Hello everyone,
For all you physics lovers out there in the world, today is all about Vehicle Physics in video games. I have been super busy today, so I'm going to make a very quick post about it! Now, I'm not going write up too much on the technical or mathematical nature of physics in video games. I'm mostly going to talk very briefly about the conceptual part and I'll post a thesis on a lot of simple (and complex) mathematical equations to consider when driving a car in the gaming world! However, that does NOT mean that I won't ever post about physics/mathematical equations on this blog. I definitely will post more on these topics later on as I learn them and as I take mathematical notes with the LaTeX document preparation system.
Vehicle Physics is always an interesting topic to consider in lots of games, such as city-based games like Grand Theft Auto and Racing games like Need for Speed. However, you'll notice that a lot of major AAA games that AREN'T Racing related don't tend to implement too realistic of a vehicular physics-based system! Why? I think that the main reason a lot of major game companies aren't is because developers are focusing on creating other content that is way more important to the core game, such as the story, the environment, the weapons, or even just the overall gameplay experience. Nevertheless, vehicular physics can make games a whole lot more fun and intriguing! For example, suppose you've driving a huge truck with cargo in it and you're driving it along the road at a very high velocity. When you slam on the brakes, the cargo in the truck will probably move a bit towards the front of the truck and the truck should take a longer time to slow down to a complete stop than a small car. If video games neglect something as minor as this, it will make the physics system in the game seem wonky and unrealistic. That's why I like to think of Vehicular physics as a component of detail, and people tend to notice minor details like that!
Here is a VERY interesting master project/thesis done by some unnamed author (at least I couldn't find it anywhere) about car physics. It discusses all sorts of physics equations related to drag, traction, engine torque, weight transfer, suspension, and even some collision detection and response and much much more! It also describes some of the physics pseudo-code, which are human-readable notes on how the physics program should work.
https://nccastaff.bournemouth.ac.uk/jmacey/MastersProjects/MSc12/Srisuchat/Thesis.pdf
Here is also a cool Mad Max the game video on its car mechanics!