First of all, this is not mine work. I've just thought that it could be of help in case you decide to do seamless planetary landing. Here's demo video of it: http://youtu.be/uvskrieOWPw

You can find documentation and source code here: http://proland.inrialpes.fr/download.html

Hopefully it can give you some ideas how to implement things you want, without having to waste much time figuring out how to do it.

You can also check Pioneer, the most recent open source "copy" of Elite. But it has terrible graphics imho, a bit better than Oolite. Although Pioneer does have procedurally generated cities but they look awful. Many others did seamless planetary landing, including projects like Outerra, SpaceEngine, Celestia etc. Also many individuals did it.

In case you want to create proper nature on those planets, this is interesting one man project as well: http://youtu.be/Xs7TvmuLm1M

I have just one question. All these projects have LoD popping issues. Is it possible to optimize the code to avoid that or there will always be some pop-up, even with best hardware?

It would be awesome if you guys who are working on these procedural engines each by himself, could somehow create a company together and make the game of my dreams

Edit: One more thing. Your backers should know that even if you make seamless planetary landing possible, it will be an empty ground with maybe a base or two. Without multiplayer it would be waste of time doing it and waste of space in general. With animation between space and planets you can make it like in Heroes and Might and Magic, show some planet scenery in background and put options to build things on that screen. Imho having whole planet to explore is bad idea, if you don't make everything procedural: nature, cities, even people. But that takes too much time and maybe not even possible.

One dude from my country was trying to achieve that in his spare time and eventually he got fed up with it. Engine he created was used for some dumb arcade space on-rail shooter. You have to put limits somewhere.

Wow, beautiful. Thanks for the link, I was unaware of this project and will gladly take a peak at the source code

The popping problem is a hard one to solve. I don't think it's impossible, per-se, but most LOD techniques used for planet rendering don't fully smooth out popping. To be honest, I'm not sure how much additional power it would take.

The only solution I can think of is have the vertices of the higher detailed LOD match the existing one, then spend a couple of seconds to morph into the correct position.

Leshma,
A brilliant first post, proland looks amazing.

I also agree with you about pioneer/oolite, they both need a little bit of a clean-up in the interface department.

Leshma wrote:You can also check Pioneer, the most recent open source "copy" of Elite. But it has terrible graphics imho, a bit better than Oolite.

Deej wrote:I also agree with you about pioneer/oolite, they both need a little bit of a clean-up in the interface department.

Pioneer is of course a remake of Frontier, not Elite. And as far as Oolite is concerned, there's the beauty of its expandability. If you want stunning graphics, you can get them. There's not just one, but several re-designs of the ships and stations available, each in their own style. And there's not just one, but several packs of planet textures available. And so on. For starters, you can check out the "Expansion Packs" section in the gallery, in order to get an idea what it can look like. Also, the graphics (and interface) department is continuously improved, even as we speak. Check out for instance what the lasers and exhaust plumes will look like in the next version.

I watched this the other day and it sure looks stunning the proland fly over demos and would love to do that in a flight sim, might even forget about the universe domination plans and just go sight seeing for a while.

Any word on whether you'd consider using this or similar, Josh..

With the new LOD and AO stuff you've been doing lately, the "pop up" issues might not be such an issue now?

ok you guys should see this video i swear when i saw it i thought it was the real thing O.o http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Ghulpp6CPw

lenny wrote:ok you guys should see this video i swear when i saw it i thought it was the real thing O.o http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Ghulpp6CPw

Nice, but not yet the real ting: the trees all look the same.