Frontier First Encounters D3D

FFED3D is an adaptation of the original FFE game. As the screenshots below show, the FFE engine has been completely overhauled and produces much-improved graphics; the planets and sky/space are more detailed and most of the ships and buildings have been updated.
The definitive version is FFED3D-AJ, which was being worked on by Andy Jones aka AndyJ right up to his death in July 2022, at the age of just 50.
RIP Andy and thank you for making my all-time favourite game so much better.

The FFED3D story began back in 2006, when a Russian programmer named DreamZzz adapted First Encounters to run under the Microsoft Direct 3D graphics API. This opened up endless possibilities to enhance the graphics of the game, by allowing new models for the ships, planets, stars and buildings to be imported. Over the next few years, many coders brought their designs to the table, bringing new levels of detail to the game.

When DreamZzz stepped away from the project, two programmers took on the task of further improving FFED3D - Ittiz and AndyJ. Both produced much improved versions, with virtually all the legacy bugs from the original FFE eliminated, but AndyJ continued to offer new builds of the game for a long time after.

glFFE

glFFE was the first version of FFE to offer increased graphics resolution, and was based on JJFFE by John Jordan. It used the OpenGL graphics API and was a major step forward for FFE. It has largely been eclipsed by FFED3D but information and downloads are available here for those interested.