SpaceKit quick start

This guide builds each part of SpaceKit from an empty level: a planet, its atmosphere, the starship, a ring habitat, a flattened build site and scattered actors. It assumes SpaceKit is installed and the required renderer settings are applied.

See it working first

Open /SpaceKit/Maps/MultiPlanetsMap and press Play to see the full loop already set up: several worlds, the starship, boarding and landing.

1. Create a planet

1. Drop ASKPlanet into an empty level.

2. Set Planet Radius and Seed.

3. Assign a landscape material, a biome foliage asset and a grass asset. Samples ship in Content/PlanetGen/.

4. Press Play. Terrain streams in around the player.

Spawn above the surface

Terrain streams in asynchronously. Spawn the player above the surface, or wait for the first chunks to finish building, so the character does not fall through the terrain.

The player character is ASKPlanetGenGravityCharacter. It walks the full surface of a sphere or the inside of a ring, has a jetpack, and has a fast-fly hyperdrive ability (FastFlyTo(TargetLocation, Duration) in Blueprint).

2. Add an atmosphere

1. Put a Sky Atmosphere in the level, and optionally a Volumetric Cloud.

2. On the planet, tick Enable Atmosphere and assign a USKPlanetGenAtmosphereAsset.

USKPlanetGenLODSubsystem drives the level’s single Sky Atmosphere from whichever planet is currently active, so many worlds share one atmosphere. The planet’s atmosphere settings are in its Planet|Atmosphere category.

ASKPlanetSunSky is an alternative that configures the sky from the actor itself rather than through the subsystem. Either works; the demo maps use the subsystem route.

3. Add the starship

1. Drop BP_Starship into the level near the Player Start.

2. Press Play, walk up to the ship and interact to board.

The ship reads the gravity at its location and aligns to it, so the same pawn flies in atmosphere and in open space without switching modes. Its door also works in zero-g, so you can board or leave it out in space. The StarshipDemo map shows the ship on its own, with no planet generation running.

4. Build a ring habitat

1. Drop ASKRingWorld into the level.

2. Set Planet Radius, which on a ring is the ring radius. The pole axis becomes the spin axis.

Terrain sits on the inner surface by default: centrifugal gravity pushes you outward onto the floor. A ring has three extra groups of settings:

• Ring: ring length, inner or outer surface placement, and the spin axis.
• Ring|Shell: the hull cylinder and end walls (bBuildShell, ShellThickness, WallThickness, WallHeightOverride, ShellMaterial).
• Ring|Shell Layers: an array of translucent cloud decks and haze bands. A layer with an empty Material is hidden.

The RingMap demo shows a finished ring habitat.

5. Flatten a build site

1. Tick Enable Exclusion Volumes on the planet.

2. Drop ASKPlanetGenExclusionVolume where you want the pad and size its box.

3. Click Align To Planet so the volume lies flat on the surface.

4. Adjust Blend Radius to set how far the ground eases back to natural terrain.

Terrain flattens to a true tangent plane, and foliage and grass are cleared inside the box. The result is consistent across chunk seams, so the pad does not change as chunks stream. Exclusion volumes work on planets and ring worlds.

6. Scatter actors

1. Create a USKPlanetGenSpawnerAsset (Content Browser → Miscellaneous → Data Asset).

2. Set ActorClass, then filter by Biome, Min/MaxSlopeDegrees and Min/MaxNormalizedHeight.

3. Assign the asset on the planet and press Play.

Placement is deterministic, so a given spot always spawns the same thing. Actors stream in around the player and despawn beyond SpawnRadius.

Where to next

• Features lists everything SpaceKit does, with its key classes and Blueprint API.
• FAQ covers multiplayer and passengers.
• Troubleshooting covers flat-lit terrain, floating foliage and flat-looking water.