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200 billion star system? how can it even possibly be?
TweFoju
Member UncommonPosts: 1,236
i mean, how many hundereds of tera HDD do they need to even have a 200 billion star system in a single game?
and i am assuming here that you can actually visit one of the 200 billion, and if this game claims that it will be Immersive, then i see it that you need at least hours to travel from 1 star to another, that is even using Warp
i cannot think of how we can even explore 200 billion star system
i could be wrong about the idea, someone explain to me? thanks 
So What Now?
Comments
You couldn't. 200B is a meaningless term in the context of an online game. Even if every MMORPG player joined this game and spent every minute of the rest of their lives playing they'd never visit even a fraction of a number that large.
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I have not looked into it but I would guess that they use a procedurally generated instance for the star systems beyond core gameplay in an effort to create a sense of "endless exploration".
Even 9000+ is a lot.
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That's because all those star systems aren't stored on your hard disk, they are procedurally generated (on the fly) when you enter one of them.
Basically, they are stored as an algorithm, or a collection of parameters which determines how they are generated (as I understand it).
An old classic space game called Elite was supposed to have 283 trillion star systems on launch, but the makers decided not to because it would be too confusing.
Which I can see happening with this game as well; though exciting, I have no clue how you're supposed to find anyone or anything in that vast space.
Feel free to use my referral link for SW:TOR if you want to test out the game. You'll get some special unlocks!
I'll be amazed if this game ships at all, let alone if it ships with 200 billion star systems.
"Come and have a look at what you could have won."
It would work the same way as the 87 gazillion weapons that are in Borderlands.
Most worlds and systems will share textures and other things but everytime you visit a new one a name is randomly generated along with every other necessary object for that system to come alive. Once a player leaves a system, it is stored only in a seed number so that when a player visits the seed is loaded up.
That is how some games can have a random map generator, using a seed number (ex. 768392664) to call up a map. To understand it check this games:
Simutrans
Open Transport Tycoon
Minecraft
Anno 1501
Procedural content is the key.
Look at this example -> http://www.theprodukkt.com/kkrieger
It's a 96kb single-level game using this method back from 2002. And now compare this to Unreal Tournament for example, which uses way more bits and bytes to achieve the same results for a single level.
so does the system we went before can be visited again?
because i assume that the whole system will get larger when a player discover a new star system, and expanding the universe overtime?
say when we start the game with 100km of map, will it expand to 500km after a year?
So What Now?
Have you ever played Spore ?
Its pretty much the same concept - because of the procedual generating of textures and planets you will not find one that look alike (though a lot of buildings will probaly look the same on different planets due to that being static models being placed procedually) - Though it may be a lot of star systems with a total of even more planets than star systems, but atleast creates the possibility to explore, even though you will never be able to visit everything there is.
So in short: The computer generates the textures and planets, star systems, and places static objects procedually to create so many star systems, that is why its possible.
TweFoju: Yes they can be visited again, and will look the same when you get back, as it is using a number to indentify how it has to look. An alghorythm is used to calculate how the planets needs to look out from a number like 22436 (or even longer), and since that specifiec star system/planet will always have that number then you have a result which will look the same as the last time you were there.
This "game" is not really a game. Those X number of stars are generated using some kind of mathematical method and there is only one guy working on the "game" part time. So I would say it is more an experiment/hobby than anything else.
Not sure why it is even listed here. This site needs to have some kind of bar for listing games.
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I don't know much about the game itself, actually the first i've heard about it, but..
That's the beauty of a random map generation feature, atleast that is my guess of how it could be done.
Out of those 200 billion though, who's to say everyone will experience the same map/instance/whatever when they goto say star system A, B, C, etc.
Each indiviual person might only see 10,000 unique maps during their entire play through the game, while someone else might experience a different set of those same 10,000, so technically I think they could claim that to be 20,000 unique systems even though they were only 10,000 locations from a content point of view, see where i'm going with this?
That might not be how they end up doing things, but it would be possible to accomplish their goal of 200billion if it is done in such a way, since that 200billion number could just be a complete total of possible randomly generated maps.
Whoa! It is a game, the procedurally generated galaxy is simply the world it will take place in. There is a game which will take place within it, both at space flight and planetary level. All other artifacts will be hard coded, such as the space craft, stations, buildings etc.
It's pretty much a one man band as far as engine and mechanics coding is concerned with A LOT of community support for item creation and modeling.
It's listed here for a good reason, it has a web site, a community, screenshots, vids (even a silly little flight demo game) and because as far as I can see it's about the best game in the pipe line currently.
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The site has an excellent explanation on how it functions. Everyone has the same planets etc because they all have the same code, starting point (not a good term really). The laws for generating the star system is the same for everyone, procedural is not random, it simply means that after setting the parameters for the existance and creation it doesn't then require individual mapping for every planet, moon and it's position. Suns have the same impact as they do in relity and this effects how their orbiting bodies are in nature. Obviously thats massively simplified to say the least but you get the idea.
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The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
I take it none of you have played Elite 2? because Infinity is just basically doing what Elite 2 did back in the day.
All the planets are created procedurally- meaning they're generated through algorithms that create textures and paralax maps to create the complex terrain of the planets. This is why they're able to create so many planets in so little time. Add this to some awesome LOD management and you can render all of it in real-time at no hit to the GPU.
Elite 2 was great in that it managed to fit an entire universe onto a small disk-- Infinity is trying to replicate that.
The real test will be getting the cities and the shrubs to come up on the planets in a logical manner, for now the devs have just sprinkled planets where ever possible, looks ok but could be a lot better, and as for cities we've seen some epic tech demos but nothing too major that'll lead us into knowing what the final product will deliver.
The fact that this was all possible by such a small team however is the amazing part.
I played Frontier back in the day but you have to keep in mind that that game was an offline single player game. Whilst I fully understand how Infinity is going to try and implement that number of star systems via procedural content, given that it is an online game with numerous simultaneous users it is a totally different kettle of fish to E2.
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Here is a FAQ. http://www.infinity-universe.com/Infinity/index.php?option=com_easyfaq&task=cat&catid=13&Itemid=28
Quote from Infinity FAQ.
What happens when your ship is destroyed ? Is there perma-death ?
When your ship is destroyed, your physical character will escape in a capsule pod. Perma-death does not exist; however, you will be unable to do anything until you are rescued, either by paying a non-playing character (against a fee), either by waiting for a player to pick your capsule up. Quote end.
He-he, I'm from the Shadowbane community, and I like they don't take the 'easy mode' direction as too many gaming companies these days.
It's an interesting sci-fi PvP MMO.
Infinity The Quest for Earth.
The Shadowbane Emulator (SBEmu) http://www.shadowbaneemulator.com
Every planet and star-system is to be proceedurally rendered. Just like the old game Elite.
Agreed. It's taken me years just to explore 1/3 of that.
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So What Now?
It has been dead for years Jim.
If it's not broken, you are not innovating.
So What Now?
Or you could look at what Daniel Lawrence did with only 8k ram back in 78-82 with his game:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telengard
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Elite Dangerous claims to have 400 billion
I think this is the right way for real sandbox mmorpgs to evolve. Considering we don't yet have the necessary technology capable of manual creation and full time running/processing massive worlds, something like this could be a good alternative if done right.
The bigger the better. Nothing else really matters if you can do it cost effective.
In a real AAA full loot open world sandbox a world like this could provide enaugh space for both PvE and PvP players to live in symbiosis.
You can have central world with meaningful points of interest for people who like to interact in PvP and you can have the outside unknown world ready for explorers and PvE players to get lost and live with almost 0 risk.
Think EvE but bigger.