Physics of WiiSports Golf
Forces on slopes
(Autoplay and pause 0:53–1:01) What happens next?
How does the software decide?
Realistic games
In order for games to appear realistic the programmers have to
use what's called a physics engine, a piece of software that
uses physics to find out what happens next.
In putting the player has to take account of the slope of the
green when playing their shot. What equation governs the
effect of the slope?
Think and Talk
Task
We can all describe roughly what will happen to the ball on the
slope but the game needs to respond very precisely to small
changes in how fast it is hit or in what direction it is hit.
Your task today is to find the equations which govern the effect
of the slope. To keep it simple we will not include concepts
like friction or spin and will assume that the ball is struck at right
angles to the slope.
We will then try to use these equations in a very simple
simulation. In the first level we will assume the speed of the ball
after the collision and calculate the speed of the skittle. In the
second level you need to work out the speed of both.