[Suggestion] Planet Generation

[ZachZent]

There are two sides to planets, resources and visuals. Many games get one right, but not the other. Astroneer gets the resources right, but is visually bland. NMS gets the visuals right, but the limited nature of resources makes visiting planets more of a nature tour. This idea combines the aspects of both sides.

Planets would be separated into categories based on their general terrain. Here are six basic categories:

• Desert (dry with little flora)
• Snow (cold and snow covered)
• Grassland (lush teeming with flora and fauna)
• Jungle (wet, densely packed flora)
• Ocean (mostly water)
• Barren (little to no flora or fauna)

Additional generation features can be added. For example desert planets would have a higher chance of spawning closer to the star with snow worlds spawning further away. Regardless, a majority on planets spawned should be barren worlds so habitable planets aren't super common.

Planet categories would have their own set of creatures, buildings, etc. Desert planets would have dune worms while the snow planets have yetis. Grassland planets would have larger farms while the ocean world consists of floating cities. This makes the planets more distinct from each other without requiring too much extra work in creating hordes of creatures or going for the NMS style of creature creation. Infinitely diverse, yet principally the same.

Each of these worlds have the basic resources that are shared among all planets. Enough that you can create basic vehicles and ships. Next are the higher tier resources for the better technologies. These are distributed among each planet category. Desert has resources A, B, C. Snow has resource B, C, D and so on. This means you don’t have to go to every planet planet just to get enough materials to craft something, but can tactically decide where to put down to get the resources you want. On the other side, a player won’t be able to just sit on a single planet and have everything they need which promotes exploration and expansion. Finally there are resources exclusive to each planet type. As to prevent the problem of needing to jump to each planet to get all the items for say an engine, these items should be trading items, luxury items, or crafting materials for the highest tier of technology.

For the actual generation of the planet, you could just go with a random generation of terrain styles for each category. Desert planets are a random generation of canyons, dunes, etc. This would work, but with it being random comes the slight problem of all planets of one category both looking and feeling the same. Take a overhead of any Minecraft world seed and they will all look essentially the same.

The other option is to separate specific types of planets (see the table below). These planet types would still have the same resources, but the land generations would be much different. A dune world for example would have mostly dunes with some hills and other generations. A canyon world would me mostly rocky mountains, mesas, and canyons. Both are desert worlds, but visually distinct from each other making the galaxy seem more expansive and diverse. These planet types are just a sample, more could and should be added.

Link to document with the table, pictures of each planet type, and a general description of each. https://docs.google.com/document/d/160kS7UKVrD75iZtaespKU1uuxVxwvqlB8EwaN7GvXVs/edit?usp=sharing

[Sullos]

I love basically every aspect of this and support it. The only thing, as mentioned above, is to have logical dispersion of the planet types among a solar system. So less habitable hot planets closer to star, and cooler planets on the outer rims. Asteroid belts much like our solar systems would be cool too. The only question left for me is the moons. Will we possibly have moons? I would be happy without them though. So just curious. The hotter planets closer to a star should impact how ships work with heat dispersion mechanics, likewise in reverse with cooler planets, possibly being so cold on the surface, preventing hips engines from taking off unless they have sufficient thrust.

[ZachZent]

Asteroid belts much like our solar systems would be cool too.

Belts should have a random-low change of spawning on every planet. May not be the most realistic, but boy is it pretty

The only question left for me is the moons. Will we possibly have moons? I would be happy without them though. So just curious.

I actually forgot about this, but I feel it can be simple. Planets have a change of generating with a moon. Lower chances of generating with multiple moons. Moons would most likely be barren with a very low chance of spawning as one of the planet categories/types. I would say that this should break with logic and allow any type of environment regardless how close the planet is to the star. That way you won't get a desert planet with a desert moon every single time. Besides think about it. A barren planet with a forest moon. mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

[captain828]

There are two sides to planets, resources and visuals. Many games get one right, but not the other. Astroneer gets the resources right, but is visually bland. NMS gets the visuals right, but the limited nature of resources makes visiting planets more of a nature tour. This idea combines the aspects of both sides.

I just want to point out Empyrion as an example that does both very well. The resources are meaningful and distributed around planets similar to Astroneer and the planets look gorgeous with some also being multi-biomes.

There is also one more important thing: Points of Interest (POIs). With the exception of planet-specific resources, POIs are one of the things that make you go out and explore. Without POIs, things feel dead.

In Astroneer, POIs are equipment wrecks that you can salvage, lockboxes with research data and the odd alien megalith per planet.

In NMS, POIs are odd alien glyphs, the occasional trade outpost and rare larger alien places.

In Empyrion, POIs are player-made: some are simple wrecks dotted about the planet with basic loot, others are complex bases with defenses, traps and epic loot.

[ultrak2k]

There are two sides to planets, resources and visuals. Many games get one right, but not the other. Astroneer gets the resources right, but is visually bland. NMS gets the visuals right, but the limited nature of resources makes visiting planets more of a nature tour. This idea combines the aspects of both sides.

I just want to point out Empyrion as an example that does both very well. The resources are meaningful and distributed around planets similar to Astroneer and the planets look gorgeous with some also being multi-biomes.

There is also one more important thing: Points of Interest (POIs). With the exception of planet-specific resources, POIs are one of the things that make you go out and explore. Without POIs, things feel dead.

In Astroneer, POIs are equipment wrecks that you can salvage, lockboxes with research data and the odd alien megalith per planet.

In NMS, POIs are odd alien glyphs, the occasional trade outpost and rare larger alien places.

In Empyrion, POIs are player-made: some are simple wrecks dotted about the planet with basic loot, others are complex bases with defenses, traps and epic loot.

To be fair, tsuna has outlined interest in cities and towns with concept art, which is why buildings seem be around besides being needed for tutorial area

[Calvert4096]

Are cities/planets both planned to be procedurally generated?

Shortly before Spore was released, I remember being excited about the idea of using player-generated content to semi-procedurally populate the universe with alien species and civilizations.

I don't know if it's over-ambitious for tsuna to attempt this, but it would be neat if he could similarly attempt to leverage the community's creativity this way -- whether it be for NPC bases/ships or planets themselves. NMS definitely had a lot of resources behind it, and even after many updates I still hear criticism about their attempts to make a living universe. I understand some of these are technological limitations (e.g. players can't build across many planets without something eventually despawning).

[AlienXtream]

this is a bit of an old thread but still relevant. saw a video on terrain generation. i feel it has at least some good enough info to get pointed in the right direction and some digging deeper into the methods should yield nice results if done well, which no doubt you will blow us away when you are ready to tackle terrain and planet generation (no rush, just providing possibly useful resources for when you decide to work on the system). question is do you want to capitalize on the "cartoony" style with the planets or do you want something a bit more realistic at its core (but still stylistically similar enough that it makes sense with the rest of the art style). personally i would suggest going for something similar in style to the 3D animated starwars series's (starwars: the clone wars and starwars: rebels), since so much of this game is inspired by the starwars franchise.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MazA1SlpwTY