Demo For NASA MMO Coming In January

News of the upcoming NASA MMO, Astronaut: Moon, Mars, and Beyond, has been scarce since its announcement in 2008, but NASA recently revealed that a "mini demo game" is coming in January that will show off some of what they've completed so far. "Moon Base Alpha utilizes actual NASA Constellation program design details developed by NASA for mankind’s return to the Moon in 2020. Timelines in the much anticipated Astronaut: Moon, Mars and Beyond MMO will be set even farther in the exciting future (2035+), but the ability to explore our own near-future moon missions is also planned for in the forthcoming game facilitated by the NASA Learning Technologies and Innovative Partnerships Programs." They're provided a slideshow and a brief video, and one of the developers spoke about the game with Edge last month.

Hooray! Now we can CrowdSource Asteroid mitigation

[starglider29a]

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1485682&cid=30513270&art_pos=6 [slashdot.org]

I wish that someone would make a game of this... where you need to send up a vehicle, bump and asteroid and watch the change. Give us all a chance to crowd source the various "solutions". Learn just how friggin tricky this would be, how long it would take, how little effect we can have. All of this talk about "capturing this asteroid" on this thread alone is sad. The amount of energy in an asteroid's kinetics is astounding. This topic needs a dose of realism.

Make it so!

Re:Hooray! Now you can Karmawhore!

[Anonymous Coward]

The karma whore always cuts+pastes someone else's text with little or no contribution of his own. Sorta like what niggers do when they use the white man's technology (like TV) to talk about how much they hate the white man.

Ha

[elrous0]

If thirty years of bullshit promises about moonbases and men on Mars are any indication, this game will never actually materialize.

Change

[gearmonger]

Now this is the America I've come to expect: NASA is starting to make games about going into space instead of actually going into space. I'm sure some self-proclaimed 'Gen-Y expert" marketer somewhere is nodding and chuckling to himself while stroking a white cat nestled in his lap.

Will it be like Spore?

[s_p_oneil]

After doing SimEarth, Maxis kicked around the idea of a SimMars. NASA was really excited about helping them (and helping build up PR on the space program), but Maxis killed the idea because they couldn't find a way to make a game about Mars fun without making it 100% fantasy. It's like trying to make a math game fun.

Cut NASA's PR budget

[Animats]

NASA has far too large a PR operation if they're doing this. If they're doing a full-scale game for PR, their PR budget is too big.

The promotional end of NASA may now be the most effective part of the organization.

Re:non-windows slideshow

[psydeshow]

Or just a series of JPEGs for crying out loud.

It's a SLIDESHOW.

Re:Will it be like Spore?

[Aladrin]

Depends on your definition of fun. Based on watching today's MMO player, I think I could make an accurate moonbase simulation where you spend 4 hours at a time sitting in front of a panel and watching the CO2 filter stats and occasionally pushing a button to equalize it. Add in the necessity to walk back and forth to the bunk and you've got a game.

But seriously, give them some 'real' tasks like monitoring experiments and such and I think there's plenty of people who would play it, at least for a while.

Re:Change

[Anonymous Coward]

Or it could enthrall millions of young minds and create a Golden Age of space exploration in the next few decades. I'd gamble a few million of my budget on that if I were NASA.