Honeslty, sorry to say but i use gimp on linux and from there i can generate normalmap, with imagick i can generate animated textures.
On windows you can get normalmap with a photoshop plugin , and animated textures .....i don t know (you need a convert toolfrom  png or whatever to mng)

hello argh
On windows
Try exporting to .obj , then import  into milkshape , then it has an exporter for cal3d. It worled for me, but like 1 year ago.
Else, i think max can do that, but i am not sure, ask Arianna  or planeshift team how they do exactly, they use max.

As far as i know red faction only have a predefined list ofojects you can destroy with corresponding premade broken parts and stuff, so technologicaly there s nothing impossible there for CS.

i guess only darek  knows , you can find himon the irc sometimes

We already discussed that with  somone, some month ago, one thing which is possible at this moment would be to use either some kind of docking station, or make the ship go throught nimbles before landing.
It s notpossible to have a smooth transition from space level to a city/human level  if you have 10000 planet completely modelised, maybe that s possible If it s 100% dynamicaly genrated content, but it s not even sure and anyway would require l33t coding skills.
It s not even a problem of number of poly displayed at time on screen, but a problem of amount of memory needed to store all the mesh datas, even if you don t  display allof themon the screen, that's the "huge world problem" it require dynamic loading/unloading of data wich is currently not possible.