Planet Rendering

Old Duck

Old Duck
What Frontier has achieved with their procedurally-generated moons and planets is nothing short of amazing. Yesterday I finally took the SRV out of storage for a spin. I purposefully landed at the terminator (not Arnold) with the hopes of catching a sunset / sunrise. The transition from space to low-level flight is very smoothly done. I've not noticed any "feature popping" like one sees in other games (NMS in particular). Features come into view at the pixel level from what I can tell. Yes, there is sometimes a little bit of texture popping, but it's way less than other games I've played, and hardly noticeable.

One of the things that impresses me with these moons / planets is that Frontier seems to have factored geology into the procedural landscape generator. I've found locations that look dried river beds, I've landed in huge craters that look exactly what I would expect a crater to look like, I've flown in canyons and fractures and such, and I've only just begun exploring these planets / moons at this level!

An advantage of landing at the terminator is that the shadowing adds a real sense of depth and detail you don't get at "high noon". I definitely recommend you try it just once. Oh, and you might catch a sunrise / sunset! Use the system map to determine the planet's rotation first. The one I landed at takes days to rotate, so no sunset for me, yet.

The other thing that amazes me is the graphic performance on the surface! I'm getting very good FPS and graphical detail, and this is on the PS4 Slim! I can't imagine what you PS4 Pro users are seeing.

Anyway, TL;DR, sorry! I conclude by saying Frontier's planet renderer blows NMS out of the water, IMNSHO. It makes NMS feel like a child's toy, Minecraft in space. I can't wait to see what Frontier does when they add atmospheric planets and planets with water. FDev deserves a round of applause!
 
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Jon flint

Jon flint
Since you're enjoying planets, may I offer a destination you may enjoy.. plot a course to the system "Epsilon Indi" and land on the moon called "Mitterrand Hollow"... You'll see why :p
 

Mr Fad

Mr Fad
Credit where credits due this has been the thing that has impressed me most by the PlayStation conversion as it's seamless now compared to what I'm used to on xbox! :)
 

Snowymonk

Snowymonk
Old Duck said:
What Frontier has achieved with their procedurally-generated moons and planets is nothing short of amazing.
Click to expand...

We need photos of your experiences.

There was a lot of noise pre-launch about whether the PlayStation would be able to handle Elite Dangerous? Why hadn't we seen any gameplay? Would planets genuinely look realistic?

It sounds like you have had a very positive experience and the fact that you are on a PS4Slim will help counter some of those arguments.
 

isaack_hunt

I
Old Duck are you mainly playing in 'Open' ? Have you experienced any crashes when coming out of Hyperspace? I ask this as you sound like you have invested many hours thus far.

o7
 

Old Duck

Old Duck
isaack_hunt said:
Old Duck are you mainly playing in 'Open' ? Have you experienced any crashes when coming out of Hyperspace? I ask this as you sound like you have invested many hours thus far.

o7
Click to expand...

Yes to all of the above. See this post and the conversation that follows. I have a theory, which I think deserves its own thread, so stay tuned.
 

Lloyd Morgan-Moore

Producer
Frontier
Thanks for the kind words Old Duck, I'll be sure to pass these on to the people responsible for Stellar Forge. It still boggles my mind sometimes too, we've got some very clever people on the team!

If you want to learn more about it there's a nice post here that goes into more depth.
 

UnhappyDev

UnhappyDev
Mr Fad said:
Definitely :) although I've heard the xbox has improved with the latest update so if I can drag myself off the ps4 I'll check ;)

I was pretty much blown away on my first planetary landing :)
Click to expand...

I don't often land on planets, but when I do it's always an event. And even after nearly 2 years the game can still knock me out with its visuals, e.g. when landing on ringed moons...just so good.
 

Jintosh

Jintosh
I see someone mentioned Mitterand Hollow in the Epsilon Indi system already . . . just remember, it's going too fast for you to be able to catch it up, you have to wait in front of it to try landing. Seriously though, everyone should try landing there at least once.

...It's a fun place that was originally a bug, but is now a feature [noob]
 

zatoichiBSG

Z
Just wanted to touch on no mans sky which you compared elite to,for all its faults and the lies and over promising,at it's core it is still very impressive what the devs managed to achieve on their tiny budget(game development,i'm sure they got extra money from sony for marketing)and sure it looks almost minecrafty but to be fair,that is the art style they were going for :pI will echo how impressive elite has looked on the ps4(particularly space to planet transistion)...never before has one man taken so many screenshots,the only criticism i have thus far is how long i had to wait for it :(
 
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Old Duck

Old Duck
Snowymonk said:
We need photos of your experiences.
Click to expand...

Here's one:

DDklwFRW0AAwt6U.jpg:large
 

Tetzmol

Tetzmol
Old Duck said:
FDev deserves a round of applause!
Click to expand...

Indeed, they do. It's a wonderful game. Planets surface on a Pro looks amazing, some of the rocks have little sparkles on them. As do the icey rings, the ice seems to glitter if seen from close by. Amazing details.
Thank you Fdev, for bringing us a joyful and amazing game again. I loved the old 1984 Elite, this one promises to be loved even more.
 
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