Terrain Features

What the ground is made of, down in the atmosphere. All of it is drawn from satellite and map data, with generated detail on top.

• Hills and mountains

  The shape of the ground comes from NASA's height map, curved with the Earth, with generated ridges for the detail the map lacks.

• Forest

  Rainforest grows only where the satellite map shows forest, and fills a whole area 200 km across, drawn as clumps of trees about 100 m wide.

• Rivers

  Rivers drawn from river data, each as wide as its flow, running on to the sea. Nothing lands, grows or is built on them.

• Towns

  Towns are generated, not mapped: streets, shophouses, a dense core and a few towers. Ships cannot land in a town or its fringe.

• Sea

  The sea comes from the satellite map: clear blue counts as water for the ground, the trees and landing alike.