Space is infinite, the sever however is not...

[Swizy]

How will this be handled, will there be a "edge to space" or just a point from which space gets boring?
I'm eager to find out what Cryptic will think of :)

The funniest solution for me would be that when you reach the farthest point and cross it you appear on the other side of the universe facing the same direction ^^

[Trekkie]

Just to keep things simple, I think that there will be an "invisible wall" at the edges of the universe, but it would be neat to see something similar to what you have described.

[Mr.Taboo]

They might be able to make it limitless there just wouldn't be anything there but open space.
I base this on when I use to play "Freelancer" as far as I know you could fly in any direction and never hit a wall.


.

[Mathurin]

How about as you get further from known space it takes longer to reach anything, if it started taking 5 RL hours at warp most would turn back, I dont think any player is nuts enough to let the computer warp about for a week or 2 just to find the edge of space.

Or they could add space hazards which would force a ship to turn back.

The empty space idea would work fine too.

[jayrelo]

or there would be planet eaters, black holes, barrier nebulas, i could think of some cool shizo that could seem plausible out there in the great unknown.

an easy way which they might go is that you can't 'exceed your ships range' or something like that.

but this concept, which i'm glad was brought up, brings about something that could be so small in the game, but also brings out the true test of cryptics supposed love of trek lore and of everything outerspace. there are so much nuance about exploring the great 'out there', ya know?

i like there being an unknown. like that idea mentioned about how you can go further out but theres just nothing but empty space. but maybe a small percentage chance that theres an easter egg out there, some reward, something... just the idea'r of going where no man, no one would dare to go, because of time, or boredom, or the risk of there being nothing and having to make a long journey back home. it sounds cheesy, i know, but isn't it the true base of what star trek is? going where no one has gone before?

truly an interesting concept that i hope cryptic is willing to think about. to them, its some programming language and a couple more pixels. to me? its something much more. its a true trek game.

ah, now i've got myself in love with space and unknown all over again.

shucks...

[Azurian]

Well from what little we know, seems "space" is going to be seperated into sectors. So if they do like other games, you reach the edge you will either encounter a barrier or simply zone into another sector (zone).

Now if I remember right, the Devs said we are pretty much staying in the Alpha Quadrant for now, with the Beta and Gamma Quadrants becoming available in the future.

[admriker444]

dont forget that what might be empy space today, tomorrow it may have 5 new planets to discover. Cryptic says it will always be adding planets to an ever expansing universe

[callsign11b]

yea they said something about the computer spawning up planets and systems when it needs to so i'm thinking a very large area to explore.

[Aslan_chShran]

I thought they have computers making solar systems even as we speak? Of course it won't be 'infinite' but won't the game universe be in a constant state of growth so we can continue to explore?

[KO_Gilligan]

You could treadmill out there.... it would appear as if you keep going further as you keep moving but really you are close enough to go right back into playable space....

[Banaticus]

I think we can all agree that, when out of warp, it takes forever to cross through even a solar system, let alone the massive space between solar systems. When in warp, the background is somewhat blurred, right? So, when you reach the edge of the map, just keep the blurred background animation playing and allow the "distance" measurement (or however players know where in the galaxy they are) to just keep adding up. Problem solved -- players will "think" they're traveling beyond the edge of the map.

[Typheron]

http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Galactic_barrier

and theres your answer, in the Trek universe there is actually a HUGE pink wall.

[endeva]

I have read that they intend to use Trans-Warp Conduits as well as warp, to allow faster travel times but I wonder if they will instance each sector of space like Eve, in order to keep it flowing better overall.

I also believe, that players should push the boundries of the game, making it expand and reachable as you progress within the game, maybe even getting specific missions that offer instanced sectors of space available only for people with or who have completed the mission.

"Star Trekkin across the universe, on the starship Whatsisname, under Captain Burke...." :D

[Swizy]

http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Galactic_barrier

and theres your answer, in the Trek universe there is actually a HUGE pink wall.


Thanks Typheron I had no knowledge of it because I didn't watch TOS.
But the data is in conflict with itself and to tell you the troth I would be disappointed to see a HUGE pink wall anywhere in the game, even if traveling for 2 weeks to get to it. Thought from a designers point of view it would be practical to implement.

[Mr.Taboo]

If anyone was wondering what i was talking about I found a link to the Freelancer demo.
Freelancer Demo (http://www.gamershell.com/download_1395.shtml)
You'll have to go thru the tutorial missions to get access to the cruise engines but after that your free to do what you want so pick a open part of space and kick in the cruise engines,

.

[Allardyn]

I have had this discussion with physics professors before. Space being infinite is a theory, and IMO a flawed one. How can anything in the universe including itself be infinite.

A propose a different way at looking at it, space is FINITE at any point in time. However if we go with the big bang theory it is constantly expanding, just like blowing up a balloon. The scary thought there is that eventually it would have to burst or implode.

[THORN74]

well i for one am going to set course for the delta quadrant at maximum warp and then leave my computer on for the 60 years it would take to get there :D

i dont really care if there are hard barriers or not, the points where the barriers would be, should be in areas of insignifigance. for example Canis Major dwarf galaxy after the constellation in which it lies, it is about 25000 light years away from the solar system and 42000 light years from the centre of the Milky Way. this is the closest galaxy to our own, would you really want to cross a 25000 light year void (there is nothing but space inbetween us) real world referance (http://astro.u-strasbg.fr/images_ri/canm-e.html) so having a barrier at the edge of the galaxy (where earth is pretty close to) wouldnt matter to me.

[cavilier210]

thorn, u just shattered my map of the galaxy, thanks, lol

[THORN74]

thorn, u just shattered my map of the galaxy, thanks, lol

sorry dued im just the messanger. its amazing the **** u can find on the internet. I would very much like to visit the gamma quadrant, not much has ever been said about that one. we know whats in the delta quadrant (thanx voyager) and the alpha abd beta quatrants are where "we" live (fed, klingon, rommies, and the rest ) . if i remeber correctly earth is very near the alpha/beta border, but i could be mistaken.

[cavilier210]

the alpha beta border runs thru the center of Sol (the sun)

[THORN74]

i was right ST galactic map (http://www.stdimension.org/Cartography/Source/map_stency.gif)

[cavilier210]

lol, i can't read german

[THORN74]

sorry try this http://www.stdimension.org/Cartography/Source/map_stency.gif

u have to cut and paste it ...the site dosent allow hotlinking

[cavilier210]

cool, i figured it out. seems that the site you reference doesn't like being linked to. does the link work for u?

EDIT: ops, i didn't see the second part of the post, lol. but i got it

[THORN74]

i figure most fo the exploration of the game will involve the rest of the alpha and beta quadrants, but i would eventually like to see some of the gamma and delta quadrants also (good old wormhoiles / transwarp conduits would work) though i doubt they would pull a voyager and strand us out there.


though it could be a neat idea to take a whole taskforce/fleet into the kazon or hirogen territories. if they thought one ship was a pain in the ass imagine what they would think of 12 or 15 ships!

i doubt it will happen though

[cavilier210]

i fear for the future of the hirogen and kazon, lol. but i think it would be fun to fly forever and have to fly forever back. how much empty space will there be anyway? seems trek games hate to leave anywhere empty, but i think nebulas that are immense would be more fun to see and experience then a slew of planets and asteroids

[Thibor]

How will this be handled, will there be a "edge to space" or just a point from which space gets boring?
I'm eager to find out what Cryptic will think of :)

The funniest solution for me would be that when you reach the farthest point and cross it you appear on the other side of the universe facing the same direction ^^

On the absurd side ... you reach the "developers' edge" and Q appears, chastises you for being silly to come ALL the way out here then slings you back to the alpha quadrant.

On a more serious side, while space/universe may indeed be infinite (or infinitely expanding) there will be a threshold at how much "stuff" can populate it with regards to the servers. Most current enterprise level database systems do away with fixed/max number of records and simply cap it at a memory size. I've read the current Oracle scales into the terabytes. How the galaxies, star systems within and objects within a star system are stored I have ZERO clue or how much storage room even a planet would take up in their system. There is likely a cap ... even if it is a million star systems and 10 million planets. :P

However, simply because there's a limit to how many thngs exist within the universe doesn't mean the coordinate system they opt to use has to have a boundary.

[jhem99]

I reckon there should be enough space for one person to explore for a year before boundary reached.

[jayrelo]

or there would be planet eaters, black holes, barrier nebulas, i could think of some cool shizo that could seem plausible out there in the great unknown.

an easy way which they might go is that you can't 'exceed your ships range' or something like that.

but this concept, which i'm glad was brought up, brings about something that could be so small in the game, but also brings out the true test of cryptics supposed love of trek lore and of everything outerspace. there are so much nuance about exploring the great 'out there', ya know?

i like there being an unknown. like that idea mentioned about how you can go further out but theres just nothing but empty space. but maybe a small percentage chance that theres an easter egg out there, some reward, something... just the idea'r of going where no man, no one would dare to go, because of time, or boredom, or the risk of there being nothing and having to make a long journey back home. it sounds cheesy, i know, but isn't it the true base of what star trek is? going where no one has gone before?

truly an interesting concept that i hope cryptic is willing to think about. to them, its some programming language and a couple more pixels. to me? its something much more. its a true trek game.

ah, now i've got myself in love with space and unknown all over again.

shucks...

after reading everyone's post, i'm still gonna go with my dream.

[ExAstris]

To dispell a few mislead notions, space as it is currently concieved of in physics is not infinite. Its roughly 156 billion lightyears across according to some calculations that take reletivistic time dialations into effect in conjunction with the maximum viewable distances in the universe (i.e. the farthest objects we can see, Quasars), as well as the time the physical processes that would creates quasars and galaxies/systems/planets like our own would need.

Star Trek just about never leaves our galaxy (The Milky Way), which is a piddly 100,000 lightyears across. With regular warp it would have taken Voyager 70 years to traverse roughly 70,000 of those lightyears. Transwarp gates will surely reduce travel times drastically between gates, but unless the gates can slighshot you also, we'll likely be constrained to our galaxy.

I would like to see official exploration outside the Milky Way though, if transwarp gates can work at long enough ranges it would be awesome to send an expedition to the small Magellenic Cloud to set up a transwarp gate there so that exploration could begin in a second (albeit smaller) galaxy, with all new story telling possibilities.

Heck, any dev reading this might pitch the idea to have this expedition mentioned in the "Path to 2409" updates so that if they decide to open up a second galaxy in a future expansion they can bring this teams Transwarp Gate online as a excuse to get there.

This is of course assuming that they already don't have plans for an Ubergate of some kind that can generate a transwarp tunnel all the way to other galaxies to fuel their "infinite exploration" engine :D.

[cavilier210]

i would find it hilarious if this "ubergate" was called the Ubergate, lol

[jayrelo]

To dispell a few mislead notions, space as it is currently concieved of in physics is not infinite. Its roughly 156 billion lightyears across according to some calculations that take reletivistic time dialations into effect in conjunction with the maximum viewable distances in the universe (i.e. the farthest objects we can see, Quasars), as well as the time the physical processes that would creates quasars and galaxies/systems/planets like our own would need.

Star Trek just about never leaves our galaxy (The Milky Way), which is a piddly 100,000 lightyears across. With regular warp it would have taken Voyager 70 years to traverse roughly 70,000 of those lightyears. Transwarp gates will surely reduce travel times drastically between gates, but unless the gates can slighshot you also, we'll likely be constrained to our galaxy.

I would like to see official exploration outside the Milky Way though, if transwarp gates can work at long enough ranges it would be awesome to send an expedition to the small Magellenic Cloud to set up a transwarp gate there so that exploration could begin in a second (albeit smaller) galaxy, with all new story telling possibilities.

Heck, any dev reading this might pitch the idea to have this expedition mentioned in the "Path to 2409" updates so that if they decide to open up a second galaxy in a future expansion they can bring this teams Transwarp Gate online as a excuse to get there.

This is of course assuming that they already don't have plans for an Ubergate of some kind that can generate a transwarp tunnel all the way to other galaxies to fuel their "infinite exploration" engine :D.

awesome idea. kudos.

[Cryptic_Fan_101]

Silly. This was all answered by the arcade classic, Asteroids. When you get to the edge of the screen, you simply appeared on the other side of the screen. :D

[Markhottel]

i hope that they make space like 9 billion or mor light years =)

[cavilier210]

thats more space then is in the galaxy

[jayrelo]

thats more space then is in the galaxy

i'm sure that was the last thing that he would have thought up based on his post.

[ExAstris]

thats more space then is in the galaxy

Actually its not, if the universe is expanding at the speed of light (which we think it is) and the age of the universe calculations are accurate (currently estimated at over 14 billion years), then the universe must have a diameter of at least 28 billion lightyears.

Considering temporal deformations due to rapid motion (i.e. a relativisitc compensation) and the better guesses seem to indicate the universe is 156 billion lightyears across, give or take a dozen billion.

[Lateo]

Actually its not, if the universe is expanding at the speed of light (which we think it is) and the age of the universe calculations are accurate (currently estimated at over 14 billion years), then the universe must have a diameter of at least 28 billion lightyears.

Considering temporal deformations due to rapid motion (i.e. a relativisitc compensation) and the better guesses seem to indicate the universe is 156 billion lightyears across, give or take a dozen billion.
Another neat little thing, is that the -universe- as a concept is mostly based upon star/galaxy positions, its not known how much actual "space" there is for the "universe" to expand out into, so while the universe is finite (just a very very large finite) the "space" around it might not be.

frontier Elite did a -great- job of presenting this (yes at one point i got a fast ship, put it at the edge of the universe (last star system in the last galaxy) pointed the ship away from the universe, max speed and max time advancement then went to work for 12 hours))

Server space might not be infinite, but developing a game you learn that what the player percieves -doesnt have- to be what is, with some very clever client/server architecture it wouldnt be very server intensive to have a literally -infinate- universe.

[eventhorizen]

Another neat little thing, is that the -universe- as a concept is mostly based upon star/galaxy positions, its not known how much actual "space" there is for the "universe" to expand out into, so while the universe is finite (just a very very large finite) the "space" around it might not be.

frontier Elite did a -great- job of presenting this (yes at one point i got a fast ship, put it at the edge of the universe (last star system in the last galaxy) pointed the ship away from the universe, max speed and max time advancement then went to work for 12 hours))

Server space might not be infinite, but developing a game you learn that what the player percieves -doesnt have- to be what is, with some very clever client/server architecture it wouldnt be very server intensive to have a literally -infinate- universe.

None of which appears remotely within the paradigm of this game.

[cavilier210]

Actually its not, if the universe is expanding at the speed of light (which we think it is) and the age of the universe calculations are accurate (currently estimated at over 14 billion years), then the universe must have a diameter of at least 28 billion lightyears.

Considering temporal deformations due to rapid motion (i.e. a relativisitc compensation) and the better guesses seem to indicate the universe is 156 billion lightyears across, give or take a dozen billion.

i said galaxy, not universe. they aren't the same thing

[THORN74]

our current understanding of our galaxy is the milky way has a diameter of ~ 100,000 light years.

star trek has never left the miky way galaxy (except the tos episode where the andromedians took control of the ship, but they never made it anyway) and i see no reason to do so now.


asside from the small spec of space voyager traveled i the delta quadrant, and the small amount of space near the bajoran worm hole in the gamma quadrant, only a small section of the alpha and beta quadrants have been settled or even explored. there is plenty left to discover and travel through.

[Aslan_chShran]

http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Galactic_barrier

and theres your answer, in the Trek universe there is actually a HUGE pink wall.

Man, forgot about that... in a way that's kinda dumb if you think about it. If there is a huge wall, and they already reached it in TOS, then how the heck during the TNG years are they still exploring the galaxy and claiming they've only discovered and mapped a 10th of it? Kinda stupid, if you ask me.

[Swizy]

This is of course assuming that they already don't have plans for an Ubergate of some kind that can generate a transwarp tunnel all the way to other galaxies to fuel their "infinite exploration" engine :D.

Ubergate!!! I have been laughing for the last 15min, thank you ExAstris :)

[Futuristicdragoon]

Ok. I have a hunch that what they tell us is correct. I think it'll be limitless. If it is, and if it works the way they described in Game Informer, the star systems (beyond were The Federation has reached so far) will be created randomly by their engine.

With this being said, maybe they'll just buy more server space when the new data is created.

You may be asking, "Would they do that?" I'd think so. Among other things, it'd make the game famous for it's unlimited expansiveness. Another thing to consider is what you're going to do first when you buy the game. Which one of these would you do first?
- Go to Quarks and hang with the older crew of Deep Space Nine
- Check out Federation HQ on Earth
- Visit Vulcan
- Go out in the middle of nowhere only to meet a race you've never met that provides much less of an epic experience than the last three things to do?

They'd have no problem with buying server space cause we'd be too busy meeting characters we already care about.

Oops! Didn't notice how much I talked. Sorry ! :rolleyes:

[TheMasterpiece]

Isnt it ever expanding tho? as the game gets older, more will be added. im sure there wont be a problem