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@dmccoystephenson dmccoystephenson released this 24 Oct 14:57
· 19 commits to main since this release
0.5.0
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Learn about vigilant mode.

In this release, Venus, Earth, Mars and Titan get air: it slows the ship, heats it, and colours the sky.

Landed under four skies: Venus, Earth, Mars and Titan Coming down into Earth's air: 57 km up, 10 km/s, 27% heat
The ship landed on Venus, Earth, Mars and Titan under their skies The ship descending toward Earth with an orange glow over its leading end and HEAT 27% in the HUD

What's new

  • Air (#23): each air thickens toward the ground, from the real surface density and scale height of each body (NASA fact sheets; Titan's are derived from its measured pressure, temperature and composition).
    • Drag: Venus's air is so thick that full thrusters make well under 1 km/s near the ground.
    • Heat: speed in air heats the ship toward a burn speed, which is higher where the air is thinner: in Earth's air about 5 km/s at sea level, 16 km/s at 60 km and 50 km/s at the top. The HUD shows HEAT and warns HOT above 75%. At 100% the ship burns up and is put back above the air. Diving into Earth under mass lock alone burns up in under a second.
    • Autopilots: both keep to a cool speed in air and slow down before reaching it. The landing autopilot reaches the ground in about 30 s on Earth, 20 s on Mars, 60 s on Titan and 90 s on Venus.
    • Sky: inside the air, the sky takes the air's colour on the day side, and a glow of hot air grows over the ship's leading end.
    • Game choices: the burn speed, the drag's ballistic coefficient, the single-layer air and the sky colours. DATA_SOURCES.md lists them.
  • Daytime skies (#25): a bright sky now washes out the orbit lines, small bodies, the markers of distant bodies and the labels. The Sun, the target and nearby bodies stay.
  • Driven play (#24): a test harness can play the game through the engine, with a stepped clock that repeats frame for frame. A driven run never reads or writes the mission records.

Known gaps

  • Air is a single exponential layer, with no winds, weather or lift.
  • Pluto's and Triton's thin air is left out.
  • Mission best times stay on the device that set them.

Playing it

The browser build is live at https://orrery.play.danielstephenson.dev. For the desktop build, see the README's Building and running section.

Full changelog: 0.4.0...0.5.0

drafted by Claude on behalf of Daniel Stephenson

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