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Try returning to Earth manually!
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| SpaceEngineer | Date: Tuesday, 14.06.2011, 22:41 | Message # 1 |
 Author of Space Engine
Group: Administrators
Russian Federation
Messages: 4800
Status: Offline
| Can you find a way back to Earth from any place in the Milky Way galaxy? Without using the autopilot or the HUDs object markers ;)
I can do it  I shall describe the process here. You must be a true Space Wolf to recognize the star groups and clusters from first look ;)
This is what I use for my visual navigation. Find Magellanic clouds and Andromeda galaxy first. If you remember where Sun is placed in our galaxy relative to these galaxies, you can locate it's neighbourhood. Go there and try to find Orion nebula and Orion's bright giant stars (Rigel, Betelgeuse, Alnitak, Alnilam, Mintaka). Do not click on any star to see get its name, cheater!  Then move yourself into a position where shape of the Orion constellation looks right (as it would be seen normally from Earth). There you can locate the Pleiades cluster. Place yourself more precisely to adjust it's position in space relative to the Orion. Then do the same for Giades cluster, until you see bright orange giant Aldebaran moving close to you. Place it to the right position near Giades, and then you can see Sirius, Procyon, Alpha Centauri and Sun which forms a recognisable pattern (like twisted rectangle). Now you are almost at home!
Try to do this for yourself. It is cool! :)
EDIT: Tried this in Oculus Rift. This time it was much more harder! I don't know why, but experience in true 3D is very different!
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| Neon | Date: Wednesday, 15.06.2011, 15:28 | Message # 2 |
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Explorer
Group: SE team
Australia
Messages: 208
Status: Offline
| Wow... that's impressive... I was wondering how we'd figure out how
to get home when we finally do make those trips in RL. Guess now I
know. lol... I know some of those stars & objects, but to use it for
that? Well, I think I'd need to bone up a bit more lol.
Very nice +1
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| Gabriel | Date: Thursday, 16.06.2011, 15:34 | Message # 3 |
 Space Tourist
Group: Users
Australia
Messages: 20
Status: Offline
| Woah... I'm impressed. If I'm ever offered two seats on a space ship, I know who I'm taking with me. To hell with my girlfriend haha
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| SpaceEngineer | Date: Thursday, 16.06.2011, 21:07 | Message # 4 |
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Author of Space Engine
Group: Administrators
Russian Federation
Messages: 4800
Status: Offline
| The next objective could be to find a way to return to the Milky Way from any place in the visible universe, but in current version this can be done quite easily, because there are only ~10,000 galaxies, and they form as two cones, with the Milky Way somewhere near the center of those cones..
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| Neon | Date: Thursday, 16.06.2011, 22:23 | Message # 5 |
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Explorer
Group: SE team
Australia
Messages: 208
Status: Offline
| Yeh that's the easy part... finding the sun there isn't so easy
unless you know where the clouds of magellan are in refernce to it.
Both sides of milky way look the same. lol
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| SpaceEngineer | Date: Friday, 17.06.2011, 12:38 | Message # 6 |
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Author of Space Engine
Group: Administrators
Russian Federation
Messages: 4800
Status: Offline
| You must train on SE simulator before you take a real trip on a real spaceship 
Fly away from the Milky Way and select the Sun with the object marker - make a note of the marker position on sun from where you are in space. Then orbit around the Milky Way and look at Magellanic Clouds, and remember their position relative to Sun. Now turn off the object marker on Sun, and now try to return to sun using visuals clues only ( use the ';' key to turn off marker).
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| Neon | Date: Friday, 17.06.2011, 15:43 | Message # 7 |
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Explorer
Group: SE team
Australia
Messages: 208
Status: Offline
| cool I'll try that :)... It's settled, your going to be my ships navigators lol
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| SpaceEngineer | Date: Friday, 17.06.2011, 15:47 | Message # 8 |
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Author of Space Engine
Group: Administrators
Russian Federation
Messages: 4800
Status: Offline
| You must call yourself "astrogator", because we are in the space, not at the sea
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| Robbie | Date: Friday, 17.06.2011, 19:41 | Message # 9 |
 Pioneer
Group: Global Moderators
United Kingdom
Messages: 590
Status: Offline
| How about this for a little gameplay fun:
You're lost in deep space and need to get back home in your starship. Your onboard computer's star charts have been f***ed-up by some hacker who has just infected your ship's computer systems with a space virus via your Galactic Internet Browser (aka IE 9000). Luckily for you, you still have a lock on earth's position. Unfortunalty, the on-screen computer's marker and name tags system has also been infected by the nasty virus, so the only way to get back to Earth is by manually using the onsreen 'distance from Earth' read-out. Set a heading and start flying, start making course corrections as the distance read-out begins to shorten, along the way keep making course corrections as you get closer and closer to Earth. Once you are within 50-100 light-years of Sol, reduce the stars magnitude to roughly 3.5, this will help to identify the local stars in that area from the many background stars. The Sun and local stars are easy to pick out now, then once you find the Sun, just choose the 'third rock' (Earth) it can be seen easily, shining in the darkness.
I started out from the 'edge' of the known universe and found my way back to Earth using this method. It took quite a few course corrections the nearer I got to Earth, but it's a nice feeling when you finally arrive back home. 
Quad Core i7 930 CPU o/c 3.8 GHz - 6GB DDR3 1600MHz RAM - ATI HD 5870 1024Mb - Intel SSD X25-M Gen 2 - Win 7 64-bit
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| Neon | Date: Friday, 17.06.2011, 20:50 | Message # 10 |
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Explorer
Group: SE team
Australia
Messages: 208
Status: Offline
| But how did you get rid of the marker, you can have no display with ~,
but if u have any, u get the marker as well. Nice imagining.
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| SpaceEngineer | Date: Friday, 17.06.2011, 21:30 | Message # 11 |
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Author of Space Engine
Group: Administrators
Russian Federation
Messages: 4800
Status: Offline
| Press [;] key to turn off the object marker, or go into the 'Show objects' menu (F4) and untick the check-box.
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| Neon | Date: Friday, 17.06.2011, 23:12 | Message # 12 |
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Explorer
Group: SE team
Australia
Messages: 208
Status: Offline
| Yes, I figured that out. Well I did it, from LMC to Sol, though
had to cheat a little lol... found Centauri A n thought it was
alpha centauri n wasted an hour looking for the Sun but it
was 142 pc away lol, so headed approx direction, lost my
way, refound it using distance to sol as a guide at the end.
First method was Vovas idea, I found my way to Antares, then
to B Centauri, finally to A Centauri... where I made a mistake,
had to use a cheat to findout I was still too far away. Then I used
Robbies idea. But I got home.
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| Robbie | Date: Saturday, 18.06.2011, 07:35 | Message # 13 |
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Pioneer
Group: Global Moderators
United Kingdom
Messages: 590
Status: Offline
| Hi Neon. Yes, My imagination does run away with me sometimes, that's because I love playing the space pilot.
The quickest time back to Earth took me 7-minutes from outside of the Milky way. With my 'distance read-out' method it's important to keep the lock/fix on Earth, and not to click on any stars to obtain information about their locations. So distance read out must be the only clue to finding Earth.
When I'm around 1000 ly from Earth I make my course corrections in a linear way, by filtering the x,y,z direction, moving through each plane one at a time, using only the W,S, then A,D, and R,F keys in an arbitrary manner. This really helps to fine tune the distance read-out and hone in quickly to Sol's position. I avoid using the mouse for course direction, as the radial movements make honing-in on Sol's position very haphazard. I only start to use the mouse for course changes when I am getting really close to Sol - somewhere around ~10-Lys.
When I'm in the vicinity of Sol, I also reduce the background stars magnitude, the local stars become the only ones seen then, so it becomes easier to locate the Sun from within this ~10 Lys area. The fly speed needs to be about 0.10 pc/sec or less, so as not to fly pass the Sun too quickly.
I've done this quite a few times now, and I'm getting quite proficient at it.
Quad Core i7 930 CPU o/c 3.8 GHz - 6GB DDR3 1600MHz RAM - ATI HD 5870 1024Mb - Intel SSD X25-M Gen 2 - Win 7 64-bit
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| SpaceEngineer | Date: Saturday, 18.06.2011, 15:21 | Message # 14 |
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Author of Space Engine
Group: Administrators
Russian Federation
Messages: 4800
Status: Offline
| I just repeated my return flight back to Earth, this time with the HUD disabled.
I started from a terra planet in the Large Magellanic Cloud, and arrived back at my city Saint-Petersburg
Maybe I'll record a video next time
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| Neon | Date: Saturday, 18.06.2011, 19:18 | Message # 15 |
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Explorer
Group: SE team
Australia
Messages: 208
Status: Offline
| hehe yeh nice one Vova :)... I finishd mine at my home town.
Yeh imagination is really important.. especially in a game like this
where there is no real interaction with the universe or gameplay yet.
Still it's always good
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