I think I found the inspiration for Stellaris' Dyson Sphere design...

[BlackUmbrellas]

EDIT: Having some technical difficulties.

For comparison, the similarly-proportioned and angular Dyson Sphere from the upcoming Utopia expansion:

To be clear, I'm not suggesting Paradox is "ripping off" anybody- just saying that the similar designs (in contrast to just about every other "Dyson Sphere" I've seen, which are properly spherical) seems too much to be coincidence and that whatever the "2005 The Enterprise Mission" was, it likely served as inspiration for the art team in this area.

 

[Vanhal]

Or maybe just:

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

Or maybe just:

It's a tad more specific of a resemblance, don't you think?

 

[Talanic]

It's a geodesic dome. They're very strong for their weight and allow for the most even distribution of mirror panels around the star.

I used to work near a similar structure, although it was built in that form more because it looked cool than for any real architectural purpose. You may recognize it:

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

It's a geodesic dome. They're very strong for their weight and allow for the most even distribution of mirror panels around the star.

I used to work near a similar structure, although it was built in that form more because it looked cool than for any real architectural purpose. You may recognize it:

If the Spheres in Stellaris were actually, you know, round, I might accept it as just a coincidental use of a similar design principle.

The fact that both that piece of art and the Stellaris Sphere are very angular and clearly geometric, plus that they both feature a lot of lights on the "panels" themselves, indicate to me that the Stellaris one was probably inspired by whatever that picture came from. I've not seen similarly "crude" geodesic shapes elsewhere in a similar context before.

That isn't a bad thing- everyone gets inspiration from somewhere. I just thought it was neat; I'm not accusing Paradox of "stealing their design" or something like that.

 

[General Retreat]

http://www.enterprisemission.com/moon5.htm

The picture seems to come from an absolutely mental blog from 2005 that's full of gibberish. That picture demonstrates what the author thinks one of Saturn's moons (Iapetus?) actually looks like. It's not a Dyson sphere, although he does talk about them specifically just below.

I doubt Paradox are fans.

 

[BlackUmbrellas]

http://www.enterprisemission.com/moon5.htm

The picture seems to come from an absolutely mental blog from 2005 that's full of gibberish. That picture demonstrates what the author thinks one of Saturn's moons (Iapetus?) actually looks like. It's not a Dyson sphere, although he does talk about them specifically just below.

I doubt Paradox are fans.

I'm not sure why the location of the image would influence whether or not some artist at Paradox saw it and went "Oh, neat" and used it for reference material. The similarity is kind of uncanny. Inspiration can come from weird places. I found the thing on a totally different (if equally crackpot) website during a completely unrelated google search.