Star Citizen: Microtech - Biomes Rework

Microtech is part of the first fully released and playable star system in the Star Citizen universe, Stanton, which over time has suffered some visual changes and updates to try and keep it up with new trends and technical upgrades within the industry and company. It was in this context that we decided to rework the green areas of the planet in order to create denser and more realistic spruce forests, grasslands and tundras, making use of upgrades in the Planet Tech systems that naturally happen over development of the Star Citizen universe.

The rework of Microtech was a very important milestone as it was the first time that properly dense forests were added into the universe of Star Citizen, an effort that required not only a rework of the biomes themselves using slightly updated and modified technology, but also new foliage assets to provide the planet with a fresh visual change in it's green and unfrozen areas.

In this rework I was responsible for the development of the new biomes, using our internal procedural distribution tools part of Planet Tech v4, in order to achieve natural environments that heavily resemble Earth, with spruce forests that transition to lush grasslands and cold tundras. I was also responsible for assessing the needs of the new biomes in relation to the list of foliage assets needed to achieve the visual needs of this project, alongisde Sebastian Schroeder and Maximilian Keilich. The main objective of this rework was to push the techonlogy at hand as much as possible and deliver dense forests on a planetary scale while keeping those biomes as performant as possible.

I was also responsible for the creation of the new Spruce asset, which is a key visual identity to the updated biomes, as well as the new and updated grass set seen in the images. You should check Niklas Rüffler's portfolio for the bearberry asset work (https://www.artstation.com/artwork/K3V0xW), a key asset in the tundra biomes, as well as Hasbi Adenan's portfolio for the temperate fern asset work (https://www.artstation.com/artwork/rlyP52).

Creative Director: Ian Leyland
Planet Content Art Lead: Sebastian Schroeder
Planet Content Environment Artists: Maximilian Keilich; Patrick Gladys; Özlem Gladys; Pascal Müller; Niklas Rüffler; Hasbi Adenan; Lukáš Chovanec;

https://www.artstation.com/sebastiansch
https://www.artstation.com/maxikeilich
https://www.artstation.com/patgladys
https://www.artstation.com/miu
https://www.artstation.com/schnibbsl
https://www.artstation.com/niklasrueffler
https://www.artstation.com/hasbi
https://www.artstation.com/miroxs