What Does "Simulation" Mean To You? [+]

[Marc17]

I'm going to say Immersion as I'm more partial to (my interpretation of) GDS.

 

[Pedantic]

My understanding is a bit of both. They are simulating a galaxy for folks to explore, and also want interesting gameplay.

NMS definitely suffered for years from having a procedural generation system that created a lot of stuff with nothing to do, though I hear they've done a lot since then through extensive updates.

 

[Celebrim]

I'm not familiar with the game. Is the point of the generator to make realistic planets, using data from observations, or is it to make a variety of worlds that will lead to interesting gameplay?

Well, the point is definitely not to make realistic planets. My understanding is the planets are really only a few dozens of kilometers in diameter, but this is big enough and people's sense of scale limited enough (as to what they can imagine) that the planets will generally feel planet sized to the average user. So it's definitely a simulation in that they want people to be immersed in the illusion of realism, but there is no real commitment to realism per se.

 

[soviet]

"Evoke setting through its own procedures" is a great phrase.

Thanks. Buy my books! ;-)