Caves, Ravines/Canyons And Volcanoes

[Sickle]

On other planets/moons like Laythe, Eve and Duna, I think it'd be awesome to have some more things to fly through like Ravines and Canyons (Like the one on Dres but much bigger!) and Small caves for Rovers to journey into.

[Wolfmaster112]

well i agree it would be nice, but the added strain on components would increase the minimum system requirements i would think. I would think someone would make a mod for this instead of implementing it into the game.

[tntristan12]

I agree that more varied geological features would give players more interesting landing spots, and would be fun to explore. For example: the equatorial canyon on the Mün.

[Beeman]

I'd be down for caves, tunnels and other interesting land formations. Would be a good reason to diversify rovers and rover delivery vehicles.

I feel like this is probably planned, though. But maybe it's one of those things that can't easily be done just yet. Like, they might have to optimize things a LOT to make jagged surface features or things like tunnels and caves. Then again, I don't know anything about it XD

[MrKicker]

This wouldent be verry good for people with low end systems, as it would put a huge amount of strain on the componants. But mayby somebody could turn this into a mod. That way people with low end systems dont have to deal with the lag if they dont install it.

[StarManta]

Having a different terrain map doesn't affect performance at all.

[zekes]

and like plantsandjunglesandcitiesandbridgesanddocksand

shipsandcarsandcitesandkerbals!

Whew.

[Sickle]

Well the answer to the Performance issues could be an option to toggle these on or off.

[Fifi]

I think it could be toggle'able to "low-end mode". Terrain is very important - almost all the "I DID IT" pictures and land bases spots desperately needs good one.

[Deejay2000]

I could be wrong (and often I am), but I don't think changing the terrain is going to kill the FPS for low-end systems. A canyon is not much more than a crack in the surface, and I wouldn't think it'd be much different (FPS wise) than a deep crater.

-Deejay

[rewdew2]

Well, i can think of one way that this could be possible.

if you look at the current terrain of like, Kerbin. as in standing on the surface resolution, the grid of mesh is about.. .eh... 5 meters per side (that can depend on what graphic setting you have though)

Now what could happen is the devs make about... 20-25 different tunnel segments, including ends, entrances, straights, downs, turns, pits, and random spiky pits.

What the game does is simply notes where on a surface a cave is, and what segments it uses (these of course will be randomly generated when you start you're ksp, or pre-written into the game)

Then when you get within that radius where the terrain is shown to have a cave, it would load (just like loading a craft when approaching it)

and it would of course replace the collision mesh where the entrances are; with empty spots where an object can pass through.

and of course, the caves would be able to have different mesh resolution settings, like low (probably about 50-100 faces) medium. (about 100-200) and high. (200-500, holy crap, that would BURN anyone's computer)

[chrischambers]

how much of the game is being generated by the graphics card, cos if the whole game is being calculated all the time, and this is putting the strain on the machine, then would it just be better to have the visual area of the game features being at high detailed, and the non-visual, parts not being calculated. So this way we would be able to move around and only parts of the game is being calculated.

[Rhyunix]

I'd have to say that having more terrain features would definitely spice up the game - with this I could see the KAS Mod being used to rappel kerbals down ledges. I'd have to agree that it would affect low processing computers but they could, as suggested before me, turn it down or off. It would surprise me why It would need this because craters aren't generated - they are just there