Cloud Imperium Games (CIG), which spent more than a decade developing Star Citizen and Squadron 42 with $600 million in crowdfunding, recently revealed its progress. Although both games do not yet have a release date, players have a playable and technologically challenging space world.Star Engine engine looks ambitious
Showcasing the developed “Star Engine” game engine, the trailer provides a comprehensive overview of the unique technology powering Star Citizen and its single-player version, Squadron 42. The trailer highlights the engine’s ability to render various scenes and characters at an impressive scale. Throughout the half-hour video, various environments across multiple planets and star systems are rendered in real time, without loading screens. Showcasing advanced lighting and physics simulation effects, the video shows cities, mountains, caves, ships, space stations and other locations.
CIG says their only compromise is that the engine compresses the distances between planets to save time. Bethesda’s space exploration-themed RPG game Starfield has often been criticized for its excessive loading screens. The absence of these transitions is the main focus of CIG’s trailer. Probably the most striking feature of the trailer is that it shows that, thanks to the engine, characters can perform various activities inside ships, cities, trains and space stations, while other characters can perform actions at the same time.The gameplay showcased by CIG so far doesn’t appear to be fundamentally different from what players have experienced in games like Starfield, No Man’s Sky, and Elite Dangerous. However, if CIG can successfully release one or both of its projects, it could combine many elements from other space games and achieve even more. Cloud Imperium Games announced a while ago that Squadron 42 was entering the polishing phase. On the Star Citizen side, the process and crowdfunding continues.
