Oct 28th 2024 Update

In the process of completely re-factoring my space trader game, I had a few ideas for making the graphics and game GUI all completely custom with just OpenGL graphics constructs (so far points), and GLSL shader code.  So far, I like what I have, and the soft body physics was totally last minute, and the thing that shocked me was the code is super simple, understandable, easy to play around with, and light weight.  So the soft body physics will be a neat animation for the player's inventory collected from the solar system.  This is just the very beginnings of the beginning, and I'm starting to allow myself to think outside the box of: everything has to make sense, because you can create things in game dev just for fun.  Anyways, I also played around with the planets' surfaces and added perlin noise (2 octaves), randomized the size of the planets, and also added the fun little alien trader guy that peeks out mysteriously (eventually he will only show when you arrive to trade or first visit or something like that).  Alright, please let me know what you think, as feedback is the most important thing, and I would love to hear what anyone thinks about how to add some fun mechanics!  Thanks.