shipdesign analysis

[darkfaerytales]

i have to admit that initially i was astonished by SL going so far

there was a period when i take many shots of my accidents just cause i like it and then for checking the vary kind of visual damages the ships get when destroyed, another interesting thing to go in depht

[Cerbis]

You know, seeing that Eject readout just reminded me of something... if you look closely at the canopies for the various craft you can notice design that closely mimics the design of canopies in ejection seat-equipped fighter jets, such as the Icaras' triple-section canopy. However, most of the craft seem to have -broken- canopies when crashed (Of course, the glass might shatter from the sheer impact after the fact. ), which would indicate that they use canopy-destruct ejection systems, which would explain the patterns you can see in the glass on some of the craft, for instance the Piranha.

Those patterns are break lines in the glass material, to help the ejection process.

Such stunning attention to detail!

[darkfaerytales]

i remenber some people complaint about the proportions of some canopy respect the old ship models when the first material of the game comes to light

because some was big or too " centered "

personally i like the great part of them, as a modest military aircraft fan i'm happy of this, the more there're reasemblance to modern fighter jet elements the better is for me...

[mic-dk]

I spend way to little time in photomode. Wow.

[Motorsagmannen]

@mic-dk: yupp youve missed a lot my danish compadre. without photomode this thread would be well not impossible, but by far worse.
@dark faerytales: lovely photos you got there, i sent you some of my photos over the psn to, hope you got them.
and another thing, i am awre that i could fit in much more detail in my little analysis, but the fact is that there is just soo much, evrywhere, on ll the ships. it would take forever to give a full- detailed report, and also i am trying to stay on the ball and not wander to far off into detail of another reason, if i cant manage to produce theese relatively frequently i might loose momentum, and i really want to finish this now that i actually have the time for it
eidt: but you mentioned that i should pay attention to texture of the hulls, i have been doing that all along, but most ships have nothing special. I mentioned the riveted armour of the triakis, and yes i will mention the honeycomb on the assegai and make notees of any texture that shines out among the others. in fact since assegai was my first love in this gme the honeycomb structured panels covering this craft was among the first discrete detailing i came across in this game.

that said i love all your feedbacks, and all tiny wonderful details you lead me to.

[Motorsagmannen]

ASSEGAI-Developments
First impressions of the assegai, quite back heavy but still, sleek, sexy and incredibly fragile.
It is a dual-hull craft, consisting of two quite long hulls with huge fins stick down on the rear end and a aerodynamic center-hull, the center hull has big wings too and these function as the by far biggest airbrakes in the game when pivoted in their sockets.
Every panel of the assegai is made out of a composite honeycomb material, which looks like carbon fiber on the backside, so all in all it looks rigid and lightweight. But this also leads to the front end being incredibly light.
because the entire front end is made out of a single thin layer of this material, bent in a wide “v” shape. The only thing to weigh it down there, are the two cannon bays on the outside of the hull, and what appears to be its AG-generator, hidden inside the teeth of the wings connected to a slim pipe of wires. The assegais main bulk is all mounted in the center hull far to the back of the ship, connected to the front hulls with only two metal clamps to each front hull. This small amount of support between the hulls, make the assegai look like the most fragile ship in the game, although its composite armor probably is quite strong.
The external hulls also have quite much extra thickness towards the rear this seems to work as extra protection on the fins to make them endure scraping better. Along with the added armor it also has a rather big rectangular box on the right external hull with three hexagon light boxes. I don’t know the purpose of this, but aesthetically I think they should have lowered it a little bit so the don’t brake the hypersmooth lines of this ship that much. On the left side there is a stepladder like on many other ships. The increased thickness of armor also applies to the airbrake-fins on the center hull. The most dominating feature of the entire center hull is the two MASSIVE coolers each side of the engine. they are by themselves covering a cross section matching the rest of the top part of the ship. Another reason for these to stand out is because of the dark grey carbon fiber coating on the backside of each unit, especially because this is still dark grey even on silver skin. Along with the teeth on the wings, and the airbrakes, these are my favorite bodypart of this ship. The centerhull itself is one of the most streamlined in the game, quite long and narrow, and it has a long sweeping line from tip to end, and except from the massive coolers the center hull is quite thin.
When it comes to the main engine it is a bit hard to tell exactly where it starts, the belly of the assegai is more complex than on most other ships, but it looks like the engine itself begins around where the underside of the body suddenly broadens up in two wide “Y” shaped intakes, also notice the ridge between those intakes has a quite big notch in it forming a vicious spike( might be to tear up armor on ships the assegai land on top of ).
What seems to be the main intake of the engine though is the kinda big one on the underside of the nose, it is shaped as flat horizontal hexagon and runs duct all the way through the center body. The booster engines on the other hand does not have a clear intake at all, the seem to either draw some air from the big coolers on the opposite side of the wing they rest on, or they get all fuel & air from the main engine, through the connecting hose. It also looks like it has a separate set of boosters mounted on the chassis beams, connected to the “Y” shaped intakes through a hose, but these do nothing in the game.
The exhausts in the assegai, is composed of a rather big main one in the shape of a horizontal oval shaped from 8 pieces of metal blocks surrounding a solid metal octagonal ring. And the boosters have one small square shaped exhaust underneath each cooler unit.
Evaluation of handling versus appearance, this craft looks really nimble in all ways. And given its big amount of fins and huge airbrakes( which I must add also are the second coolest in the game), it fits both stats and flying feel quite right, it even oversteers as the rear center of gravity would suggest.
When it comes to speed it also looks quite right, its aerodynamic and light, and the engine looks like its fairly powerful but not overwhelming .
The shields statistics I want to brake into some aspects, it looks like it has the most advanced armor in the game, both rigid and lightweight, thus saving it from having the shield stats of the icaras but the integral structure of the craft is where it has its biggest drawbacks. It has compromised so much in being lightweight that the overall structure is vulnerable to impact from both weapons walls and opponent ships. So looks like this fits quite nicely to the stats to.
so to sum it up the assegai looks like a purpose built racer in every way, and is definitely one of the sexiest crafts in the game
Livery:
#1
It has a quite equal primary scheme of white and blue, with some okra details and trim. External hulls are primarily blue with a white trim along the edges. “ASSEGAI DEVELOPMENTS” written along most of the left hull and “ACHIEVE YOUR DESTINY” down the right one ( small nice detail on the right side, is the decal saying established “AD” logo 2113.) the center hull is primarily white with a blue racing stripe running from the nose all the way through to the back windscreen. It also have a blue trim in the bottom section to complement the huge blue coolerunits, the cooling units themselves have a cool white arrow that fits snuggly with the venting grid on top. After the cabin it has a fairly large okra section covering most of the panel covering the engine, this is detailed by a white triangle. The airbrake fins are blue with an okra line on the top facing the hull, on the airbrakes there is also a huge white “AD” logo
(Oddly enough the inside texture, of the broadest part on each external hull, has changed greatly and now look tarnished and damaged compared to the silver skin, this applies for all three liveries.)
All in all it looks rather nice, and all the lines fit well with the ship.
#2
(“Oh sweet it’s a new livery, I bet it looks sweet and different from the standard one” well the disappointment followed shortly.)The second one has slightly less blue but more white and okra, the center hull is almost unchanged except from a few small changes, the blue racingline now features a tiny version of the waving bear logo, and instead of a white triangle on the okra engine panel there is an arrow pointing at the exhaust. But the airbrakes look vastly different it now features more okra on the top and also big part on the bottom to, the “AD” logo is now gone and replaced with a arrow pointing down and backwards, in solid blue on top of slim blue & white line grid.
The external hulls look completely different with a white primary colour on top and blue primary on the portion facing downwards, it has an okra stripe encasing the teeth. Pointing directly inwards and closing each other over the gap between the hulls.. on the blue broad part of each hull there is okra circuitry details. Another cute detail is the (“ubermall panda” next to the right-side row of teeth)
This skin has a great variety in details but I miss big team logos, and all the different lines flow in a way that seems confusing and disruptive, it has some cool small details, but all in all it just looks a bit too messy.
#3
(“Yes, it’s the last livery, finally new look for the assegai” this was my initial thought when reaching 8000 points on this craft, and the assegai was also the only ship I raced until I reached around 10k with it. Boy was I disappointed, it is yet another blue white and okra. DAMN YOU AD >.<
Enough with the digressing and on to the livery itself,)
The center hull is quite different from the others because now its primarily blue all round, it features the awesome waving bear on the engine panel waving at the pilots you pass ( cool detail, and probably the best reason to use this skin.). and now it also features a HUGE arrow, starting on the top of the engine panel and merges into the cockpit, the sides on the arrow is painted on to the coolerunits. On the airbrakes, the big “AD” logo is back and now the thickened section is painted all okra. Looks nicely.
But when it comes to the external hulls i`m not to happy, it has a harlequin mosaic of big slabs of blue white and okra, it gets some points by having the big “ACHIEVE YOUR DESTINY” written in white over the blue and okra fields on the left side. And the blue “AD” log along with “ASSEGAI DEVELOPMENTS” in okra.
Also like the tiny tag on the right side next to rectangular box saying “Part 405/7 Heavy duty alloy” which indicates which part it is and what material it is made of.
This is my preferred racing livery simply because it looks best in chase-cam, but in total the standard one looks best. (And I must say this again, WHY ARE ALL LIVERIES ON THE ASSEGAI BLUE WHITE AND OKRA!!!?!?! Its so unrewarding to gain new skins when they are all so alike each other, every other ship have at least one that looks significantly different.)

This was my opinion on the Assegai

[Motorsagmannen]

or is it all a Mirage?

soon you will know the truth
p.s my anlysis is definitely getting bigger each time lol.

[yeldar2097]

yay for mirage
looking forward to it

[darkfaerytales]

you are right motorsag there is too too much to describing the ships

i remenber the first 2-3 months of the game i spent much time in the menus than in the game...

better to stay synthetic and focused, you're right, but...I HAVE SAY YOU THAT I'M MANIACAL! I HAVE SAY IT!!! hehehehe

as for the texture of the hulls you're right again in fact not that all the ship have something special, in fact there're something distinguishing on assegai,mirage, triakis ( as you have nicely described ) , qirex eheheh just 'cause some friends of mine say that " this Ship is much weathered and ruined than others " true! 3rd EG-X skin (? for me it's strange )
but i found something strange on the textured " skin " of HARIMAU too, i cannot explain or described it but it is STRANGE, seems built by strange material...

THANK YOU PAL I RUN to CHECK MY PSN FOLDER!

[Motorsagmannen]

yes the qirex is definitely more weathered and beaten than most others, but my first posts werent nearly as thourough as they are now
im considering grouping all my analysis, into one big post, it might bring a better structure to this thread and keep the consistency. but of course it could also be daunting to have so much info and text in one post
edit: now im up to 14 pages back to back in wordfile, size 12 times new roman, omg what am i doing here xD. btw mirage coming up tomorrow)

[Motorsagmannen]

MIRAGE:
This craft is by many referred to as the “green bug”, the reasons for this is quite obvious, all the skins are green to a certain degree, and the “mantis body is made to look like… well a mantis. And also people have shunned it as ugly, this I wont agree on one bit different, yes. Ugly? not even the slightest.

The mirage is probably the roundest craft in the game. all panels even the ones with straight lines are rounded off. The center hull itself is almost wheel shaped, being the shortest hull compared to its height and also being the only cockpit with no nose in front of the pilot, just a tall windscreen. the mirage is also quite broad compared to its length, and thus the overall appearance turns it into a different looking craft. But not only does it look different from the rest, it looks even more futuristic. Every aspect of the mirage looks like its more technically advanced than the other teams, the strange armor coating, the transparent lcd screen on the windshield, even the design of the craft itself seem more modern. One of the most notable features is without doubt the big mantis claw external hulls, these function as shields for the otherwise exposed pilot against mines and bombs, especially the massive, thick ( I guess around 40-50 cm) triangular plates at the front, they are also dual layered, those are tough without doubt. but this way of armor plating also seem to grant the pilot a limited LOS other than directly to the front. The other use of the mantis claws is for the housing of its gatling cannons, they are located in oval crevices, on the outside of each claw, the cannons are linked to the center hull by a thick cable linked to an oval box on the inside of the claw. Imo these are the coolest main guns in the game, they even have exposed ammo visible in a rectangular slot right behind the gun . it also have one energy weapon hidden on the inside of each claw located on a oval long box, which is connected by thick cables all the way to the thinnest part of the hull, there it meets up with the cable for the gatling cannon and the merge into one cable crossing the thin section back to the rear of the external hull.
(to further enhance the mantis image, the mirage has two rows of three spikes on each claw at the bottom, just as real life mantises, and the two antennae is curved slightly outwards to replicate an insects, its unnecessary but cool design details.) When it comes to one of the issues that seem to confuse people the most, the mirage has quite big front ends on the external hulls, yet the middle section of the hulls is quite thin, how does it stay in one piece, not only during racing but also during heavy weapons damage, after all the mirage does have quite high shieldscore?. Well, the answer is three layers of composite material all along this panel, that said when the ship does explode these always bends out of shape, so it is probably the weakest link in its armor, but not as weak as they first appear. And all of the ships body panels seems to be made of a material mimicking the looks of insect exoskeleton, the surface is not smooth at all, and truly seem organic. Is this another trick behind the technically advanced mirage or part of their mantis gimmick? When it comes to the other aspects of the shield, the mirage looks rock solid. no need to mention the external hulls further, the rest of that will survive Armageddon. And the compact centerhull is also built to endure, with the thick metal plate shielding the whole belly including its two slim horizontal rectangular boosters. And the rest covered almost completely in armor.
The external hulls are connected to the centerhull, using primarily a dense pauldron, fitted to a socket on the upper part. When it comes to the airintakes, the mirage have an unusual body and therefore the ordinary intakes are gone, the three most obvious are the two small rectangular ducts, one on each pauldron, and the third being the broad ribbed intake right after the cockpit. Its also possible for the huge 90* angled pipe on the left and the four small 90* angled ones on the left is connected to the engine, either to provide lift or to feed air, but its hard to see the real function of those ( personally I would have put either two big ones or, 8 small ones instead for a cleaner look ). It is not as easy to make conclusions as to how exactly the engines function, especially because of the unorthodox bodyshape of the mirage. So sadly I cant make any conclusions about that especially as there are no direct air ducts what so ever, but the big one on right behind the cockpit seem to lead towards the main thruster. What I can say is that this is most definitely a compact engine, and I can make an educated guess based on speed based on its thruster size. The main thruster is slightly larger than average and is completely quadratic in shape small trapezoid metal inserts breaks up the quadrant and gives it more texture (which is a nice touch). The boosters are almost impossible to spot during races as they are located directly underneath the main thruster, and are of the same width, which makes them quite big even though they are very flat rounded of rectangles. When in use they show to small jet streams each instead of one solid flat one. So my judgment on this crafts speed based on appearance is it looks plausible. both the main thruster and the boosters are slightly bigger than average, but not dominating, and because of the roundness of the body, It probably doesn’t suffer from much aerodynamic drag.
When it comes to the handling, the back portion of each external hull function as wings, these are fairly large and would probably ensure fair handling ability, and the airbrakes although not that big in surface size, looks efficient to as they are mounted s a natural extension of the wings. Which btw give the hulls a great total appearance when it comes to the flow of lines. So it does look to be up to specs there to.
All in all, the mirage is a different looking craft and has a feel to it as being thoroughly designed to look a certain way, most of these aspects look nice but when it comes to practicality its extreme design does definitely hinder the LOS of the pilot. If this is countered with cameras and censors on the external hulls it shouldn’t lead to any problems,( which seem plausible regarding the advanced design of the mirage in general ) but this couldn’t be discovered. I give the mirage my approval because of its many cool and unique design features.

guess what the post is too long lol, sepparated in two posts, apparently i cant have over 10000 characters

[Motorsagmannen]

MIRAGE: part. II
Livery:
Before starting I would like to point out that the mirage is the ONLY craft with paint on the silverskin, you cant get rid of that stripe running across the middle of the center hull. Again I really like this line and the fact that even the silverskin has it looks cool.
#1
The standard livery is composed mostly of black and different shades of green, with white detailing. The black is located on the top panels (these are black on all liveries). The entire right side of the ship is one massive mirage logo and starts out with a fairly dark green on the entire right section of the center hull, and onwards on the external hull. At the edge of the thin section the section the dark green ends and the lighter green continues. The transition between the shades of green is made by the white lines of the mirage logo, and all in all it is one of the better adaptations of a team logo over an entire shipside. Details on the right side of the ship is not plentiful but the all fit in snuggly, on the bottom of the center on the mantis claw is the mirage slogan “SEEING IS BELIEVING”. On the wing it has the mirage logo in the lighter shade of green fitted on the dark green background. And last but not least it’s the Ubermall panda located on the front triangular armorplate.
On the left side it starts at the back of the center hull with light green, this continues forward until it reach the thin section where the right side turned into the light green. The left side now turns into dark green all the way to the tip. Details on the left side is most prominent in the white “MIRAGE” written on the lower center part of the claw. There is also the mirage logo now in white located on the left wing, and the white barcode running along the thin section (this barcode is placed in the same location on every livery, which is rare in the AG-crafts.) Dividing the two sides of the ship is the white wide center line, running the entire length of the centerhull.
This livery has nice duality over it and I like the chasecam which shows dark green on the right side and light green on the left, the left side looks a bit bland compared to the right though because of its lack of prominent details. It is also the only non- symmetric livery to this ship.
#2
This livery stands out from the other two in a good couple of vital aspects, all the colours are the same but the balance between them are altered greatly, main colour is now white, and the detailing is now done in the two shades of green. The exceptions to this is found on the front armorplates which is solid dark green, the airbrakes which are also dark green with black diagonal zebra-trim along the two sides facing the body. And the center hull which is primarily in the lighter green. To start of with the center hull its all light green except from the panel right in front of the pilots feet, and the top half of the panel covering the backside. the detailing on the center hull consists of a white line going across the top of the cockpit and dark green trim following the transition between the white and the light green on the backside panel, it also features the thick stripe running along the length of the panel, this also in dark green. When it comes to the external hulls, the top half of the claws are painted dark green, and adjascent to the entire dark green section it has a pinstripe in the lighter green, this pinstriping is also found on top of the pauldrons but now both the lighter and the dark green are thin lines running along the panel. The “MIRAGE” on the left and the “SEEING IS BELIEVING” slogan on the right side of the claws are dark green. The “MIRAGE” logo on the wings is now two- couloured in light and dark green just like the actual logo. The barcode on the left thin section of the external hull is now pink and barely visible, but it is still in the same location.
Truly this livery looks awesome, and has a true racing feel to it in an old school fashion,
( the closest match to this among the other liveries must be the #3 livery of the qirex, which happen to be my favorite for that craft to) the mixture of hypermodern AG-crafts and racing stripes I must admit appeal to me greatly, and therefore this is my favourite livery for the mirage. Only downside, I whish the airbrakes where white instead.
#3
This by far the darkest of them, the entire front section is dark metallic gray up until the angle in the thin section where the lighter green takes over as the majority colour except on the cockpit sidepanels which are black and the centerhull backpanel which is dark green on the top half with the thick stripe in black. The detailing on this ship consists of a certain interesting elements, the “MIRAGE” on the left external hull is now also featured on to the right as well, removing the slogan completely. And it also has a vertical green line ( of the lighter one ) running down making the center line in the “m” the center line in the “G” is also green. This looks cool on the left side but sadly doesent correspond well on the right side because of when you compose a logo with words on one side the letters wont match with the layout on the other, so the green line hitting the center of the “m” now hits the center of the “E” and makes little sense, the middle lines of the “m” and “G” are still green though, which is nice. on the wings the mirage logo is now in white and on the left side it has “MIRAGE” written under it. The left side has a big “m” instead. The airbrakes have the same black diagonal zebra pattern on the sides facing the body, but because of the lighter shade of green it stands out much more clearly now.
On the center hull things get interesting, the black panels on the side of the cockpit have a thin dark green mesh dividing the panel into big black rectangles, this is only visible in the right light conditions, and even then you don’t see it clearly until you bring up the exposure in photo mode, it’s a cool feature that I bet most haven’t seen. I love it 
As for random decals the Ubermall panda is back to the right external hull, but now moved back to just before the “MIRAGE” decal. (if you think im beeing obsessive with the ubermall panda and the blue waving bear your probably right, but they are just too awesome not to include here.)
All in all for this livery, quite cool but its my least favourite for this craft, its just to dark, and lacks the contrast that the other two have, it still have some excellent design features though, and these heighten my view on it.

P.S. the caps and uncaps of the letters "m" and "G" are there to best fit the font on the craft itself.

Ok Mirage complete, hope you like it

[Motorsagmannen]

stay tuned

[darkfaerytales]

this is definitely, if not the best, one of the best analysis you done , kudos friend!

heehhe now as usuals my toughts

the antennas are actually " antennas " for comunications, many ships have, so i think the enginner have say theyself " uhm we have built a ship who completely mimicks a mantis and there's left to put in some comunication array, so why not "

i wonder however the 3 teeth under each hull purpose,maybe docking/transport ?

ehehehe search my old post " no one loves mirage " i say your same exact words on remark how mirage is " futuristic " even in a futuristic game, i have compare it to some of the current concept / prototypes cars who never see a place in the market

seems roughly 20 years ahead, anyway remain hard establish how the " time moves " in the 23 century compared to how it does today, as i've mentioned before sincerely i have expected an lcd installed on every ship, mirage gets one for obvious reasons...
but by many aspects the things are better this way, i wouldn't never want some elements could ruin the " future but industrial " look of wipeout, so monitors are cool

a curious fact over eveything is , yes it's true , we mark mirage as " strange " " unusual " " advanced " uncanonycal " but in the end it's fundamentally the same goteki 45 Pure design but splited into 2 hulls and overally rounded up

one more last question remain unsolved to me : a mantis? why a mantis?

[Darkdrium777]

hmm. could be, but its not at the end of the nozzle but crowning around it, therefore it looks more like a cooling rib than a vectoring nozzle imo. but i like the way you think and thanks for the input

Just coming back with this: WipEout PurE intro. Look at the end.

[Motorsagmannen]

wow awesome vid, never seen that before, yes the end there is without doubt vectoring nozzles, but it still won`t change my view on the EG-X.
@drk faerytales, im glad you like it, and coming to the mntis question, ehm dunno if you mounted this towards me or towards th SL designers. but if its towards me well, ia mantis has quite long thin arms with big claws at the end, therefore it wouls be a naturall comparison. if its at SL, the mantis are considered to be one of the fastest species in the world when it comes to reflexes, and besides i guess they would think an insectoid design would look cool in WO and therefore implementing the mirage with its mantis body. mantis body is also SL`s words for describing the mirage, and i used it because i can see where they were going with this.

[Motorsagmannen]

a bit swmped with work atm, but will get my next babie online asap so be patient, might take couple of days

[darkfaerytales]

haahaha i was thinkin' other morning in the bed, about assegai, and the infamous partnering with triakis in which they have developed " unique shielding technology " whose " improve " the durability of the assegai chassis , haahaha maybe paying big $ to triakis to help develop a 7 shield in the end , how big MOFO they are at Triakis! they have screw up them! i guess if now this shield is " improved " then before was worser than the icaras one

poor assegai

[Motorsagmannen]

well they seem to also consider light weight over shield capacity. so the shields is quite lightweight, and durable enough for its purpose. i dont think triakis ****ed them over so to speak. and as you said, without the composite alloy shield, i would probably rate is a 5 in shield

[Motorsagmannen]

HARIMAU:
First impressions on the harimau is, wow this is a really sexy craft. Second thoughts hmmm, looks like a fish. It is one of the thinnest crafts in the game and a streamlined overall look to it. When it also is one of the flattest the ships it looks quite compact overall. Everything needed is fitted in the confines of the hull without sticking out more than necessary. The belly is the smoothest on any ag crafts (except from the zone-craft). And the only protruding elements are the arsenal mounted under the tip of the nose. And boy does this thing have an arsenal, rivaled only to the auricom in amount, and fitted on a smaller space. It is epic, composed of two huge missiles on each side (outer ones functioning as cannons for some reason), two energy weapons mounted to the forward directed ag- generator. And two massive rocket-pods mounted a meter apart along the center holding 10 rockets each. And compared to the pleasantly flat fishlike first impression it looks like it can bite quite hard.

The hull is in general divided into two sections, the nose, with the cockpit weapon systems and AG-generator. And the rear containing wings, airbrakes and engine. The engine is mounted as a bridge between the two hulls and runs along the entire rear section. Speaking about the engine I want to discuss the MANY and various air intakes on this craft. They vary much in size but the harimau features almost ridiculous amount, most of them visual in plain sight. The biggest ones first, it is the two MASSIVE ones on the belly they are triangular shaped and runs the around 75% of the entire width of the craft. These are probably main airintakes to the engine. And as most other big intakes on other ag craft, they are invisible without photo mode. On the top of the hull there is an array of intakes and air-ducts, most prominent being the wide flat ones on each side of the cockpit. These are just as wide as the one s on the belly but being totally flat they lack a little in capacity, these are divided in two equal sized holes each. In front of those and running alongside of the nose is a series of intakes divided by slanted panels, although static the look like they are closeable and consists of five intakes divided by four slanting plates. On the ridge of the nose itself there is two small intakes, probably leading air to the cockpit.
Behind the cockpit is two black panels sticking out on each side in n angle, each of those is an intake to. In the middle of these panels there is a center panel composed of two antennas in front of a central venting hole. Running on the sides of the craft, parallel to the three center panels is a black grate which seems to be venting hot air from the backward facing AG-generators ( at least the look like it by appearance, but hard to tell what their use is. All I know is that they look awesome with their black center cone and blue, glowing halo.)
on the rear hull it has some fairly big ones mounted inside the lower set of wings. And the last ones are two small grates located on the far back on top of the engine, these emits a blue glow, and looks like they are there for venting the engine. As a last note all airintakes and venting grates that are visible are black, which make them all stand out clearly on any livery. The AG generators on the harimau is different from all other crafts, they are composed of four thin lines running along the topside of the bottom airintakes. In between of these there’s metal rails, which seems to be functioning as protection against impacts. These AG- generators are uniquely harimau´s, and resemble no other generator design.

Moving on to the main engine. It looks like it starts right where the ridge containing the cockpit has a dent in it, the engine starts where the panels go up after the dent. It is wedge on the top side slanting all the way towards the exhaust, and the underside is level but semicircular the whole way. Like most other aspects of the harimau, the engine is thin and compact. The only protruding elements to its otherwise smooth appearance, is the exposed fuel lines. One on each side of the engine and two on the middle, connected via two half-halo pipes encasing the engines middle section. Towards the back end of the engine is a strange trapezoid red light, I have absolutely no idea what this is, but its fairly large and is also something only the harimau has. On the top side of the engine there is fewer details than on the belly, however a few caught my attention. Running on both sides, between the engine and the panels of the nose section, runs a pipe that looks surprisingly much like exhaust and muffler of a car or motorcycle. The pipes are gunmetal grey along with the rest of the engine but the “muffler” is much lighter and stands out quite clearly. Also worth noting is the two humps on the topside of the engine each having a small airintake mounted on the top. And now to the exhaust nozzle itself, it is mainly composed of two elements. The canter rectangle, and the outer rectangle encasing the central one on all sides. This is a bit hypothetically because it is extremely difficult to make out if the harimau has booster engines or not. But my conclusion after studying this ship excessively, is this: the central rectangle is the main thruster, and the outer rectangle serve s booster engines, although they are both linked without doubt to the same engine and mechanism. This is also a design trait no other ship has, every other ship have distinct and separate boosters and main engines, but it does suit the compact design of the harimau well to have a two engines wrapped up in one. All in all its power output doesn’t look to impressive but it still looks kinda fast. So it seems up to specs. Moving from oomph to handling,

it is all centered in the back hull of the ship. The rear hull is quite dense in the middle, being full of the engine. But other than that its all wings, two really big ones covering the top, and two slightly smaller ones right below. The top wings also house the coolest looking airbrakes in the game (imo). These are two flaps lying indistinctive on the top of the wings when out of use, but when they are deployed they pop up, along the entire width of the front end of the wings, mounted to two broad hinges. In all aspects the harimau looks nimble and maneuverable, its narrow body, streamlined hull and huge wings are all contributing to this. So I would say it looks fairly well designed all in all in both handling and speed. On to the shields, it is hard to point fingers at flimsiness with the ship being as compact as it is, but it does have almost the entire engine exposed, and the armor don’t appear to be thick at all, so I would give it a rather plausible shield rating.
Speaking of shields it is interesting to note that the silver ship have a mixture of smooth ordinary panels, and panels having the same insect like texture as the mirage. None of the other liveries have this, they only have the smooth panels. But all the liveries have the machined grooves and dents on every panel.