There are two distinct interfaces:
The menu driven ‘galaxy’ map that acts as a main interface this could be made on an overlay layer of the map which will also be the same renderer for below.
A real-time 3d game engine that will handle conflict resolution, with the space-battles part of it similar to Homeworld, also the ground and space battles would use the same engine if possible and the ground battles would be similar to the Total War game series.
