[ODE] Simple FPS-like character

[Flavien Brebion]

I've been using ODE for years now, but i'm still amazed at the lack of 
support for simple characters collision detection/simulation.

Browsing the mailing list archive, it seems like the question isn't 
asked very often - every 6 months in average -. Does that mean nobody 
uses ODE for first-person games/simulations ?

In general, it was suggested to use a capped cylinder to simulate a 
character. This doesn't work well in a generic environment ( made of 
many complex tri-meshes ), with staircases.

In the past months, i've been using a capsule ( a cylinder capped by two 
half spheres ). Unfortunately, you have to make the spheres have a large 
radius to be able to smoothly climb the stairs. And spheres with a 
larger radius mean that your character is "fat", and can no longer fit 
doors entrances, for instance.

The best solution would be to use a simple ellipsoid. Unfortunately, ODE 
does not support it, nor is there any function to set a non-uniform 
scale to spheres.

Any suggestion ?

F. Brebion