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No Man's Sky - What changed over the course of development?

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Ollie Pooch

In a perfect world, we'd all be homersexual
You're going towards the center of your current galaxy. Since getting to the center of the Universe is the perceived goal its not unrealistic he means that.
A guy got to 3 more galaxies on Reddit, so hopefully he can confirm if they get crazier or not.
 
Disclaimer: Maybe some of this stuff is in there just very rare and undiscovered to my knowledge.

jr3vGrF.jpg


No big crashed freighter/starships on planets.

Yd4OukG.jpg


No giant sandsnakes/dune worms. No the eels and things don't count.

LZS7ixc.jpg


Working Portals. People have found the structures but no way to activate them as far as I know. Cut feature really late on?

jKLEQyn.jpg

lCmcHXW.jpg


AI Wingmen. 'Command RAGAR II' may have some other meaning, but several trailers showed starfighters joining you on your journey.

ZiOetK1.jpg


These Mega Structure planets?

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The level of creature interaction where big creatures would impact the flora as well as scare off big herds of smaller beasties.

It feels like that not only was the engine and game misrepresented by the staged demos, but it seems like they were bordering on CGI at times due to how much better they looked and operated. When you include the fact the game only has "its fucking nothing" troll endings and the ability to meet other players is not in there, it feels like half the game is missing.


I've found several crashed stsrships, you can even take them over as your ship... you just have to repair everything again just like the start of the game before you can leave again. I haven't seen any freighters crash landed, though.... but I'm only 4 galaxies in...

Giant Flying sand snakes were found in the data mining for the game, they exist.

Not sure about the portals, but there's a theory about pushing the giant metal spheres located at some of the relic to them to see if something happens...

No idead about the AI wingmen or superstructure planets... like I said, I'm still out in the outer rim.

Other than that, I don't know... I think it's representative of the game I'm playing...
 

mujun

Member
I've found several crashed stsrships, you can even take them over as your ship... you just have to repair everything again just like the start of the game before you can leave again. I haven't seen any freighters crash landed, though.... but I'm only 4 galaxies in...

Giant Flying sand snakes were found in the data mining for the game, they exist.

Not sure about the portals, but there's a theory about pushing the giant metal spheres located at some of the relic to them to see if something happens...

No idead about the AI wingmen or superstructure planets... like I said, I'm still out in the outer rim.

Other than that, I don't know... I think it's representative of the game I'm playing...

How many hours do you have to endure to actually see some cool shit? The tedious gameplay isn't worth putting up with in my opinion.
 

Ollie Pooch

In a perfect world, we'd all be homersexual
How many hours do you have to endure to actually see some cool shit? The tedious gameplay isn't worth putting up with in my opinion.
My first planet on a 're roll' was actually quite cool, but I didn't see anything there I haven't seen in countless screenshots. I've had one nice 'lush' one since then, then the rest are variations o the same theme - barren rock, lots of caves, a few resources.

People keep talking about crazier stuff as you near the 'centre' of your galaxy but again, noone's actually shown anything that suggests that. As far as I'm concerned it's totally random.
 
How many hours do you have to endure to actually see some cool shit? The tedious gameplay isn't worth putting up with in my opinion.
Tedious gameplay? Are you just spending hours mining stuff really slowly? I don't get some people. Most I've ever spent mining as a grind was an hour, while wearing a Spider-Man mask, to see how much Emeril could make me (3 million). It was boring. I've made 3 million in less than half that time by stealing things that cause the sentinels to chase and shoot me. Much more fun! The cool stuff is all over the place, but if it was happening non-stop it wouldn't have any impact. Having slower more relaxed moments exploring a new planet that is way different to what you had seen up to that point becomes extremely rewarding when you leave with a bunch of goodies and suddenly space pirates attack you on the way to space station, and you can engage or just warp to another star :D
 

KKRT00

Member
There's only a few things I've seen from previews that aren't in the game

* Factions. Well, I'm only on my second system so I can't really say for sure, but there were supposed to be procedurally generated "gangs" (different from the hand-crafted alien races) that filled the universe and fought with each other. It's possible that I just haven't hit a border where there's fighting, but I haven't see any kind of narrative bits to suggest what faction area I'm in or how to increase my standing with them.

* Planetary orbit. Planets were supposed to orbit around their star, but this seems to no longer be the case. I haven't seen any planets that are close to their stars. In general, star systems are much less of a realistic simulation than Sean led us to believe.

* Portals. Well, the structures are still there, but no one seems to know how to turn them on. My guess is that Hello just shut them off before shipping. They seemed to be working during the preview where Hello showed them, so I'm not sure what happened there.

* Giant creatures. I haven't seen anyone reporting 100-foot tall dinosaurs.

Everything else is pretty much as described in the previews.

Planet rotation – play testing has made it obvious people are struggling to adjust to this during play so it’s effects have been reduced further…

http://www.no-mans-sky.com/2016/08/update-1-03/

What? Reduced? They do not move at all and 'sun' is changing its place, which means that by design they wont move.
 

Lo_Fi

Member
I mean one of the more commonly touted features - being able to rename everything you discover first and upload it - yeah that sounds cool, but in reality it's quite pointless.

I personally love that aspect. It seems small, but it's really neat to have a permanent (insofar as long as the servers are up) effect on the game for each player.

But I also like the core gameplay loop. It's the exploration part of Minecraft. That's what it always seemed like from the beginning, and the game I'm playing seems mostly like what they advertised, aside from the multiplayer stuff.
 

Osla

Neo Member
My biggest disappointments:

- All planets rotate on their axis at the same (ridiculously fast) rate, which means all planets are the same in that respect. It would've been nice to be on a planet where a day actually does last 10 minutes, while on others it would last 40 hours.

- The planets don't revolve around their star and the moons don't revolve around their planets.

- There are no life-sized mountains (or I haven't seen them yet). They've all been tall hills at most so far, nothing as awe-inspiring as the Alps for example.

- On that note: no hints of plate tectonics resulting in realistic mountain chains, although I guess that would be a bit much on the programming side.

- All animals I have seen so far seem to be evolutions of previous animals I've seen, even though the planets they're on are many, many lightyears apart.

- When you do a planetary search (L3) and you find something, that icon is displayed in the centre of your screen until you reach that destination. Even if you're on another planet.

- The option to place route markers or site markers is missing (right?).

Really enjoying the games other than that though.
 

KKRT00

Member
My biggest disappointments:

- All planets rotate on their axis at the same (ridiculously fast) rate, which means all planets are the same in that respect. It would've been nice to be on a planet where a day actually does last 10 minutes, while on others it would last 40 hours.

- The planets don't revolve around their star and the moons don't revolve around their planets.
Actually they do not rotate at all. The 'sun' is moved through the sky when you are on the planet, but sun affects shadows on the planet only for like 1/3 of the daytime. Its also not simulated properly, but just faked, for example shadows do not change its length, just rotate.
 

Megalo

Member
I watched the IGN video again and it looks just like the game i'm playing right now tbh. (after 10hours in)
I've found planets looking better than that, multiple trading post with lots of ships coming and leaving, cool creatures. It was a pre-release version so of course some gameplay elements have changed since then, but nothing major, it's just balancing.

Some trailers are questionable but not this imo.
 

delume

Member
This reminds me of the 'hunt for the truth' when Destiny came out. That game wasn't everything people expected on release but benefited hugely from constant updates. Can't what to see how No Man's Sky changes over time.
 

Osla

Neo Member
Actually they do not rotate at all. The 'sun' is moved through the sky when you are on the planet, but sun affects shadows on the planet only for like 1/3 of the daytime. Its also not simulated properly, but just faked, for example shadows do not change its length, just rotate.

Do you have a source for that? You can see the stars 'move' just by looking at them when you're on a planet though, which leads me to believe the planets do rotate. Unless the whole universe revolves around the planet you're on at that moment (which would be quite medieval!).
 
How many hours do you have to endure to actually see some cool shit? The tedious gameplay isn't worth putting up with in my opinion.
Iv played about 20 hours... Most of that was in the first 10 though...

Oh... And I just had the AI Wingmen!!!


I answered a distress call in space. A frigate was being attacked. I joined in a got some loot before the dentinal ships showed up the spoil the fun...
 

KKRT00

Member
Do you have a source for that? You can see the stars 'move' just by looking at them when you're on a planet though, which leads me to believe the planets do rotate. Unless the whole universe revolves around the planet you're on at that moment (which would be quite medieval!).

Ugh that stationary moon :(

You can see the stars 'move' though.

Source is me :) I did quite extensive testing of it.
Stars move, because it is just a shader that generate skybox covered in stars.
 

autoduelist

Member
Oh... And I just had the AI Wingmen!!!

It sounds like some people don't see what they want to see in the first 10 hours and then decide the game doesn't have it as a feature. AI wingmen, creatures hunting other creatures, etc...

Meanwhile, they might see things that are completely new and unique, but not credit the game for them since they aren't on some checklist of 'things to look for'.
 

Osla

Neo Member
Stars move, because it is just a shader that generate skybox covered in stars.

Well then! Consider me even more disappointed haha!

Maybe I should look into buying that Elite planetary landings DLC to see how it compares.
 
AKA every software project ever...
I mean, that's true to some degree, but were you let down by for example Mario 3D world for something it wasn't or didn't offer? How about Jak and Daxter? Or Halo 3? It feels like a lot of games recently have promised to be something they aren't. Sometimes it's just rabid fan expectations.
 

MrSpaM

Banned
It honestly seems like half the game got cut like a month before the game released

I hope this 'paid DLC' isn't just stuff they cut from the game a la Destiny
 

Kanyon

Member
IGN First video runs at super-smooth 60FPS and is being demo'ed with a PS4 controller. Was the PS4 version ever running at that framerate?

The first thing I noticed as well in that IGN video, graphics are on a vastly different level. The world is so lush and dynamic, no pop-in from what I could tell and compared to what we have now a vastly superior look.

Don't get me wrong, I'm really enjoying the game but that non-piss filter, luscious and vibrant look is definitely something I would prefer in the game. Also like the alternative scanning mechanics, send out your scan pulse and it catalogues your findings automatically. Much easier than what we got in the final game.
 
- There are no life-sized mountains (or I haven't seen them yet). They've all been tall hills at most so far, nothing as awe-inspiring as the Alps for example.

- On that note: no hints of plate tectonics resulting in realistic mountain chains, although I guess that would be a bit much on the programming side.
I commented on this in another thread as well, and I've dwelt on it more and become even more convinced about this being an issue. I think you're right, there's very little that matches actual planetary landforms. In my time with the game, I don't think I saw any:

  • Realistic mountains/mountain chains
  • Massive canyons like a Valles Marineris
  • Plateaus
  • Buttes or tables
  • Volcanoes and therefore obviously none of the landforms that spring from volcanoes
  • Sensible water formations like rivers or waterfalls
  • Great plains likes a Sedna Planitia
  • Glacial landforms on cold planets like a fjord or glacier
  • Plate tectonics and subsequently no continents.
Really, there seems to be very little topographical variation all around. In fact, the terrain generation that they've created seems to just simply create a slightly bumpy planet, so you never see a planet like Earth with huge land masses and giant oceans. Which I would guess is a product of them using a Perlin noise filter to generate the base world like Minecraft does, which makes for a quickly repetitive and "samey" universe. Obviously this is a large part of where those "samey" complaints/critiques are coming from that so many people have. If the planets are just variations on the same bumpy theme with color swaps, then yes, they might be technically different, but in practical terms, they feel unvaried.

I don't know if there's a better solution in terms of getting varied and realistic landforms via procedural generation, but I hope there is.
 

danowat

Banned
I commented on this in another thread as well, and I've dwelt on it more and become even more convinced about this being an issue. I think you're right, there's very little that matches actual planetary landforms. In my time with the game, I don't think I saw any:

  • Realistic mountains/mountain chains
  • Massive canyons like a Valles Marineris
  • Plateaus
  • Buttes or tables
  • Volcanoes and therefore obviously none of the landforms that spring from volcanoes
  • Sensible water formations like rivers or waterfalls
  • Great plains likes a Sedna Planitia
  • Glacial landforms on cold planets like a fjord or glacier
  • Plate tectonics and subsequently no continents.
Really, there seems to be very little topographical variation all around. In fact, the terrain generation that they've created seems to just simply create a slightly bumpy planet, so you never see a planet like Earth with huge land masses and giant oceans. Which I would guess is a product of them using a Perlin noise filter to generate the base world like Minecraft does, which makes for a quickly repetitive and "samey" universe. I don't know if there's a better solution in terms of getting varied and realistic landforms, but I hope there is.

Ok, warning, this is a bit "tinfoil hat", but I am just bringing up a discussion point here.

It does appear that something has changed in the algorithm for creating the world(s) from some pre-release versions, compared to what we actually got.

Could this have something to do with the copyright claim against the team for using the Superformula?, did they have to quickly do some (sweeping) changes to the proc-gen engine to avoid any potential legal wranglings?

I know that Sean said the game contains no superformula prior to release, but is it beyond doubt that something may have had to change because of this?
 

MrSpaM

Banned
Ok, warning, this is a bit "tinfoil hat", but I am just bringing up a discussion point here.

It does appear that something has changed in the algorithm for creating the world(s) from some pre-release versions, compared to what we actually got.

Could this have something to do with the copyright claim against the team for using the Superformula?, did they have to quickly do some (sweeping) changes to the proc-gen engine to avoid any potential legal wranglings?

I know that Sean said the game contains no superformula prior to release, but is it beyond doubt that something may have had to change because of this?

You know what is going to be interesting

The files for the few demos we saw are actually in the game files

If somebody can somehow run these demos then maybe we'll start to see what they changed before the game released compared to these demo's they showed

I agree with what everybody is saying in this thread tbh, why do the animals seem a lot more dynamic in the demo's? why is their movement actually life like instead of clunky like we've seen in the actual game? Why does everything seem more vibrant and alive?

If somebody could run these demos and prove the finished game is nothing like the demo's the conversation with hello games could get a whole lot more interesting
 

BigTnaples

Todd Howard's Secret GAF Account


Thanks.


So I just watched that video? Not seeing many changes from the final build? Everything seems about the same to me, aside from scanning now requiring more than a simple button press, which I am a fan of.


Everything else seems pretty damn similar to what we got considering it was over a year old build.


What is so amazing about this video that didn't make it into what we have in our hands?
 
Ok, warning, this is a bit "tinfoil hat", but I am just bringing up a discussion point here.

It does appear that something has changed in the algorithm for creating the world(s) from some pre-release versions, compared to what we actually got.

Could this have something to do with the copyright claim against the team for using the Superformula?, did they have to quickly do some (sweeping) changes to the proc-gen engine to avoid any potential legal wranglings?

I know that Sean said the game contains no superformula prior to release, but is it beyond doubt that something may have had to change because of this?
I'm honestly too much of a mathematic schlub to really get what the superformula would have done for procedural terrain generation, and I honestly don't remember if the terrain looked better (more varied) in the pre-release footage.

Whatever Sean says about the game not having the superformula now, we do know that at one point, they did mess around with it and stuck it into their systems.


I suppose two possibilities come to mind from reading that.

One, at some point they were indeed using the superformula in their code and they showed off the game in public using the formula, but later took it out after they learned of the patent (or came up with an inhouse solution). Or two, they never used the superformula directly outside of testing and came up with their own math for the procedural generation based on Gielis' superformula. Which I guess would mean the E3 demos and such were just bull? Dunno.

As a note, rereading that old thread on the superformula is kind of an bizarre as it seems that people don't really understand what the issue was. Gielis' patent isn't quite on the formula itself. Patenting mathematical formulas is ridiculously hard, if not impossible in most cases. What you claim in the patent is not the formula but using the formula to create specific things, e.g., procedurally generated terrain and animals. Of course you could debate whether that patent applied to this game, but I digress.

Whatever the case, go mess around with the formula. It's neat: http://mysterydate.github.io/superFormulaGenerator/
 

mokeyjoe

Member
I watched the IGN video again and it looks just like the game i'm playing right now tbh. (after 10hours in)
I've found planets looking better than that, multiple trading post with lots of ships coming and leaving, cool creatures. It was a pre-release version so of course some gameplay elements have changed since then, but nothing major, it's just balancing.

Some trailers are questionable but not this imo.

Yeah, looks like an early version of the same game. Didn't see anything I haven't seen in my game, and there are clearly things missing from the final release.
 

danowat

Banned
I'm honestly too much of a mathematic schlub to really get what the superformula would have done for procedural terrain generation, and I honestly don't remember if the terrain looked better (more varied) in the pre-release footage.

The game looked more organic in previews, flora looked more vibrant and seemed to have (more) logic to how it was placed, fauna was also more organic, look at how the birds flew in previews, they had a more natural flight pattern, in the release version they just flit around, also the ground creatures just seem to have random pathing, they don't flock.

I get that it's a huge game, and they your experience may vary depending on how lucky you get with the planets you land on and the generation engine, but in the 20 or so planets I landed on before ditching the game, it never looked like that IGN video.
 
I commented on this in another thread as well, and I've dwelt on it more and become even more convinced about this being an issue. I think you're right, there's very little that matches actual planetary landforms. In my time with the game, I don't think I saw any:

  • Realistic mountains/mountain chains
  • Massive canyons like a Valles Marineris
  • Plateaus
  • Buttes or tables
  • Volcanoes and therefore obviously none of the landforms that spring from volcanoes
  • Sensible water formations like rivers or waterfalls
  • Great plains likes a Sedna Planitia
  • Glacial landforms on cold planets like a fjord or glacier
  • Plate tectonics and subsequently no continents.
Really, there seems to be very little topographical variation all around. In fact, the terrain generation that they've created seems to just simply create a slightly bumpy planet, so you never see a planet like Earth with huge land masses and giant oceans. Which I would guess is a product of them using a Perlin noise filter to generate the base world like Minecraft does, which makes for a quickly repetitive and "samey" universe. Obviously this is a large part of where those "samey" complaints/critiques are coming from that so many people have. If the planets are just variations on the same bumpy theme with color swaps, then yes, they might be technically different, but in practical terms, they feel unvaried.

I don't know if there's a better solution in terms of getting varied and realistic landforms via procedural generation, but I hope there is.


Come one. Do you really think if procedural generation could build you a replica of earth there would be so few developers using it?

The NMS universe is a fine attempt at procedural generation that definitely puts the game above the majority that try to design large-scale terrain.

But we know the only way we can come close to replicating Earth is through procedural generation, but it's going to take a fair few more generations yet.

Does everyone have to go nutty when talking about this game?
 

BigTnaples

Todd Howard's Secret GAF Account
I watched the IGN video again and it looks just like the game i'm playing right now tbh. (after 10hours in)
I've found planets looking better than that, multiple trading post with lots of ships coming and leaving, cool creatures. It was a pre-release version so of course some gameplay elements have changed since then, but nothing major, it's just balancing.

Some trailers are questionable but not this imo.


My exact thoughts.
 
The game looked more organic in previews, flora looked more vibrant and seemed to have (more) logic to how it was placed, fauna was also more organic, look at how the birds flew in previews, they had a more natural flight pattern, in the release version they just flit around, also the ground creatures just seem to have random pathing, they don't flock.

I get that it's a huge game, and they your experience may vary depending on how lucky you get with the planets you land on and the generation engine, but in the 20 or so planets I landed on before ditching the game, it never looked like that IGN video.


Watch the Gameinformer interview where they show the terrain generation. Or the Newyorker one, it looks the same then as now.

I think you really had too high expectations of what it could do when we've literally seen videos of the worlds being built.
 

BigTnaples

Todd Howard's Secret GAF Account
The game looked more organic in previews, flora looked more vibrant and seemed to have (more) logic to how it was placed, fauna was also more organic, look at how the birds flew in previews, they had a more natural flight pattern, in the release version they just flit around, also the ground creatures just seem to have random pathing, they don't flock.

I get that it's a huge game, and they your experience may vary depending on how lucky you get with the planets you land on and the generation engine, but in the 20 or so planets I landed on before ditching the game, it never looked like that IGN video.


Eh. I've only been to a couple systems and already the planets I've landed on have looked better than the IGN video, and the creatures look just as great.


Also, 20 planets is nothing. Just on the math alone you could play this game for the rest of your life and never see anything but lifeless planets, or every planet you visit could be filled to the brim with plants and wildlife.


Or more than likely cause you could land somewhere in between. Either way, experiences will vary. Vastly.
 
Come one. Do you really think if procedural generation could build you a replica of earth there would be so few developers using it?

The NMS universe is a fine attempt at procedural generation that definitely puts the game above the majority that try to design large-scale terrain.

But we know the only way we can come close to replicating Earth is through procedural generation, but it's going to take a fair few more generations yet.

Does everyone have to go nutty when talking about this game?
I'm not suggesting that it does exist in the gaming world. That said, there is some pretty impressive procedural tech in other industries, and there's some pretty promising recent research that has been done into procedural terrain generation based on things like plate tectonic simulations.

I think it's interesting that Sean talked about this being next-gen tech when it really seems to working at the same basic Perlin noise filter level that other sandbox games do. I guess I'm mostly disappointed that for all the big "maths" talk that Hello Games talked, there's nothing super revolutionary in terms of terrain generation. I don't really totally buy that the tech "definitely puts the game above the majority that try to design large-scale terrain" either. The impressive thing about the procedural tech on show is the fact that there's 18 quintillion of these planets. Whether or not you think it's worth it to explore 18 quintillion of the same bumpy-ish planets is a matter of taste of course.
 

KORNdoggy

Member
IGN First 18 Minute Gameplay Demo

No Man's Sky E3 2015 Sony Conference Gameplay Demo

I thought it might be interesting to look back at all the pre-release footage of this game and see how it differs from the shipped product, especially since GAF posters tend to do better trailer/demo analysis than I do. Perhaps a harder look at some of this stuff will give an indication of why some players' expectations were out of whack, or what it was that made the pre-release version so compelling when the final release fell a bit more flatly.

Things I've noticed off the top of my head:

IGN First video runs at super-smooth 60FPS and is being demo'ed with a PS4 controller. Was the PS4 version ever running at that framerate?

You can discover animals in both videos just by sending out your sonar "pulse". Super easy. In the final game there's a rather tedious "scanning" mechanic associated with discovery. You have to aim the camera centered on them and hold down a trigger for a few seconds.....frustratingly it only seems to work at shorter ranges.

Map markers had towers of light associated with them for easier navigation. That looks really nice and flashy. It also seems like you weren't frequently having to "Pulse" to get markers to stay on screen.....they were there persistently.

Mining was more of a point-and-shoot affair. Most rocks instantly blow up and generate resources. In the final version you're stuck with this beam that you must focus on a rock for many seconds at a time, and it slowly whittles the rock down and overheats a couple times in the process. I presume this change was made so that mining had kind of a different feel from shooting, but man does it look easier and less monotonous here.

There's a cool, giant, multi-level trading post on a planet with ships coming and going. Not sure if those are in the final game, but I haven't really gotten to them yet.

Thruster Fuel does not deplete every time your ship takes off (or at least there's no notification for it).....which leads me to the somewhat larger point of....

Around 12:00 in the IGN video Murray says you can play "Purely for Exploration", "Purely for Combat," "Purely as a Scavanger".....even going so far as to claim that you might be able to play the game without ever setting foot on a planet. At some point I get the sense this might have been an intended goal, that you should be able to play whatever role you want. That's clearly changed. Perhaps pressure to be a more proper videogame made them more tightly integrate all the survival/collection aspects. That's why you're picking up all kinds of stuff to refuel and recharge, dealing with depleted tools and life support systems. As it is, you can't play "purely" for one particular role......but looking at these early videos where there's no discernible economic penalties for joyriding, no cost for basic galactic mobility, it seems that at one point at least "pure" roles were viable. An explorer would simply be able to get credits for exploring, and that cash would be used to fund his exploits around the galaxy.

What are the differences you have noticed between this and other early alpha/beta footage, and No Man's Sky 1.03?

the animal scanning is different, but i think it makes more sense that what are essentially binoculars are what discovered animal and plant life. also, they work at ridiculous distances. click your right analogue stick to zoom. it helps.

towers of light still exist but they're specific to the beacons now. again, i think it's a context thing, the sense of discovery is less if all you're doing is walking from beam of light to beam of light. the scanning for location thing isn't much deeper of an experience, but it helps a little.

mining is much more impressive technically now. it's a longer process, but you can upgrade your multitool to have that "point and shoot" blow it to hell features you see here. not to mention the absorption of the minerals looks WAY better now.

trading posts are still in. i find they're the best place to buy new ships

i guess for thruster fuel to have a purpose it needs to be something that depletes. maybe they originally had no fuel management at all. again, it's an extra layer of depth that i like though. plus take offs don't deplete fuel if they're at a landing beacon or on a landing platform.

no MP is probably the biggest difference. but given the slim odds of ever seeing anyone i don't think it matters that's it's not there and wouldn't have changed the core experience anyway. it's not like they said you could team up and mine resources together or anything.

my biggest difference/loss is the larger creatures. the massive sand worm for instance. that sort of thing would have provided an awesome set piece.
 
S

Steve.1981

Unconfirmed Member
...Really, there seems to be very little topographical variation all around. In fact, the terrain generation that they've created seems to just simply create a slightly bumpy planet, so you never see a planet like Earth with huge land masses and giant oceans...

In my experience so far, the planets are plenty varied.

I've only been to 2 systems and already I've had a planet with massive (and I do mean massive) mountains and multiple huge, deep Grand Canyons with lush forests when you get to the very bottom of them.

I've also had The Arctic Planet. It was like 75% water, only broken up by rocky, snowy islands.

I guess what you find is just your luck on a given night's play.
 

Irminsul

Member
The impressive thing about the procedural tech on show is the fact that there's 18 quintillion of these planets. Whether or not you think it's worth it to explore 18 quintillion of the same bumpy-ish planets is a matter of taste of course.
I wonder if there really are 18 quintillion planets. The number, IIRC, just stems from it being roughly 2^64, so using 64-bit numbers, that's the maximum number of combinations you get.

Although I also think it doesn't matter that much whether it's really 18 quintillion planets, due to the fact you already mentioned.
 

danowat

Banned
I wonder if there really are 18 quintillion planets. The number, IIRC, just stems from it being roughly 2^64, so using 64-bit numbers, that's the maximum number of combinations you get.

Although I also think it doesn't matter that much whether it's really 18 quintillion planets, due to the fact you already mentioned.

It's impossible to prove, or disprove.
 

KORNdoggy

Member
I'm not suggesting that it does exist in the gaming world. That said, there is some pretty impressive procedural tech in other industries, and there's some pretty promising recent research that has been done into procedural terrain generation based on things like plate tectonic simulations.

I think it's interesting that Sean talked about this being next-gen tech when it really seems to working at the same basic Perlin noise filter level that other sandbox games do. I guess I'm mostly disappointed that for all the big "maths" talk that Hello Games talked, there's nothing super revolutionary in terms of terrain generation. I don't really totally buy that the tech "definitely puts the game above the majority that try to design large-scale terrain" either. The impressive thing about the procedural tech on show is the fact that there's 18 quintillion of these planets. Whether or not you think it's worth it to explore 18 quintillion of the same bumpy-ish planets is a matter of taste of course.

i've seen worlds made up of intersecting "worms" of land that is far beyond what most, if not all games have done so far in regards to terrain generation. and it's on a planet wide scale no less. there is definitely more to it then a "noise" displacement.
 
In my experience so far, the planets are plenty varied.

I've only been to 2 systems and already I've had a planet with massive (and I do mean massive) mountains and multiple huge, deep Grand Canyons with lush forests when you get to the very bottom of them.

I've also had The Arctic Planet. It was like 75% water, only broken up by rocky, snowy islands.

I guess what you find is just your luck on a given night's play.
I'd like to see pictures of anything that actually match the appropriate scale of a mountain or canyon. Because all I found are what could be called big hills and deep valleys.
 

SonnyBoy

Member
The biggest thing for me is planets not spinning nor orbiting around their star. This was talked about a lot and seemed to be something Sean Murray was rather proud of, then axed silently.

IIRC, he said that playtesters got confused having to account for planetary rotation and how it affected waypoints or some such nonsense.

That really sucks. Is this something that could be toggled on/off in a future update?
 
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