Cloud Imerium Games announced the production schedule for Star Citizen 3.0. According to the team, this schedule update is a Star Citizen roadmap for the remainder of 2017. It’s also worth noting that Star Citizen 3.0 will represent the first time for players to try out the much anticipated planetary tech in a live build.
Star Citizen 3.0 will feature RenderTarget refactor; a technique that will save over 50% of video memory usage. Moreover, this upcoming version will sport Area Lights with proper shadowing, new Light Controller for runtime light switches, highly optimized vertex and position format for all geometry, as well as Dynamic Physics Grid to support sparse space areas vs. dense areas like space stations.
Here are some of the features that have already been implemented in the 3.0 version of Star Citizen.
GRAPHICS
- RenderTarget refactor
- This saves over 50% of video memory usage.
- Area Lights with proper shadowing
- Shadow System refactor
- This is more efficient and allows for planetary scale shadows.
DESIGN
- Crusader Converted to Object Container Setup
- With the transition to Object Containers, the Crusader map was completely re-designed. Each Point of interest is now an object container laid out via the Solar System Editor. This is in preparation for Object Container streaming and seamless transitions from different POI’s and between Star Systems. Mission Flowgraphs are converted over to use Subsumption and the new Mission System
- Mega Map for Persistent Universe
- Mega Map tech (also used in Crusader for seamless loading between different gamemodes) is now possible in the new PU map, which is setup in the solar system editor. This allows the utilization of Mega Map technology.
- Revamp of Power Plants / Shield Generators / Coolers and the Heat & Power System for improved gameplay and conversion to Item 2.0
ENVIRONMENT
- Modular Room System for procedural generation of planetary outposts
- Official Outpost Spawning System ready for mission designers
- Integrated Outpost distribution to PlanetEd
- Single outpost Object Preset
- Cluster of Outposts
- Crash site mission
- Interface to hand place modules and save to Layer
- Interface to teleport the camera to the closest outpost
- Area boxes created by artists (all room sizes are now usable in the outpost procedural system)
- Entrance Room system working (stairs and ramps are now available as initial rooms)
- Rooftop Prop system working for Solar panel
- Wall prop system working for additional prop variations
- Material Wear/Dirt on props using Layer Blend done and actually working
- Developed Outpost “feet” system
- Set random rotation and offset caps on planet editor
- Start documenting 3 possible map layouts looping system (using 2 or 4 meters metrics * system; using connection additional corridor pieces; using spline skinned corridors)
- Support Aircon/solar panel system on outposts
- Added color tinting to Outposts
- Added color tinting interface to Planet Ed
- Created material distinction for interior / exteriors
- Group elements offset in Planet Object Preset to be able to offset landing pads
TOOLS
- Solar System Editor
- A tool that will layout entire solar system with their astral objects (sun, planets moons) as well as space stations, etc.
PERFORMANCE
- New Light Controller for runtime light switches
- New network message queue (current in QATR) to reduce network bandwidth and network thread time.
- Light Entity Render node merging.
- Dynamic Physics Grid to support sparse space areas vs. dense areas like space stations.
- Highly optimized vertex and position format for all geometry
- Texture memory usage reduced across the project
- Unified material libraries for use across all departments
- Comparing and finding all duplicated normal maps and albedo maps in the LayerBlend texture library
- Clean up LayerBlend Material Libraries, Resolution Adjustments, Renames to Lower Case
- Follow-ups on list of unused textures and materials
- Massively improved LOD computation and average face sizes for ships
- Shared hair assets (instead of bespoke asset per head) for character creation
- Automated facial asset LODs, skinning algorithm per lod updated.
- Reworked mesh setup of facial assets for optimal performance and reduced drawcalls.
- Unified helmet and character mesh into singular render proxy for better performance and visuals.
- Various portal and culling improvements.
- Improved Animation Data Base collection and build process for optimized animation data streaming also added external tools to manage this.
- Deprecated thousands of legacy and test assets including animations, geometry, libraries and more for reduced build size.
- Automatic Asset Error collection and tracking.
- Reworked itemport layout for characters and character items
- Updated all assets using HumanSkin to highly optimized HumanSkinv2 shader. This saves upwards of a 100 megs of texture memory per face.
ART
- New Assets:
- Heavy Marine Armor
- Explorer Suit Armor
- Cloth and Clothing simulation on various assets old and new
- Updated helmet interiors and exterior for updated art, FOV tech and standardization
- Armor converted to work within modular customization structure
- Finalized delivery of ALL facial assets from 3lateral.
- Ships:
- New Skinning and Rigging tools for landing gear on ships.
- Constellation Cargo Bay/Elevator extensions
- Light Group entity optimization
CODE
- New Radar Databank
- Subsumption
- This is the initial release of the foundational technology that drives all of the AI, mission, dynamic content, and conversational logic. The mission content previously created with FlowGraph has been replaced and the implementation time to achieve a desired effect has been cut dramatically.
- Various Performance improvements
- Planetary Physics Grid to support orbiting and rotating planets
- MFD implementation for Item 2.0 Components on ships
- IFCS improvements to support AI & Takeoff System
- Unified Visor for seamless Ship 2.0 / FPS transition
- HUD/Visor integration for new Radar Databank
- Vehicles No Longer Use Lua
- This is a huge step forward on the code side.
- Skeleton Extension support for Item Port Offset overrides per item
- Numerous types of physics simulation for all Item 2.0 attachments including hair, weapons, grenades and more.
- Destructible component for items, props and environment assets
- Nested Physics Grids support for vehicle transportation inside large ships, i.e. DragonFly & Rover
- Physics simulation gravity vector now respects planetary gravity
- Modular loadouts rule sets and support for up to five loadouts
- Animation driven facial audio implemented
- Updated Sandbox Editor Python integration.
- Zone culling on all character assets and layers, system complete and mesh markup complete supplemented with tools to easily support new assets.
John is the founder and Editor in Chief at DSOGaming. He is a PC gaming fan and highly supports the modding and indie communities. Before creating DSOGaming, John worked on numerous gaming websites. While he is a die-hard PC gamer, his gaming roots can be found on consoles. John loved – and still does – the 16-bit consoles, and considers SNES to be one of the best consoles. Still, the PC platform won him over consoles. That was mainly due to 3DFX and its iconic dedicated 3D accelerator graphics card, Voodoo 2. John has also written a higher degree thesis on the “The Evolution of PC graphics cards.”
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Can’t wait 😉
Looking awesome. It’s gonna be a real treat to be able to land on planets and moons come June.
More like later in July, possibly August, but one can dream.
But no, it’s vaporware, scam, etc., and Xbox is my lord and savior.
Those comments are still going strong on other sites currently (and sadly).
not sad to me.. and let them pay for online.
The comments probably will disappear when 3.0 is released.
Those comments will persist even after launch. Ignorant people don’t change their opinions, they just shell further into their bubble when more evidence is added to the contrary of their belief.
Well I hope so but I’m sure we were thinking the same way before 2.0 got released.
I feel like I can finally let myself get excited about this game. It’s shaping up.
The current internal main dev branch is at least 9 months ahead of the current released 2.6.3 build, in terms of development progress/features, it also has 2 years of planetary technology, none of which is in the public build yet.
It will be the first proper Alpha build of the game as it’s supposed to be, rather than tiny fragmented demos which we currently have.
My nipples are going into overdrive.
Top right shot is clearly concept art, not a screenshot. Odd.
It’s taken from the official RSI website post where it shows how they translated concept art ideas into actual in-game assets, here it’s out of context.
“The environment team has been refining the surface outposts with technical, engineering, and habitation spaces coming together with their preliminary dressing passes. The exteriors are now mostly complete. The team is also looking into lighting variations for the procedural system to add more complex setups for the lighting states. The greybox for the truckstop space station is continuing and now that all the building set pieces have been established, the detail phase has begun. On the Satellite sprint, we’re close to being Whitebox complete on the communication archetype, which means the modules and classifications that were specified by design have been visually explored.”
the next pic is the final result man 😀
Wow.
Cool, just hope that the engine works as well on Nvidia and AMD, i don’t know why, but since they gone vulkan i’m kind inclined to think they are going with Nvidia. who knows?
Vulkan works fine on both, unlike DX12. If anything, them going with Vulkan promises they’re not leaning towards any one particular manufacturer, really.
I hope so
dont think so, nvidia lacking when it comes to async compute whether vulkan or dx.
I dont think they’re using async shaders so itl make no difference. Async compute is almost never used in games currently.
All new large scope games will use async compute. Not doing so would be dumb as it really brings up performance.
And I am not talking small scale shooters like CoD or BF here. Those can go suck my Terrapin.
“small scale shooters like CoD or BF here.”
Yeah, might want to step away from the pipe for a few minutes, mate.
obvious Troll is Obvious??
As far as I know they’re not but just in case…source?
well im not sure about this game but pretty sure ashes of singularity uses it and there is quite a benefit to amd cards.
Ashes does but its also famous for being very well optimized for amd and purposely crippling performance on nvidia cards. Its used more as a benchmark at this point then a game.
That doesn’t make sense at all.
Looks damnnnnnnn good. I just hope they deliver as much as they promised.
EA announces SWBF2,
CIG (inadvertently) responds by detailing Star Citizen 3.0……
Epic.
SWBF2 is not its competitor.
I doubt they even know about SWBF2 lol.
I agree, but since these are the two…. “major Sci-Fi IPs of the moment” (so to speak), & they made these major announcements so close together, it sort-of came off like “hey EA, f*ck you! :D”
Especially in the aftermath of Massively Defective: The Androgynous Syndrome.
more excited for SC but will get SW since no season pass.
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/d04509cbca84df67bd8f52001fa9c857b3513ec74f724e3f9684f58ee5199248.jpg
I just have to say it: this game is what PC gaming needs. Whether people like it or not a game like this simply wouldn’t exist without the help of generous backers. I’m sure there’s a lot of publishers who now wish they were behind this since the start and many haters scratching their heads wondering how the game is still relevant and growing after all these years 🙂
All I gotta do now is upgrade my, well, everything about my computer lol… Man this is exactly what I dreamed of wanting when I first played and finished Mass Effect 1. Even many years before playing it. I didn’t think I’d ever see such an ambitious project in my lifetime.
forever alpha.keep buying those ships boyz….lmao
An Alpha that last years, like for every other AAA game ever created, aren’t you glad you can uselessly complain about this one? Fun enough for everyone, even delusional doubters.
like dayz STILL in alpha?just like h1z1 STILL in alpha…forever alpha…lmao
3.0 will be great!
Too bad we will have to wait for at least 2 more months until then.
Mid summer it is.
Can’t wait for Vega launch.
Screw 1080Ti, Vega has way better tech under the hood, even if it will not perform as well.
I am into 4K gaming, not 1080 gaming.
Are you implying the 1080ti is faster but not capable of 4k…..
*snickers*
You are obviously clueless when it comes to PC gaming….
Here is a hint….EVERY GAME you play has some code in it from Nvidia….and most likely AMD and many more…..and if not for Nvidia PC gaming would be in a much worse state…They have repaired many game devs mistakes behind the scenes that help not only Nvidia users….
AMD users are free to use gameworks. It isn’t proprietary at all. If you want to talk about being open Nvidia have put most of the source code for gameworks up on github
But I don’t know why I bother typing this because you clearly come off as a fanboy and won’t listen to reasoning