So that trailer is pretty killer, but I'm sure I've seen that 'ground-to-space' tech in an engine demo from a few years back. The idea is not that new but it's implementation in a game engine is still pretty unique. I can't help but wonder if this is the same people and that this is the actual game that demo developed into. Does anyone have a clue what that demo was and what I seem to be miss-remembering?

Battlefront 3, it is Not the same people I believe there is no relation in tech or people just merely a concept that is striking and would seem fun.

Seamless ground-to-space travel was an idea that Battlefront 3 was toying around with before that whole thing was taken out behind the shed and shot in the face.

edit: Before being picked up by EA again obviously.

Infinity

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3muhlQYFgLE

You're probably thinking of Battlefront 3, but Evochron Mercenary did it, too.

A few space sims, like Evochron Mercenary, have a seamless space-to-planet engine.

@tetharion: That's the one I was thinking of! A completely different team then. Still, nice to know there are multiple studio's out there shooting for such lofty goals.

This game wow. I hope it we will have more information soon!

In my wildest dreams.

Really though I think I was thinking Evochron Mercenary

There was a game being made at the same time as Yager was on "THE ORIGINAL" Xbox. You were on floating islands for combat and would fly from space to the islands.

The game never came out but was covered at a time.

Something called the Mercury Engine I think, was the tech they were using.

By the way, this game looked fucking awesome.

Oh, you mean the Xbox one?

I swear, I'll never get used to that.

Well hello there...

Fucking mindblowing that a tiny studio like Hello Games is doing this.

This game almost made that whole unbearable train wreck of a show worth it. Almost.

I will say, I am trying to not too hyped for this game. I think it will be good but a four man team trying to do something whole teams haven't gotten right will be hard (but not impossible). Looks interesting. I will say I am curious to what you can do on the planets, on foot.

I'm still managing my expectations until I see a lot more of the game, but it really does seem impressive.

All of these procedurally generated games these days. Only a matter of time before games start completely making themselves!

The whole ground-to-space thing has been around since Elite.

I am in the same boat. I fear that there wont be a whole lot to actually do in the game or a reason to justify going to different planets or exploring on foot. I would still get it just to explore, but I would really appreciate something with some substance. Either way I can't wait to see more.

I got a little bit of a Proteus meets Minecraft meets space travel vibe from some of the trailer. Either way, I'm excited.

@ssully: Yeah, that's what I was thinking...there might be some space combat but stuff on planets will just be Proteus. We'll see!

Actually 'Love' the game by eskil Steinberg has this type of style to it.

@turtlebird95: The game is being developed by 4 of the studios designers/artists now, the rest of the team are slowly moving over once all the Joe Danger stuff they are doing is wrapped up. The core of the studio is small but they do have other staffers to draw upon.

It actually reminded me of some of the ideas in Spore, this game is extremely intriguing. Hope it turns out great.

And I hope it comes out for the PS4.

So the big question then is, how much of this demo was projected game/gameplay, and how much of what we are seeing currently is actually just aspirational. In short, I want to believe that the scope of this game is as suggested by the trailer but am equally open to finding out that things are a little more 'critical path' as long as the game is good.

I'm pretty sure there was a game called "White Gold" developed by some russians that was supposed to do the same thing many, many years ago.

Edit: Okay, it was not White Gold but some other title developed by the same guys: There it is

Oh wow, that's a blast from the past!. I was a big fan of Boiling Point even though it is quite possibly the most consistently broken game I have ever played. As such I held a small flame for The Precursors for a fair few years. A real shame Deep Shadow's ambitions massively outstripped their abilities. It's a sage warning though - a great trailer/demo does not guarantee... well... anything, really!

Maybe check out Space Engine. The planets themselves aren't as fleshed out but they give you an infinite universe instead.

I think the first time I saw full planetary physics and seamless ground-space flight was Fronter: Elite II

Pretty buggy game. I still have the CD around somewhere.

This. Still following this game. Waiting. One day, I will be rewarded.

Also lol, Evochron Mercenary.

No joke, one of the PHD students at my University is literally researching that. He gives the most fascinating lectures.

Maybe it's just me, but I just don't get the hype behind this. It's not the first game to do randomly-generated environments and such, nor is it the first game to do space-to-planet travel. They may be few and far between, but with the way I've seen so many people talking about it, this is all totally new stuff. Moreover, the trailer shows nothing more than the fact that we (seemingly) play in a first-person perspective, can maneuver a ship, can shoot at asteroids and ships...and that's it. We know nothing about the mechanics of the game, the story, what everything is about.

That level of mystery makes me feel like this was a video for a tech demo more than a game at the moment.

I'll be more excited when the eventual hands-on time at E3 comes around. Until then, I'll treat this with the same amount of skepticism I treat most everything.

Don't get me wrong - what they show looks cool in terms of art and such, but having been burned too many times by trailers (see Killzone 2 and Aliens: Colonial Marines), I just cannot invest much into them.

There's a thing called Space Engine which is a Universe simulator, which procedurally generates stars, planets and galaxies. You just go around in 1st person mode exploring the universe quite seamlessly (depending on how fast your CPU + GPU are) . It's pretty damn impressive.

For example, in this actual screenshot from the game below, you can literally visit any white dot you see on this screen. And by visit, I mean use your WASD keys and mouse to move to them, like a FPS. Of course, you can adjust your speed to get there however fast you want.

Get closer and you'll see something like this:

and then this

or this

etc.

The main thing to note is that this is not a game. There's no aim other than to explore, and the worlds are completely barren.

Oh and it's totally free.

http://en.spaceengine.org/

I remember Vinny played an unfinished indie game a year or two ago on PC, where he flew a ship in first person down through a planet's atmosphere then up again.

The concept of this game is directly ripped from an old game called Noctis IV. The entire universe is procedurally generated, and players can explore and name planets (that all get stored in a shared database.)

The problem with a game that is 100% procedurally generated is that it makes for an incredibly boring game. Look at Fuel, or even older games like Daggerfall... these games fall apart outside of the scripted and hand-built areas.

Even if it wasn't as ambitious as it seems, their stylistic inspiration coming from old-school sci-fi covers and such has me super interested.

Also really dig the song they used. Apparently it's not an original track, which is great cause now I don't have to wait for the game to come out to listen to it over and over.

They said there will be upgrades to equipment that's good reason to explore. If that system is robust enough, then I can see it being fun and zen. Like a really rare mineral you have to search hard for. I think already it has got more going for it thanow Proteus.

@sanj: Yeah, this is it.

@sanj: holy crap, that's awesome!

dunno if i didn't notice that before or just didn't download it, but goddamn i gotta try that out.

Same here. I don't think I've ever heard of it though, but it sounds very interesting.

The procedurally generated planets and creatures reminds me of Starbound which came out not too long ago. Of course that was a 2D game in the vein of Terraria so a much smaller scale but still.