I-Novae engine : Planetary Rings demo video

Dremor · Nov 7, 2014

Hi.

I-Novae Studios a small company that are slowly creating their own procedural game engine. At first, they intended to make a full fledged Space-sim MMO, but lacking funding, they focused on creating their engine, and then sell it to fund the MMO.

Here is the last demo video, and it look... stunning.

[video=youtube;zR9KpK1Ua-Q]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR9KpK1Ua-Q[/video]

Some previous demo :

Procedural rocky planet : 2013

[video=youtube;a6a69dMLb_k]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6a69dMLb_k[/video]

Extended flight near a planet : 2010

[video=youtube;fO7XhaTGDYg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fO7XhaTGDYg[/video]

Starfield (inside a Nebulae) : 2008

[video=youtube;lEjqmtEnW4U]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lEjqmtEnW4U[/video]

Their website : https://inovaestudios.com/

laz001 · Nov 7, 2014

Meh - it's doesn't look any better or worse than what's already there in Elite Dangerous, Space engine, No Man's Sky etc.

It seems there's a lot of companies putting together 'procedural' planets etc. I like what Frontier are doing, as it seems they are basing it off of real galactic and planetary creation (galaxyforge).

Chav · Nov 7, 2014

Wasn't this the one originally coded by a French bloke on his own Iirc? originally for a game called Infinity but never really went anywhere?

Squashie · Nov 7, 2014

laz001 said:
Meh - it's doesn't look any better or worse than what's already there in Elite Dangerous, Space engine, No Man's Sky etc.

It seems there's a lot of companies putting together 'procedural' planets etc. I like what Frontier are doing, as it seems they are basing it off of real galactic and planetary creation (galaxyforge).

Well but it does. And not only that you can actually go through atmosphere and land on planets with no loading or any gimmicks. Also the way planets are made is very interesting. Visit their website. I had high hopes for their game. Now I hope someone will use their engine.

Neutronium · Nov 7, 2014

laz001 said:
Meh - it's doesn't look any better or worse than what's already there in Elite Dangerous, Space engine, No Man's Sky etc.

Space Engine doesn't feature 3D rings yet - I can assure you for that ;-). And I really like the fog effect in I-Novae's engine. Of course EDs 3D rings are very well done and are very immersive IMO but I also like the more dispersed and variable in size rocks of the I-Novae engine - in combination with the fog they create an equally immersive environment.

NeoRacer · Nov 7, 2014

Didnt this start out in 2006 as a 1p space combat game, then it went all 'Homeworld' style later on. Meh, they are being left behind fast they better catch up or be forgotten

neutronium said:
Space Engine doesn't feature 3D rings yet - I can assure you for that ;-). And I really like the fog effect in I-Novae's engine. Of course EDs 3D rings are very well done and are very immersive IMO but I also like the more dispersed and variable in size rocks of the I-Novae engine - in combination with the fog they create an equally immersive environment.

Shigawire · Nov 26, 2014

I-Novae is not worried about catching up to anyone. They are focusing on creating the best space-game engine on the market. And that is all they are focusing on. It's going to be a fully fledged node-based game engine, in the same way that Unreal Engine 4, Cryengine, Unity are. I-Novae is technically light-years beyond any of the other engines. The only engine approaching I-Novae in technical prowess is Space Engine, but that is not made for creating games. Space Engine is a separate exploration experience. It does not have node-based shaders and c++ compilers built into it. Cobra is by comparison in its early phases, and has a lot to do to catch up with I-Novae (which is fully 64-bit btw). Cobra as well, is not built to be exported as a game engine to third parties. It's only made for in-house development of Elite: Dangerous. It's not yet 64-bit. Cobra does not seamlessly transition between supercruise and asteroid fields, but rather has to load a different instance to get it working. I-Novae does everything seamlessly, and with far more advanced rendering techniques.

I look forward to what Elite: Dangerous is going to be at the end of the tunnel. It's already a great game, and it's going to get only better.

But I also am in awe at what I-Novae is technically capable of, though the development cycle has been slow. I do think I-Novae - when it's finished - can be used by major games companies with ease, to create limitless space games. Where one can imagine the big franchises could license the engine.. Star Wars, Star Trek, etc.

And yes, it's programmed by 1 guy, a Belgian named Flavien Brebion. He's been working on it since 2004-2005.

Komemiute · Nov 26, 2014

I generally like you Shigawire.

But this post of yours is a bit assumptive.
It kind of spoil your intent.

Shigawire · Nov 26, 2014

I like you too.

Assumptive, in what sense?

Finwolven · Dec 4, 2014

I've followed the Infinity project for years, and sadly, they suffered from feature creep enough that the original game is scrapped 'until there's time to do it right'. Lots of the community donated 3d-assets, textures and such for no use, in the end, and I-Novae, while their engine is impressive, have stopped actually updating any sort of progress.

They can't even figure out how to start a Kickstarter project for a stripped-down Infinity: Battlegrounds combat action space game!

Too bad, the old Infinity Combat Prototype was hilariously fun, and if Flavien hadn't taken the stance that he's not publishing anything until it's completely and utterly ready, it might have been a game for years already. Kind of like Star Citizen is starting to look, only without tens of millions of funding.