Auto centering should be included as an OPTIONAL setup for turret twisting

> Frankly, I like forced centering for the turret movement. It makes a lot of
> sense because the amount of turret swing is bounded, just as the tilt of
> the joystick is.

Yes, however not haveing forced centering does not mean you can do a 360deg rotate of your torso, if that is what you mean. You would still have a limit on how far you can turn it or elevate it.

> I find it very convenient to be able to get a tactile
> feedback on how far I have swung the turret and also enjoy
> near-instantaneous turret response.

To determine how far the turret is swung without forced centering you can look at the guage at the top of the screen. When the torso is centered you do not see any green bar. If it is turned to the left then there is a bar showing how far. Plus you can always auto center the target with an assigned key or button.

Also, the response would be just as fast without auto centering, because turning the rudder control all the way in either direction would make the torso swing faster in tht direction. This way you can fine tune your aim for thise long range shots by turning the rudder a little bit, but in a close dogfight you could still spin it around fast.

> To understand this better, just imagine having a head-tracking setup like
> the Virtual-IO glasses or some such... If you mapped the turret movement to
> the head tracking device, the equivalent of absolute mapping (a.k.a.
> "forced-centering") would be to have your head position directly equate to
> the turret's position, whereas incremental mapping would have the amount you
> swing your head dictating the speed at which the turret swings in the same
> direction. I'd bet incremental mapping would wreck the immersion value of
> such a virtual reality setup.

True. No-one is saying incremental mapping should be the ONLY way though. For things like IO glasses, or even (maybe) rudder pedals you would use absolute mapping, of course. Similarly, you would of course use absolute control for turning the chassis...no-one want to be running around in circles even though their joystick is centered.

However, torso twisting with a rudder-enabled joystick is entirely different. This is not 3D immersive control we are talking about here.

This is why auto centering should be included as an OPTIONAL setup for TURRET TWISTING.

Don Halloran

(ref: dhallora)