Alright, elaborating a bit on the ship trails idea since models are being used for planets the invisible nebula poof nebula to get the trails as an idea works very well.
The nebula background itself is of course a bitmap, but the look of Homeworld and Cataclysm's backgrounds can be remade by a high resolution custom backdrop there.
On the individual stars, suns, and shadow effects, in the stars.tbl the glare from a sun can be lowered to nothing and so the individual stars can be done this way. (since you can position suns in a nebula)
On the second FS2 graphic thing, the small explosions when a missile destroyer launches missiles can be done with a muzzle flash like on the flak guns in FS2.
Anyhow, the whole thing to get trails might be complicated, but in my opinion very much worth it as it would capture the feel of Homeworld...
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AceStaff member FreeSpace Watch
http://freespace.volitionwatch.com/
