All about plantes boundary and planets. Better than excpected

[Battleforce]

I think there is incomplete information about this section, some say that the maps are random, that they are generated based on the biome or x reason. Thanks to the user Zarmazarma who already mentioned it in a message I have been able to test how they are "generated".



The planets are real entities, no infinite random maps are generated, selecting a point loads the real terrain in that location and the ship lands in the nearest place. There are people who say that this is not so because the tiles do not coincide with each other, the reason is that the distances are real scale or at least very large, which makes it almost impossible to overlap points.



The way I have had to validate this is to choose very precisely the same landing point as Zarmazarma and see if the map was the same. When I landed what I saw in front of my cockpit was not the same as him, but surprise, when I got off the ship and looked behind I see the same mountains but from farther away. This confirms that the map is not randomly generated, only the POI, the rest of the planet is generated and the ship lands in the closest possible place it can, they are not predefined tiles because I landed a little further, not just in the same place, and that I tried to catch just the same area through the images, which confirms that the distances are very long and you have to be very accurate to load the same part of the planet.



I leave the images of Zarmazarma where he had already tested this: https://imgur.com/a/p87vc9l

This is my test at the same location: https://imgur.com/nvIXCir



If you look I see the same mountains further away and only the POI's changed. This confirms what Tod said about putting together different tiles around a planet and what Pete said on twitter, if you want you can load the different points and end up going around the whole planet. Of course, be prepared because the distances are enormous.

[morph113]

This has actually been explained by the devs (don't remember if it was Todd) long before release that the terrain itself is fixed and the POI will be random. It's not really something new or that had to be tested. I mean even in the Starfield direct 45 min gameplay video months ago you could see it when they showed the same location 2 different times, each time with different POI. So this part was known to work like that.

All planet terrain is still procedurally generated though. I think sometimes people misunderstand or don't know what procedural generation is. The maps itself don't exist as a map like the map of GTA V exists. They are just numbers based on an algorithm. As long as the same seed is used, the results will be the same. Kind of like Minecraft or Valheim. Imagine Minecraft with it's near infinite world if there would be only 1 seed and you couldn't change it. Everyone would have the same map, but the map would still be procedurally generated. It's the system loading in and building the map based on the algorithm used. In Starfield everyone uses the same seed so the terrain is the same for everyone.

That could be interesting in the future of modding as this may be used by modders to change the seed potentially so all 1000 planets will have new terrain generated. Apart from some important landing sites like big settlements which I believe have (at least partly) hand crafted terrain.

[Battleforce]

Originally posted by morph113:

This has actually been explained by the devs (don't remember if it was Todd) long before release that the terrain itself is fixed and the POI will be random. It's not really something new or that had to be tested. I mean even in the Starfield direct 45 min gameplay video months ago you could see it when they showed the same location 2 different times, each time with different POI. So this part was known to work like that.

All planet terrain is still procedurally generated though. I think sometimes people misunderstand or don't know what procedural generation is. The maps itself don't exist as a map like the map of GTA V exists. They are just numbers based on an algorithm. As long as the same seed is used, the results will be the same. Kind of like Minecraft or Valheim. Imagine Minecraft with it's near infinite world if there would be only 1 seed and you couldn't change it. Everyone would have the same map, but the map would still be procedurally generated. It's the system loading in and building the map based on the algorithm used. In Starfield everyone uses the same seed so the terrain is the same for everyone.

That could be interesting in the future of modding as this may be used by modders to change the seed potentially so all 1000 planets will have new terrain generated.

Yes, but people are missinformed :), and if you choose one zone at the limit of two biomes you can see both.

[ingosupercute]

All I know is if you walk far enough away from your ship there will be a message telling you that this was the end and you'd have to create a new landing zone. So I guess the ability to create POI is being very limited in size.

[Battleforce]

Originally posted by ingosupercute:

All I know is if you walk far enough away from your ship there will be a message telling you that this was the end and you'd have to create a new landing zone. So I guess the ability to create POI is being very limited in size.

This is about engine capabilities, but the planet itself exist, and it's the same for everione.

[Daedrius]

Originally posted by ingosupercute:

All I know is if you walk far enough away from your ship there will be a message telling you that this was the end and you'd have to create a new landing zone. So I guess the ability to create POI is being very limited in size.

Each landing area is about as big as the Fallout 4 map. Some are barren, some barren with locations to explore scattered around and some are full of life and locations. How long do you think it might take to explore 3 or 4 fallout 4 size maps on one planet?

[zpc]

Originally posted by ingosupercute:

All I know is if you walk far enough away from your ship there will be a message telling you that this was the end and you'd have to create a new landing zone. So I guess the ability to create POI is being very limited in size.

The interesting point [for modders] about that is that it is already in the game. My guess is that Bethesda limited the areas due to us being on foot. Once vehicles are a thing (and I really do hope they will be added at some point) the areas could seamlessly extend without the need to manually place a new landing point (as said, the tech is already there).

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@OP Good thing for spreading the word. The game is way more sophisticated then some hasty drama videoclips show.

[SaLaĐiN]

The planet doesn't exist until you load it in separate loading screen.

[ingosupercute]

Originally posted by Ezeris:

Each landing area is about as big as the Fallout 4 map. Some are barren, some barren with locations to explore scattered around and some are full of life and locations. How long do you think it might take to explore 3 or 4 fallout 4 size maps on one planet?

I'm wondering if the landing area expands at the same size in all directions of the ship. Because that one time when I hit the boundary, I felt like not having wandered off that far. I mean I was mining iron so I didn't pay that much attention, but I could have sworn I already wandered off much further on other occasions.

[morph113]

Originally posted by ingosupercute:

Originally posted by Ezeris:

Each landing area is about as big as the Fallout 4 map. Some are barren, some barren with locations to explore scattered around and some are full of life and locations. How long do you think it might take to explore 3 or 4 fallout 4 size maps on one planet?

I'm wondering if the landing area expands at the same size in all directions of the ship. Because that one time when I hit the boundary, I felt like not having wandered off that far. I mean I was mining iron so I didn't pay that much attention, but I could have sworn I already wandered off much further on other occasions.

I would assume it's created the same distance in all direcdtions. However different planets seem to have different sized maps when you land so on some planets you can reach the boundary quicker. Personally I have never hit the boundary on any planet so far. I guess the different sized maps on different planets could potentially be related to how complex the terrain etc. is. Like a planet with complex terrain and flora/fauna I would assume may have a smaller map generated than a planet that is mostly just barren? I guess this could be tested to confirm.