Drone assessment from a roboticist:
(most of my bots are next-gen/cutting-edge, R&D, and usually ruggedized for outside and hazardous environments. Also space, sometimes. There is a big difference between these and consumer or factory robots. Like, huge dif.)
Forgivable:
- Battery life: The only drones that can fly that long and reliably are tethered, however I have seen crazy thin tethers for power. Regardless making this realistic would suck. Plus long-life, solid state, batteries and super caps do exist, and more are always on the way, so it's not a big stretch or immersion breaking to just have it fly with no worries. I would have recommended it the way they have it for gameplay reasons.
- Talking: Well, put simply, this AI is in it's own native territory. Plus it plays from a finite set of pre-recorded responses, and thus is just as simple as AI going back decades. Easy pass. In fact if they managed some kind of highly interactive customized AI system where you could wax poetic and talk philosophy I'd be impressed, maybe.
- Navigation: Sure, and no it does not require a ton of fancy sensors. Even the Tesla cars use little more than their cameras, which is impressive tbh. I have worked on many bots with fancy lasers, sonar, and more. It often tends to be more of a burden than an advantage, so this bot having only cams is a definite thumbs up. As for navigation AI and whatnot, again sure I'll buy it. Plus what they are dealing with for real now to get it working is not all that different, in ways, very dif in others, but it's believable.. if/when they get it working anyway
- Storage: Hard to criticize while standing next to it with 500 reinforced concrete blocks in my pocket, taking up a single slot at that. But they did help it feel more capable by putting large bladed fans. It would need more IRL, but it's enough for a pass in a video game. Plus they could have a double motor/blade set up in each, that would help.) If I changed anything here I would mainly add a 3rd blade/housing and make sure they are all doubled up. If a thing like this existed IRL it would likely have 6, 8 or more rotors.
Um, no.. but fine ok whatev:
- 2x fully articulated arms: Ha, hahahhaha, nope! This is by far where most sci-fi designs fail, hard. This and legs, anything articulated. At most I would put a 2 axis pan/tilt joint, and then mount whatever onto that. I am working on a 6 axis arm right now and there is no @%$*#!ing way, like all kinds of no for those arms. People tend to think all you need is a joint, like a pivot point, and you're good to go... ffs I wish. Motor, transmission, torque sensor, position sensor, and "transmissions" can get all kinds of whacky with belts, weird-@%$*#! gear setups and linkages, and so on. Plus wiring through all that is so difficult most give up and it all just hangs out, I fight this irl, constantly. Anyway, since this principle is SO poorly understood in sci-fi games and film, exhaustively so, I tend to give up and just say "ok, whatever", and keep playing with my eyes half rolled. Fix it or leave, I consider this a personal nitpick, few to none would notice or care tbh. But you'd get major thumbs up from anyone whose even toyed with robotics irl.
Needs work fo sure:
- Healing and Attacking: Not done yet, so I'll wait, but please no magic flying symbols or heal rays, etc. Slap a shocker, like the handheld one, on a pan/tilt on one side, and I dunno, have it hold a syringe or pull out a bandage, on the healy side, make a bandage noise, no magical floating healy fog or whatever, please. Just having them do this, mainly the healing, is a stretch enough, but works for a game, so ok. Just think you CAN pull this off in a much more believable/passable way. The shocky thing should just have a bolt or something, not some kind of plasma ray or whatever tf that was. Again I know they're placeholders, we'll see what ends up in game.
Conclusion: Yes, please, gimme.
