Orbital mechanics - in games I would rather have the 'real deal' that feels like Orbiter, than a simplified format which more or less ends up playing like an arcadey format. We can have a good Newtonian flight model and use AI thruster assistance to help the players go where they want to go but at the touch of a button, use manual engine and RCS controls to gain an edge over those flying with simpler control setups.Example - Orbital mechanics was supposed to be in the design of. It turned out to be a challenging space combat game with scalable difficulty. They removed orbital mechanics but even today, the Newtonian flight model therein is a fantastic work of art which allows for totally unlimited tactical options.The default flight control is computer assisted and limits relative velocity to 1000m/s. This can be overridden either temporarily or permanently with thruster controls or disabling the "FBW" system which attempts to keep the ship flying straight.I believe, that if you used I-War's setup you can scale the basic premise from Orbiter (which is like hitting N in I-War for full manual control) to Star Trek, which can be mimicked by using very powerful linear RCS to force the ship to fly "straight" as it changes direction in space.As mentioned above, we here in Orbiter also have some custom ship configurations to simplify flight control.Realistic rockets and spacecraft like the Shuttle have to live with realistic engine performance, which means small amounts of thrust are relied upon to make changes in vehicle trajectory over a long period of time. (Say, a Shuttle de-orbit burn).With the XR and Deltaglider series, these are more "futuristic" designs with likewise improved propulsion. Orbital maneuvers are simplified because it's easier to visualise where the ship is going, due to the faster acceleration and greater margin of error.It also has scalable difficulty, as you can elect to disable the damage model and increase engine performance to literally, Star Trek levels. But I find this unnecessary.The XR2's default setup is intuitive enough so long as you've taken a few Shuttle rides in Orbiter (on autopilot). For a greater challenge, load up an XR5 (itself a much heavier ship) with 600 tons of cargo and fly that into space and back down again.Almost everything else, including the Shuttle, would be a piece of cake then.As far as learning goes, I have been in Orbiter for only a month. Orbital mechanics is nothing difficult once you've seen how a real launch goes, and have some practise flying the ships in a controlled environment before doing any mission-based activity.In this premise, Independence War is a fantastic newbie friendly space combat game.For a real time strategy perspective, what I want is something like Nexus: Jupiter Incident with manual thruster overrides. It has a far simpler physics setup (actually, NO physics as far as I'm concerned) but things move so slowly in 3D that you're tempted to think the capital ships have a realistic sense of motion.With a superior tactical interface like I-War and manual override controls, Nexus would have been way ahead of the competition.I believe that the ease of use of a spaceflight simulator relies on its interface. I-War has an "Orb" display that tells you exactly which direction to point to correct your manually flown 20km/s Newtonian combat trajectory.You can't do that in Orbiter because it doesn't have that interface gadget, but you can improvise - use the stars and other planets to reference thruster burns, like Apollo.A good interface, once again like I-War, removes that need to improvise, and as such makes it newbie friendly.But how newbie friendly do I want your game to be? Sure I might need a couple hours to familiarise myself with your control interface, but after that, give me the full manual space cowboy stuff :3---Part 2 - semi automated launchThis is in direct response to your suggestion above:This is a great suggestion. Instead of dumping the player into Orbiter in the Shuttle with SRBs (and tell him "just launch it, now"), use the 3D interface to project a holographic series of loops into the air, so that if the player goes through the holographic flight path, he will enter orbit successfully with the correct combination of horizontal and vertical velocity.This is referenced with either me in OMP calling out squadron commands over voice comms, or an easier reference from Hegemonia's introductory movie.Part III - Navigation (sorry for crap formatting, at work here)Once again, to navigate in your universe and to intercept orbital targets (or other ships) we can simply get the player to select a target in the targeting / navigation interface and the computer will present him/her with a holographic interception course. Keep the velocity vector through the hoops and you'll reach the target fine. With an Orbiter style docking HUD display, I don't think anything can go wrong, once the player gets used to monitoring the closing velocity indicator.Here, a page from the new Star Trek movie can be borrowed - once player reaches recommended optimal cruise velocity, a big floating text informs him of it. If he fails to fire retros in time a huge "WARNING, CLOSING VELOCITY OVERSPEED" or something stares back.There is of course possibility of programming the autopilot to get the ship there under computer control, similar to the F6 / approach target command in Independence War 2. Likewise, F7, match target velocity, can also make orbital formation and dockng really simple.Once again I'm using smart interface and AI assistance to make the premise of Newtonian space easy to understand. After all, future air and spacecraft will have increased automation and even yes, I-War style AI assistance to make flight easier on the human pilot.