The “Print Screen” button on your keyboard? (sometimes abbreviated as "Prt Scrn)
(usually above the insert and delete buttons, which are above the arrow keys…)
Yea. Or get fraps because it could make movies too! For like game trailers.
Ctrl+F3, saves a pic of the active window even during gameplay.
Shift+Ctrl+F3, for a pic of the entire interface.
Blender has a lot of cool hidden features like shift+F for fly-around mode.
Cool things in Blender that aren’t so obvious
I made a checkpoint system. It shows the current lap, the next checkpoint and an arrow that points to the next checkpoint. 
(If you want to make black holes too, you could use a script I made a little while ago:
http://blenderartists.org/forum/showthread.php?t=155603)
Attachments
checkpoint system.blend (811 KB)
PhilB- Thanks for the cool keyboard shortcuts! Thanks to you, here’s my first In-Game Screenshot!
dedean- You, in my opinion, would be an awesome addition to the team. How would you like to be my first team member, the Official Python Scripter?
Your checkpoint system is gold. I would love to use it! Can you post or PM me with details on how it works (pseudocode) since I’m not exactly fluent in Python?
Also, how do you suggest I send you the file? (I don’t want to have you give me your email address- even though I promise I’m legit, it would just be weird. And I currently have no file-sharing accounts.)
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OK, I’ll try cdupload.com. But I’ll be gone for the next two weeks so I might not get it up until then.
How would you like to be my first team member, the Official Python Scripter?
Yes I’d like to be the first team member. 
The checkpoint system works like this:
Every main checkpoint is a blue cube called check# (the # is the number of the checkpoint). Every main checkpoint has two empties parented to it, called check#a and check#b. These two empties represent the actual size and location of the checkpoint. They both represent a corner of a cube.
An Always Sensor triggers the script to run at every frame. The first thing the script does is getting all the information it needs. If it has the information it needs, it calculates if the player is located in the correct checkpoint. If so, the checkpoint number (on the screen) will increase or go back to 1. (If it goes back to 1, the lap number increases by 1.) The last thing the script does is changing the checkpoint the arrow is pointing to.
The laps variable (line 4) isn’t used yet. This number is going to be the number of laps you need to do before you finished the race. I didn’t use it yet because there will be AI players too, so I’ll first try to make an AI system before I finish the checkpoint system.
I also had a few ideas for the game:
Since the galaxy of Asteracers should be very big, it could slow down the game a bit. But if the player uses wormholes to get to different parts of the galaxy, we could make these different parts in different Scenes.
We could make a money system too, so you first have to win some races and do some missions in the first part. When you’ve earned enough, you can by an anti-gravity sort of thing for your ship to be able to enter a part near a black hole or something.
What do you think?
dedean- Good to hear you want to join! Thanks for giving me the “play-by-play” of that system. Some changes- I’d like the checkpoints to be blue “force field” rings (toruses) that you fly through. Also I’d like the lap and checkpoint numbers to be smaller and more “stylized” i.e. in a font that more fits the techno feel of the game.
I like the money system idea as well. Maybe you could buy parts for your ship such as larger boosters, afterburners, or missile launchers, that would increase top speed, turbo speed, maneuverability, firepower, etc.
Also, for the wormhole idea- I agree that the different parts of the game need to be in different Scenes. How about using lightspeed boosters or something of the sort? On every scene transition, there would be something like a cutscene or maybe a “hyperspace” star wars-esque kind of animation, then the screen would show the next area of the galaxy you showed up in.
Very nice idea , have you thought about the start of a level, mabie your craft comes off a mothership, gets
its systems ready for manual use then your player controls.
thanks, jim.
Yeah, I have. In the start of the game, you are on the Asteracer mothership. On the ship itself is a practice track, where you learn to steer around. Then the ship drops you off at a small asteroid field, where you have your first “real” race. Then you defeat a small squadron of United Worlds ships investigating reports of Asteracers in the area.
Some changes- I’d like the checkpoints to be blue “force field” rings (toruses) that you fly through. Also I’d like the lap and checkpoint numbers to be smaller and more “stylized” i.e. in a font that more fits the techno feel of the game.
The little game I uploaded was only to show how the checkpoint system works. You can make the checkpoints and the text look like whatever you want.
There are a lot of free fonts on http://www.1001freefonts.com/ and you can model the checkpoint yourself (the script doesn’t need to be changed to change the checkpoint). By the way, have a look at this tutorial http://www.johnwallie.com/thumbnailing.html. I think it’s very useful.
I think using hyperspace would be a great idea.
However if you’d have this hyperspace device or something, you would be able to get to all parts of the galaxy: you’ve unlocked every new world at once.
So what if we’d use more than one way to get to other places? What if we’d use, for example, hyperspace for the first two new worlds, a wormhole for the third and a stargate for the fourth?
I also think the game will be a bit more interesting if you have to use different kinds of transport. And you could make it sort of a challenge to use them:
For example, a stargate is a way to travel really fast, so there’s a lot of space traffic. And of course some sort of space police. Since Asteracing is prohibited, the space police is chasing you while you’re trying to find your way to the huge stargate, through the crowd of the space traffic… :eyebrowlift2:
I made some sort of text images in blender and gimp with the font laserian.
http://www.1001freefonts.com/laserian.php
I think this is a nice font for the game.
At the moment I’m trying to find out how the A.I. players can avoid obstacles like asteroids or space stations…
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Nice!
I love the one with the supernova!
I’ll help with the game! I am a good modeler and UV texturer.
Sorry everyone for the long delay! I haven’t given up! I’m BAAAAACK!
dedean- OK! Good ideas, as usual. A race dodging both enemy ships and oncoming traffic would be loads of fun. Also I think that that font would be perfect for all of the game’s text.
micah- I’d be happy to have your help, but I’d like to see an example of your work. Just kind of like a portfolio model or something, so I can get an idea of your style and experience level.
Also I have started work on the massive Asteracers mothership. Just a concept model but you can see what I’m going for…
Attachments
shiptry2.blend (682 KB)
This is starting to look very nice.
As for the logo, in my opinion the one with the planet is the best.
I have a model of a meteorite for you, it’s low poly, untextured, but it’s uv mapped and has a normal map on it.
Attachments
Meteor.blend (557 KB)
Could you guys give me some c&c’s on the model, please?
(I’ve been playing around with some modifiers and found that I got an ok animation of the mothership coming out from under the cover of some form of cloaking device using the build modifier. Any way to do this differently?)
Hey polyman! I love the idea you have (especially the government banning outerspace racing) can I join your project? i will design levels for you.
Whoa!
Weird un-cloaking animation man!
I think the model is fine, but will look much better with textures. 
(I saw a refraction demo with some of the martinish cubemaps, btw)