Planet Ideas

[Quality_House]

Hello

Let me start by saying I FRIGGIN LOVE STARMADE! . . . BUT . . .

I have a suggestion about the planets. I know that you guys want an "open universe" experience, but I think you need to make loading screens for planets.

Think about it, the planets you see from space can be a low pixel spherical planet, with a block based paint pattern, the atmosphere will add a colorful fade over the low pixel planet. It will also act as a barrier, if the player gets too close they'll be prompted with a text box asking if they want to go planet side, click no and the player enters orbit around the planet, click yes and BAM! All without severe frame loss.
Also because the planet looks like a simple sphere with a blanket of atmosphere around it, you'll be able to make them bigger and believable.

The actual surface can be in a square shape, that way, no matter the size, when you reach the edge, your character can be dropped on the other side making it appear as if you are actually circling the planet. It can look like a dumbed down Mine craft world.

My computer is rated about a 5.9 so just above average and planets are scary to me cause my frame rate lags in the single digits for about 10-30 minutes depending on size. This setup will put less strain on weaker systems and allow you to set up planetary dangers like poison gas or acid rain, possibly even some indigenous life forms.

I hope this idea takes notice, I really like STARMADE but the planets don't look convincing or realistic, to me this seems like a bad trade for -10 frames per second. Other than this I can't find any major issues.​

 

[Criss]

For some people planets load fine. I think that is an indication that it is not impossible to to load the planet in real time without the need of a loading screen. Schema has stated that he does not want planets to be a separate game from the rest of starmade. I think we still have lots of optimization to see before we decide on something like that.

 

[Crimson-Artist]

welcome to the community!

This has been suggested many times before and unfortunately Schema himself has stated that he will never have instance planets as it will break the immersion of a seamless universe.

while planets are lag magnets they will continue to be optimized so that we won't ever have to fear going near them. just gotta hang in there

 

[Glutton]

While I think this is a great post about this suggestion, I personally don't want loading planets / large planets like that. I do want larger planets but I really like the seamless nature of StarMade right now. I also understand the appeal. This topic has been brought up a ton of times and a lot of variations and discussions have been made.

Good stuff though. Welcome to the forums

 

[Leanson]

No loading screens and not wanting to break immersion. Well every time I get near a planet I must wait to it to load and render or risk flying into it. Being trapped in a planet beaks my immersion lol.

 

[aceface]

No loading screens and not wanting to break immersion. Well every time I get near a planet I must wait to it to load and render or risk flying into it. Being trapped in a planet beaks my immersion lol.

This.

The planets are so frikken laggy, and I have a 300 dollar graphics card and a six core cpu (not the best but still). Seriously, the only planets i can load and play with at a decent framerate are like 70 radius, which is crazy small! As the majority of ships are a lot bigger than this.

I personally wouldn't mind instanced planets, and it's so nice that you mention this leanson. THE FRIKKEN TIME it takes to load those god damn things is just the same as a loading screen!!

What StarMade could learn from is the game "no man's sky". They have a semi voxel based world, but the thing that interests me is the fact that the atmosphere blocks the surface so you don't have to load the entire thing when in space. Plus there aren't any loading screens either. Check this video out:

 

[Leanson]

Dam.

 

[Quality_House]

That is unfortunate. . .

Honestly, the idea of a completely open universe is something I've been dreaming of for years, and I understand that computers will eventually be able to handle the workload, but it will be a while. Not everyone owns or can afford top of the line computers, and Ipads? Forget it!

Anyways, thank you for listening

 

[CyberTao]

Here's a question, how exactly does instanced planets help with lag? All that's being removed is the planet core.
The amount of blocks will be the same or greater because people want bigger planets, so the game is still gonna chug along with loading those. There are rarely nearby planets or anything more than a few asteroids, maybe some pirates.

The only thing that's there to load and cause lag is the planets and the people with you, all of which will still be there on the planet most likely. All it would do is change sitting in space above waiting to sitting at a loading screen and waiting. Literally fixes nothing unless there is some variable that I am missing here.

Game is still technically Alpha I believe (Haven't heard no Now-in-Beta news) and will optimize. While you get 10 frames now, you might get 20 frames next update for all we know, the game will get easier on older systems as time goes on.

I dunno, I honestly don't see the appeal of it, you trade the ugly edges of some planets for ugly seams as you walk across the edge on the gound, breaks interactions between space and land, would be a pain to map where exactly you appear/exit on said map, and would probably look like Minecraft when flying with missing chunks everywhere cause it doesn't load them for performance reasons/wrap around (wouldn't want to see the same object on your left and right, right?).

Just... bleh to instanced planets, it's not so much an improvement so much as it is 'different'.
Also, aliens and critters were confirmed and actually had a working test bug put onto the old default stations. Fun facts!
-Post was delayed due to random DNS error o- o

 

[kiddan]

For some people planets load fine.

Yup, on my laptop too :P Awesome technology advancements!

 

[Criss]

Sorry ace, but we can't just compare very different games and expect starmade to take some cues from it. It is built with an entirely different engine designed to handle that level of detail. The geometry in no mans sky seems to refine itself based on distance. Many games do this. I'm betting right now that the planet is not instanced at all. It looks like the geometry is always there and that as you approach details emerge. They atmosphere simply covers any transition that we might see. You can clearly see land features load in and on the first trailer I witnessed a mountain's shape get defined as the character flew over it.

CyberTao is right though, in the end we still have to load millions of blocks on planets. loading screens break immersion and schema stated he would avoid that. If there is an alternate solution, by all means we are going for that over a loading screen.