		👫️ Contrib.:	goupildb & Louis
🎰️ ID:	12833	🐛️ Created:	2011-09-16
🐜️ Updated:	2021-11-15

📖️ Summary

[en]:	A free racing vehicle simulator trying to be physically accurate and fun to play at the same time!	[fr]:	Un simulateur de course de véhicules axé sur le réalisme du comportement physique et l'amusement

🎥️ Videos

🎲️ Gameplay: (202xxx), (202xxx), [fr](202xxx),

📕 Description [en]

Slipstream is a free racing vehicle simulator trying to be physically accurate and fun to play at the same time! Contrary to most simulators out there it's not designed around a single type of vehicle. It should be able to support anything from a bicycle to a car or anything else that can be driven around on a racetrack for that matter.

Current status

Although Slipstream is still in early development it should already be useful for a couple of purposes. A model of a modern motorcycle has been implemented and it handles well enough to be both fun and challenging to race around the available track. Besides that the vehicle model has been completely based on academic research (see the manual for details and references) and every care has been taken to make it as accurate as possible. Combine this with the fact that it is easily configurable, using either the graphic interface or scripting to the very last detail and you get a pretty good research tool.

Get involved!

I could really use help developing Slipstream in a number of areas including:

• Interface design: Since the interface is html-based this is standard web development and design stuff with some custom server-side scripting for game interaction.
• Track and vehicle design: This is mainly research work. Finding specifications for existing vehicles or tracks and implementing them in Slipstream, or perhaps developing original designs. For the mechanically and academically inclined.
• Graphic design: Art creation for vehicles and track scenery. This includes models, textures, shader configuration and whatnot. If you're interested be sure to read below.
• Core development: Hackers familiar with Objective-C or Lua can participate in the development of Techne which sits at the heart of Slipstream. There's plenty to do there ranging from involved simulation and rendering related stuff to simpler utility modules.

One thing you should be aware of if you're thinking of participating in the development of Slipstream is that most of the positions above imply research assistant duty. Slipstream is based on Techne, which aspires to be a general-purpose simulator and renderer bringing computerized art to the masses, so while developing a GUI and better graphics for Slipstream is important, what's more important (at least for me) is developing the infrastructure that supports these in such a way that is generic and equally applicable to other projects besides Slipstream. I'm now in the process of redesigning Techne's renderer and http-based interface so I'm particularly in need of assistance from experienced artists and web designers for feedback in the design process. Please contact me via e-mail if you're interested in helping out with the development of Slipstream in some way.

Pure multi-body simulation, no strings attached
One point of difference between Slipstream and every other motorcycle racing simulator I'm aware of is that it does not try to control the vehicle for you in any way. You can't just expect to press the left arrow key and magically balance the motorcycle at a 50 degree lean angle. Slipstream just simulates the actual machine piece for piece and allows you to use your mouse to apply pressure to the steering bars and control levers, the rest is up to you. This makes it a lot harder to learn how to control the vehicle but it also makes it a lot more fun by bringing out all the interesting effects most motorcycle riders are familiar with. Open the throttle too much when you're leaned over and the bike will drift, drop the front wheel without finesse after a wheelie and you'll get a tank-slapper, hit the brakes too hard and the bike starts weaving as the rear wheel loses traction.

Configurable to the last detail
Another unique point about Slipstream is that the vehicles are modeled piece for piece and are completely configurable. The current motorcycle model has been based on a couple of academic research papers that describe a particular 1000cc motorcycle so the default configuration reflects that. But that doesn't mean that only one motorcycle is available. The graphical interface allows the separate configuration of every parameter so that it's a matter of seconds to, for example, raise the steering head angle a few degrees, move the front wheel mount point further to the front and get a chopper-style motorcycle. Raise the rear spring stiffness to the point of rigidity as well and you get a hard-tail. Or you can leave everything as is and just move the rear wheel mount-point more to the back to get a long-swingarm drag-bike. You can probably make modifications that actually make the bike perform better as well. The possibilities are endless.

Education and research1
Apart from that, the fact that you can make modifications and try them out in real-time should make Slipstream ideal for anyone wanting to study the nature of motorcycle dynamics. It is easy for example to change the steering head rake or offset and see how this affects the handling. For the more academically-inclined it is also very easy to study the motorcycle by recording some parameter and then producing plots. For example it's easy to change to front chain sprocket position and see how this affects motorcycle squatting during acceleration by recording the extension of the rear damper rod during scripted acceleration runs before and after the modification.

I don't really know how well Slipstream would fare if applied to research as I'm not capable of assessing that. I've tried to produce plots of the models where I could and they seemed to match the published data and I have generally no reason to believe that Slipstream is less accurate than the setups used in the research papers. To be honest I have no reason to believe otherwise either but I would be very interested in finding out so if anyone's considering doing research with Slipstream let me know and I'll try to help out as much as I can. More information on the physics model can be found in the documentation.

📕 Description [fr]

Un simulateur de course de véhicules axé sur le réalisme du comportement physique et l'amusement, par Dimitris Papavasiliou (dpapavas).
Il utilise le moteur de physique Techne (dans le Bottin).

Slipstream est un simulateur de course de véhicules axé sur le réalisme du comportement physique et sur l'amusement.
Il n'est pas limité à un type de véhicule particulier, à terme (il est en développement actif) il devrait être capable de simuler tous types de véhicules roulants. Un modèle physique de moto est déjà implémenté. Un soin particulier a été apporté à l'exactitude de la simulation.

🚧️ Installation [fr]

🔧️ INSTALLATION :
Pré-requis :
Installez les bibliothèques (toutes en dépôts): libmicrohttpd5, libcsiro0 et libplplot9
Installez le moteur physique Techne (paquet Debian/UBUNTU disponible sur le site, lien 1).
Installez le jeu (des paquets Debian/UBUNTU sont disponibles) via gdebi (lorsque gdebi est installé, il suffit de cliquer sur le paquet pour l'installer): commencez par le paquet slipstream-data puis slipstream
L'installation de gdebi est décrite sur la fiche "Glossaire & licences courantes" au paragraphe "INFORMATIONS CONCERNANT GDEBI".

🚀️ LANCEMENT DU JEU :

En console dans le répertoire contenant le binaire du jeu lancez : $ slipstream

🔍️ Test [fr]

🕵️ Test (0.1) :
Malheureusement lorsqu'on lance le binaire en console sur notre installation, nous obtenons le message :
(...)
slipstream/pages/wait.lua
Spent 0.156569 CPU seconds initializing.
Now entering the main loop.

Il ne se passe rien d'autre.
A suivre.

💡️ Commentaires généraux:
Un paquet Debian/Ubuntu est à présent disponible (non testé).