Implementation to the real world
Today, I've tried implementing the new terrain engine from our testbed project to the real thing. It was a relatively painless, but quite a long haul. The engine itself is like 90-95% done, some tweaking needs to be done but the functionality is there.
I'm going to show a picture that's VERY much work in progress. The shadows aren't being blurred at all, and the background isn't supposed to be visible.
http://i.imgur.com/dsunBEy.png
To compare to the old planet system, with the square planets, it took me around 30 seconds to dig through the planet to the other side, maybe 30 - 40 blocks. I did the same test with this new system, and it took me just above 2 minutes, and I gathered 328 blocks. There's a bit of a size comparison.