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Issue #163: CTD - Motion Sensor


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wow yet another document.
im on a roll today!

here it is nothing much on this one i need loads and loads of ideas coz im out of them. i was going to say about Heart Beat surveillance (like in rainbow six) but then it would detect aliens even when still. bummer. here it is:

[quote]RESEARCH COMPLETED: [MOTION SCANNER]

HEAD OF RESEARCH PROJECT: [JAMIE HILLSDEN]

SPECIFICATIONS:
COST:_____________________ £ ??????
WEIGHT:__________________ [weight]
SIZE:______________________ [size]
DAMAGE TYPE:____________ N/A
TYPE:_____________________ EQUIPMENT
POWER:___________________ N/A
ACCURACY:_______________ N/A
RANGE:___________________  ????
FIRE RATE:________________ N/A
OTHER:___________________ N/A

(The [MOTION SCANNER] detects any recent movement within a certain area]

Using existing Motion Surveillance technology used by [Anti-Terrorist Combat Units] our scientists have refined the rather bulky technology into a more accurate, efficient and smaller hand held device. With technology continuing to become more compact and complex, our engineers are able to produce a new hand held [Motion Sensor]. With much more accuracy it can pick up any vibrations within a short distance even through solid objects like walls. This is very useful tool for combat situations in buildings and for tracking down any aliens that may be hiding which would otherwise be overlooked. Although this new device is highly reliable and accurate it does have a very short range and cannot pick up hostiles that are stationary, therefore it cannot be relied on totally.[/quote]
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You may want to add a development history like:

"Late one night, I was watching a rerun of 'Aliens' and I thought, wouldn't it be cool if our guys had something like that? It would let us know if an alien was about to sneak up on us or not. The next morning, I got to work, and spent the rest of the week developing the motion scanner, much to the chargrin (Sp?) of my wife." -[X-Corps] Scientist

And fluff text, such as "I love this thing! It beeps when there is something like an alien moving nearby! Its saved me from quite a few ambushes, because aliens don't really seem capable of staying still! Too bad for them!" -Cpl. Alex Dupont Edited by Cpl. Facehugger
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bugger you beat me by a few days.. i..AAIIEEEe I WILL KILL YOU ANd...

LOL JK ^_^ ,it's all good :D

anyways heres what i have, maybe we can work together on this one, but if you work more comfortably on your own, please feel free to use parts of mine
[color="red"]edit.. [/color]If you choose to work solo, i'll leave mine as is and move onto somthing else. Same condition applies, if you feel any part of this text is of use, you are more than welcome to use it.

[PIRs] (passive infrared sensors)

This device uses technology similar to our radar, although these particular devices are constructed from simple electronics. The infrared light within, sends out electrons and these electrons can be detected and magnified into a signal. The [PIR] emmits this infrared signal and waits for a partial signal to be bounced back. When a person or alien moves into or in the signals path/field of view, it changes the density of the signal and the [PIR] then calculates the time it takes for the reflected & altered signal to return. The Heads up display or HUD then displays the point of reflection/Interference with a Yellow dot.

In order to have a sensor that can detect an alien life form, the sensor's sensitivity has been adjusted to incorporate the suspected temperature of aliens and that of humans. Because the filter attached to the sensor is looking for a fairly rapid [color="blue"]horizontal and/or vertical [/color]change in the returned signal, the motion sensor does not detect persons or aliens that are standing still. This filter was used so that the [PIR] can easily distiguish between lifeforms and the blazing fire that you have most likely induced apon the town.

Because of its limited ability to reconizse distant signals that have passed through walls, and the [PIR's] restricted power source, the range is limited to [50 metres] so that it can maintain a high percentage of accuracy in readings.

"Cool, I can stalk people without even leaving my quarters" -El Sico Edited by RustedSoul
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Its good, I like it.

unfortunately if we are sticking to the origional gameplay a heat sensor would detect aliens even when still. I had several kick a$$ ideas like this but they had the same problem. BTW it would be an 'AIRs' active infrared sensor. Pasive sensors work by using light/sound etc already in the atmosphere, active emits sound/light etc. into the atmos to make a reading. the latter is more accurate.

I have very few ideas for this so i would appreciate working with somebody, thats if u want to carry on with this CT.

:idea:
How about saying:
[quote]Due to some aliens' extremely high or low heat signitures and large variations of ambient heat within modern environments conventional passive and active sensors are almost completely ineffective. The new [IRVs] [infra red variattion sensor] works by measuring changes in temperature of the surroundings and recognising patterns (eg. a heat signiture moving left.) and showing it on the device's HUD. This allows aliens to be detected even in high variation areas such as cities, but means that the contact can only be detected if the alien has moved recently.[/quote]

rough idea. and we need a name for it, IRVs sucks a little too much. Edited by Kamikazee
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yes passive was completely wrong, that's what happens when you start your research with a motion sensor light and a bottle of scotch. :spank:

don't mind working with you, let's just play it by ear and see what's happens.
You'd started the thread first so you have final say, no arguments :D

^_^ i think you've just about nailed it, IMO your approach is very good


[quote]The new [IRVs] [infra red variattion sensor] works by measuring changes in temperature of the surroundings and recognising patterns (eg. a heat signiture moving left.) and showing it on the device's HUD. This allows aliens to be detected even in high variation areas such as cities, but means that the contact can only be detected if the alien has moved recently.[/quote]

an attempt to better explain it & alter the concept slightly
[quote]The new [IRVs] [infra red variattion sensor] works by measuring changes in surrounding temperatures and isolating consistant patterns. This makes [moving heat signatures] stand out even in high density areas such as cities, but means that the contact can only be detected if the alien has moved recently.[/quote]

edit. not sure about the name, in all honesty i did'nt like PIRS too much. just seemed practical at the time. nothing wrong with calling it IRVs for the time being Edited by RustedSoul
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yeah my explanation was a bit crappy, i didn't know wot i was trying to explain at the time. thanxs for the help. i will post a rtf in the next day or so and if there are no further probs i will send it to breunor and move on. We can always think of a cool name later. ill just use [] so its easy to change.
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:D it's ok i'm not even completely happy with mine, but i think you have made the break though needed on this topic, your idea/explaination of why the motion sensor can't detect motionless objects is brilliant. I only hope that any input i have added does not act as a burden to the overall idea
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I like the name "IRV sensor". Maybe I'm sick or something but I think it's good.
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will u stop putting you ideas down, its sad.
your ideas are as valuable as mine, I mean its not just me whos gonna be playing this game is it. (well actually i cant play it because of my ever so cr@ppy graphics card!)
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  • 1 month later...
Well here goes another project by the great Danny252! Ok, maybe not [i]great[/i], but good, still.
I whipped this up after finally remembering to come back here. Might be a bit short IYO, but it isn't exactly an AC-110.
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The text is looking good here, something that isn't addressed (and I seriously doubt it can be with real science) is how motion on the other side of a wall can be detected. IR can't pass solid objects, thus the line of sight needed for most remotes, etc.

In the proximity grenade text I brought up the anemometer, "ultrasonic and LASER Doppler (which measure the phase shift of sound or coherent light reflected off of moving air molecules)." This is real tech, perhaps it can be used in some format here, perhaps not. I don't think it resolves the "seeing through walls" aspect of this device any better, so maybe you shouldn't bother with it. Does anybody know of a technology that can? Since you have to research the motion scanner, it would be considered tech beyond anything we currently have, so we can stretch reality to our favor :D Perhaps some sort of miniature MRI type of technology which can penetrate solid objects, something like that? Or we just avoid mentioning that aspect altogether. The motion scanner just 'worked' in Aliens, the same can work here.
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in UFO it just used scanners, the scanners themselves aren't explained. Maybe heatseekers? Probably wouldn't work over 1km squared, like the original could, or go through walls, but an idea.
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Thermal imaging would give you everything, including stationary units, IF their temperature is high/low enough to distinguish from the background... thus not sure about robotic units, and for all we know the body temperature of a sectoid might be about 20 degrees centigrade due to it's low metabolism?

Maybe laser-doppler systems with x-ray lasers? ;) (my brother once wrote a scripture on laser-doppler, he might be able to help some with that, that is, if he still remembers anything from it :P )

Are motion detectors in 'alien' explained? If so we could 'borrow' :naughty: something?

Or we go for the sci-fi stuff like Tachyon Sensors, Nanowave Detectors or whatnot :D
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I agree with Jordos. Why not just use the sensors from the first Alien. It gave a plausible explaination as to how they worked.

The scanner uses a sensor to detect the shifts in air molecule density and of course some clever IFF to filter out the unwanted stuff.

Or it could use pheremone scent tracking. Everything smells and scents travel in air, the aliens produce a scent not of this earth so its really easy to track and filter out all the earth based scents. Edited by Deimos
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The Universal B.O. Translator! :D "Something smells a little fishy around here... wait! That's not a fish!"

Sounds good to me, I think we can bury ourselves in the science of make-believe, but keeping things simple is the best way to go in general.
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The trick with thermal sensors is that they would detect everything of the required temperature, wether it is moving or not. That kind of defeats the purpose of a [i]motion[/i] tracker, no?

And if the aliens don't generate more body heat than the enviroment, then you wouldn't see them either. :(
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I agree with him. Motion scanner is the first thing you can get and it would be crazy to develop a technology like heat detection, when you really have no idea what your enemy's physiology is like. For all you know they might be not be exothermic enough to detect. Also I read in some CTD that the Silabrate's temperture is several hundred degrees.

motion is the most universal property of every unit so we should keep it like that.
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One should also keep in mind that there are very different gameplay properties between heat/motion/chemical etc sensors.

a heatsensor would work ubiquitously, which would remove a lot of challenge.

chemicals have to propagate through the air, and due to random thermal motion will do so at the rate of cm/s, which is not very fast. So you'd have to simulate wind over the tacticalscape in order to have the chemicals detected by the sensor. not very much fun, and perhaps overly complicated.

note: perhaps we could thik about this post v1.0 and have a enemy which sniffs out humans. :D

motion sensor: density fluctuations in the air are detected. these propagate at the speed of sound. one can very easily think of them as very very quiet noises, like footfalls, since sound is just a compression of air. This has the benefit of being a quick and omnidirectional method of detection. and since it only works while enemies move, stationary enemies can present a challenge which is good. downside: moving grass, windows opening and shutting in the wind, etc, will give false signals, but preseumably the player can learn to filter these out. or perhaps the device can be preprogrammed to filter out 'normal' noise sources.

i vote: motion detector.
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[quote name='Cartesian' date='Mar 13 2004, 01:29 AM']note: perhaps we could thik about this post v1.0 and have a enemy which sniffs out humans. :D[/quote]
The chryssalid would fit in with that quite well. :)

Anyway, we should stick with a motion tracker.
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I like the motion scanner idea, Cartesian. Yeah, normal sounds like grass and wind would give a reading, but it'd be nowhere as bright as an alien stomping around.

It'd give a unique challenge to the [flying race], too. They're generally the weakest race, (no PSI, floating does very little) so being harder to see with a motion scanner will add a little challenge.

The Ammonites have loud cloaks, so it won't affect them too much.
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yes i agree with motion and I like that idea about flying aliens. They should give signals that could be interpreted as false readings, banging windows, trees and small animals. Also don't forget civilians and their signals would be as strong as any alien.
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The changing air density idea is good, that fits very well with how the motion sensor works. Civs gave off readings as well, it would be assumed the scanner is set to pick up a certain size and shape of objects, so field mice or grass doesn't set it off.
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[quote name='Breunor' date='Mar 15 2004, 10:27 AM']The changing air density idea is good, that fits very well with how the motion sensor works. Civs gave off readings as well, it would be assumed the scanner is set to pick up a certain size and shape of objects, so field mice or grass doesn't set it off.[/quote]
Perhaps the idea of how sensitive the motion scanner is is something we could consider for different difficulty levels.

rookie=only aliens
normal=rookie+public+xcom
hardcore=normal+doors/window shutters, trees
superhuman=hardcore+grass+insects+etc

also since these density fluctuations are sounds, perhaps loud sounds like grenades, rifle shots, screams could interfere with the motion sensor on superhuman. funfunfun.

ie: at each stage we add more 'noise'

CTD prototype:


Motion Scanner.
Range 30m.
One slot space
One hand
1kg.

The Motion Scanner is a lightweight handheld unit that detects density fluctuations in the air. These fluctuations propagate at the speed of sound (330m/s in Earth's atmosphere). These fluctuations are in fact effectively very quiet sounds, but the unit has been programmed to ignore most normal sources of noise as well as motion due to small animals.

Because of this the MotionScanner is a fast omnidirectional device capable of detecting moving man sized objects up to 30m away, even through thick foliage or walls. It should be emphasised that it is only capable of sensing moving objects so it should not be relied upon entirely for the detection of enemy units. Edited by Cartesian
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  • 3 months later...
oh wow! totally forgot about this!

I dont remember this at all!
~FREAKY~

Oh well getting to suggesting ideas again...

-> Gamma rays can pass through most stuff, but what would create them?
-> Played rainbow six? they had some thingy that could detect heartbeats as i recall...
-> Maybe it could use IR lasers to sense vibrations on all surfaces surrounding the device. A CPU cleverly calculates the most probable source of the disturbance? maybe?

This is a tricky one... :huh?: .. ill do some research... just after this last ice tea... Edited by Kamikazee
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I quickly read through and there seems to be a common misunderstanding...
e.g.

[quote]The trick with thermal sensors is that they would detect everything of the required temperature, wether it is moving or not. That kind of defeats the purpose of a motion tracker, no?[/quote]

Me and RS suggested that it detect CHANGES in the ambient IR radiation. Not actual bodyheat signals as this would be usless in city and desert environments. Also.. a change in temperature is created by a cold creature as well as a hot one...
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  • 2 weeks later...
Heartbeat sensors pick up a particular frequency, you need to know the enemy before you can detect it, changes in air pressure would be good but would be affected by obstructions and the scanners movement itself, passive ir systems would detect creatures not moving and active systems would also have problems with obstructions. A small seismic style monitor could sense footsteps but the technology is too sensitive and any weak signal would be lost in the flood of signals local to the scanner.

How about all of thee above? (possibly minus the ir as it makes things too easy) combine sensors with a powerful portable computer that can identify signals by type and filter out anything that is identified as harmless.
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[quote name='kchickenlord' date='Jul 13 2004, 09:37 PM']Heartbeat sensors pick up a particular frequency, you need to know the enemy before you can detect it, changes in air pressure would be good but would be affected by obstructions and the scanners movement itself, passive ir systems would detect creatures not moving and active systems would also have problems with obstructions. A small seismic style monitor could sense footsteps but the technology is too sensitive and any weak signal would be lost in the flood of signals local to the scanner.

How about all of thee above? (possibly minus the ir as it makes things too easy) combine sensors with a powerful portable computer that can identify signals by type and filter out anything that is identified as harmless.
[right][post="83531"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post][/right][/quote]

Yeah I just read th origional UFO pedia entry again... it acyually says "various sensors" so basically combine every sensor suggseted here and hey presto!
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:)

yeah nice ideas here and nice rtf danny.
I really like that motion sensor from Aliens too :D

(actually, i often mimick that rapid-fire gun that the marines use - LOL - no joke :)
(if enough pepole ask, i'll go and get a microphone and will record a wav :rolleyes:
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[quote name='Kamikazee' date='Jul 2 2004, 06:07 AM']oh wow! totally forgot about this!

I dont remember this at all!
~FREAKY~

Oh well getting to suggesting ideas again...

-> Gamma rays can pass through most stuff, but what would create them?
-> Played rainbow six? they had some thingy that could detect heartbeats as i recall...
-> Maybe it could use IR lasers to sense vibrations on all surfaces surrounding the device. A CPU cleverly calculates the most probable source of the disturbance? maybe?

This is a tricky one...  :huh?:  .. ill do some research... just after this last ice tea...
[right][post="82449"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post][/right][/quote]

Gamma rays can pass through most stuff, true. BUT it doesn't bounce back as radar waves do, and even if it does, gamma-ray-catching detectors are hard to come by. By today's technology, they tend to be large and fragile.

But I like the IR lasers idea.

On the sound/atmospheric vibration thingy mentioned earlier, for a given medium, different frequencies permeate through it to different speeds and lengths. Eg. Sound travels 10 times (i think) faster in water than in air, and at a different frequency. (i believe it would be a higher frequency in water, not sure) That makes things a tad more complicated, since there's so much stuff in the world. :wacko:

-_- My 2 cent's worth.
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Guest Azrael
OK, who has the motion scanner CTD? :huh?: , there is one written by Kamikazee, another by Danny, another by RustedSoul, and another by Cartesian, I have to revise them, so if you could decide.... :wacko: I'd be very grateful, ...someone... please...?
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I'm not exactly a frequent poster and I hate to sound presumptuous, but a thought was occurring to me while I was reading the series of posts: If the aliens are as advanced as they are, wouldn't they have some technological way of minimizing or removing their signature from most 'primitive' types of detection?

To my way of thinking, this sort of technology would be carried by the Cloaks (I believe that was the name settled on for the Etherials?). Their heavy robes could mitigate their heat and heartbeat signatures- only leaving the slightest trace of their movement on any sensors. Course, I'd like to see the Cloaks far more 'scary' and wraith-like than the original... I guess I'm sort of a sadistic gamer. The robes properties probably wouldn't be mentioned in the motion scanner write up as it would come chronologically before the Cloaks show themselves-- but it could be noted under the Cloaks description?

Just my $.02,
-NT
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Makes sense to me. Of course, there's always the concern of balancing what the player initially knows and what he/she learns relative to the rest of the game. Having to research a particular alien race to find its strengths and weaknesses is okay--perhaps learning this yourself in the battlefield would be okay as well.
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It may be called teh motion sensor, but believe me, i wrote about half of it, and it actually is mostly an infrared sensor, not a motion sensor
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  • 1 month later...
How about something using a new technology I just heard of: Aural Displacement Amplification Scanners? It appears that the United States Army is investing in the creation of a new threat detection system using the very form of the air surrounding a soldier as a catalyst. The unit sends out very low-profile radio emissions (barely prevalent enough to cause the slightest bit of white noise on civilian band radio) that seek alterations or changes in the air for the relative distance of a 20-30 meter radius (I think that's it). Kind of like sonar, only...not. Well, it sounds different, anyway. Besides, I like the sound of "Aural Displacement Amplifiction Device" as opposed to "Motion Tracker," anyway. :rolleyes:

[quote]I agree with him. Motion scanner is the first thing you can get and it would be crazy to develop a technology like heat detection, when you really have no idea what your enemy's physiology is like. For all you know they might be not be exothermic enough to detect. Also I read in some CTD that the Silabrate's temperture is several hundred degrees.

motion is the most universal property of every unit so we should keep it like that.[/quote]

Makes good sense to me--but still, maybe we can operate on "live and learn," here. You know, we start off developing your standard IR sig scanner (the kind the US Army uses, no less), which might work for your standard Grays or whatnot, until you meet up with the more "interesting" foes. Then, in a more "Aliens-style" moment, the player can have his guys getting picked off one by one by "invisible" aliens.
"Aggh! They're not showing up on the scanners! I can't see--*screams*"
Then, of course, the player might decide to allocate research to "better scanner" after all. :wink:

Alright, maybe that's a little too...offtopic, but hey--giving the player a mainstream alternative (that gets their butts kicked on occasion, no less) never hurt any, right? Then we can get to play with the cool stuff. Edited by The Master Maniac
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Aural Displacement Amplification Scanners sounds sort of like the "vision" the aliens in the movie Pitch Black had, Air Sonar.
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  • 2 weeks later...
[quote]Aural Displacement Amplification Scanners? It appears that the United States Army is investing in the creation of a new threat detection system using the very form of the air surrounding a soldier as a catalyst. The unit sends out very low-profile radio emissions (barely prevalent enough to cause the slightest bit of white noise on civilian band radio) that seek alterations or changes in the air for the relative distance of a 20-30 meter radius (I think that's it).[/quote]

That reminds me the sensor used in the first "Alien" movie... ^^


Maybe the ADAS could be an improved version of the classic motion sensors, which uses X-ray, thermal and electron detectors, with are being analysed by complex computing algorithms, some of which which filter out noise, in order to detect variations in the enviroment. Distance from any "blocking entity" (organic or lifeless, creatures and stones etc.) is measured from the device. This is helpful, because it helps the device "understand" where each entity's edges are, thus it can correctly display the size of things and filter out enviromental variations caused by small things (insects, leaves etc).

That way, we have an error-free detector, which won't display a fly as a tank, just because it moves fast :)

Just setting forth some ideas... That's not any "to-be-official" text, it really needs some "making-up" ;) Edited by kafros
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Yeah, I think that it's a good, different kind of "motion sensor." Thing is, if we can make a really spiffy-looking interface for it, the device would be that much cooler. Thing is, a motion tracker is just a motion tracker--the medium it uses to actually do the tracking is all we're delving into here.
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ok, well to be clear the name was decided awhile ago and should'nt really be an issue (i don't feel like renaming the topic again either :P ). What we want is a method of tracking, the only method i could relate too, was IR, which as Kam better explained seemed the most feasible for the year 2014.

should the text continue and/or progress with IR filtering as the base, or would another method of tracking be preferred ?

State I or Nay (with the pref'd method) common, let us get the SOB on the production line!
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Well, I was just floating an idea--wasn't trying to be presumptous in any way. I don't see a problem with the way you guys were originally shooting for at all--just have to balance what the gameplay guys want, I guess. Whatever the case is, we're still calling it a "motion sensor," I'm sure! ^_^ Hmm, from what I know, IR uses heat detection picked up on the lower end of the spectrum (er, crap, higher, that is) to remotely locate a living being. I was thinking more along the lines of night vision there, but hey--works for me. You're right in saying we shouldn't go too far-fetched with our technology here--we want something interesting, yet realistic for our time-period. Heck, even the alien technology itself sounds feasible, too, in its own way. It's just that we'll have to make according adjustments to gameplay to reflect the descriptions of items, or vice versa. To my knowledge IR scanners don't detect movement per se--they just register all "warm" objects at a certain radius. I dunno, I could be wrong. The choice is up to you guys, of course--we'll just have to work from there.

To angle it up, going with a realistic approach might be safe, but limits our creative freedom. On the other side of the fence, we can use creative liscense to theorize what technology they'll be using, say, ten years from now, in comparison with what we have at the moment (even if there are any real technological advancements, which from where I'm standing don't seem very likely). What do you guys think? Edited by The Master Maniac
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I think that the best motion sensor is the one which uses more than one method of tracking! IR, Themral, Electron, Sound (or whatever else you want), all have some advantages, BUT ALSO DISADVANTAGES! Thus, a sensor that uses most of them is the ideal device. (and why not all of them??? :LOL: )
Of course, if we don't want to make a perfect device, then... Just use technology from the year 2005 :rock: Edited by kafros
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My thoughts exactly. After all, going blind to the enemy if they decide to stay still has a degree of suspense to it, huh? Types of motion scanning technology available today include:

Static Emission Detection
Electromagnetic Scanning (ie, heartbeat scanner)
Aural Displacement Scanning
And, of course, dozens of others that I can't really think of at the moment.

Maybe with some research...
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