Alpha 18 - What does a flight director even do?
Alex Anderson 🚀, May 8, 2025Hi gang. Happy Thorium Thursday.
Before I get into the meat of the post, I have an important question to ask: What do flight directors even do? What things does a flight director need to do with the controls? And, perhaps more importantly, what things should a flight director not need to do with the controls? What things can be automated by the simulation, and what things is a flight director uniquely suited for?
If you aren't familiar with what Flight Directors are, think of them as game masters for bridge simulators. I wrote a blog post about it a few years ago. I've been thinking about these questions a lot as I've approached building certain parts of Thorium Nova. I've said many times that I want Thorium Nova to work for folks playing in their living room, when they don't necessarily have someone to play the Flight Director role. That means fully automated missions.
At the same time, Flight Directors can add so much depth and interest to the story, and help the players connect to it at a much deeper level. I want to make sure Flight Directors have the tools they need to be successful, just like the players have the tools they need in the crew stations.
Let me know what you think. You can reply to this email - I'll respond to every one - or get in touch on Discord. I'd love to hear from you.
Quick release update today - Thorium Nova Alpha 18 is now available to download. This release is mostly about bug fixes:
- You shouldn't get stuck on the "Thorium is loading..." screen anymore.
- Improvements to loading the starmap core.
- Revamped the flight start experience to allow for multiple player ships.
- Added the ability for Flight Directors to drag ships to instantly move them.
Play around with it and let me know what you think or if you run into any issues.
Take care of yourselves!