Best practice for a vast world (solar system)?

Development Rendering
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1

I want to develop some kind of realistic space simulator. I am complete newbie to UE4 but not to 3D development itself.
I will be using principally C++ programming as that tasks requires huge amount of calculations that could easily be done using C++.

I suppose that I just can’t place an Earth object in real scale, even if it has no textures/heightmaps etc. I already read about level streaming and relative coordinates but it seems to be that this is suitable for big space FLAT worlds when you’re actually not seeing further that xx km (I don’t know the exact value). But if you’re inside a space ship starting your journey let’s say to Mars you should see the whole Earth in different scales, starting from the launch site with detailed textured and trees around to just a blue dot.

I see all the difficulties of mathematical modelling gravity, N-body problem etc but I could deal with it. Anyway, my question is:

How should I use UE4 to be able to simulate the whole Solar System with possibility of landing on each planet? I mean, are there any best practice for rendering such ridiculously big scales?

2

Many games use low poly visuals for their worlds then have a transition layer to stream in a planetary map.

An example may be the ship starts approaching the planet then obscures the scene with clouds or a whiteout effect etc.

The lower quality version may have accurate textures and such to look good at orbit but the actual flying around and planetary play would be over flat landscape.

An example where No Mans Sky uses the atmosphere texture/material to handle the transition:

I think they load in the planetary bodies when at a certain distance then use the clouds to hide some of the popping transition to the planets.