Virtual space tech

[Valcan]

Game is distributed through STEAM, which i do not use, nor will, so it is not for me.

Perhaps next time, without STEAM.

Yes my one run in with STEAM was so i could play nexus the jupiter incident.

BUT....first off you have to be loged on to play second it sucks.

 

[Gravity_Ray]

The only steam I know is when I am making myself tea. So I'll log on July 7th and see what gives. Obviously for some one that has played most MMORPG's out there, I will probably be under impressed. But I hope they will have a feed back feature where players can help them improve the game.

This is the kind of outreach program they need to accomplish to interest the teens.

 

[EarthlingX]

The only steam I know is when I am making myself tea. So I'll log on July 7th and see what gives. Obviously for some one that has played most MMORPG's out there, I will probably be under impressed. But I hope they will have a feed back feature where players can help them improve the game.

This is the kind of outreach program they need to accomplish to interest the teens.

I agree, but i don't like it, because i see it as advertising over NASA's back and see no need for that. NASA could at least try and start some open source project, which would be more compatible with open policy they have for most of their data. Distribution over proprietary network is not acceptable to me.
Messing with mods and source also goes a long way to keep people interested, if that is the point, and it is much more accessible to schools and students.

NASA, ESA, perhaps other, use Linux, and other Unix flavours, a lot in image processing - it's not as if they would be strangers to the idea, actually many of programs run on Unix/Linux only.

If you write a bit of a report after you try it, i would be interested nevertheless, and you are welcome to use comparison to other MMORPGs, since i guess a lot of people reading this will at least have a hint of what you are talking about

 

[nimbus]

America's Army was always just a recruitment device. There's a few other FPS tactical war games, and as far as I've seen, the flaw with all of them, except maybe the ones more hardcore than what I've tried (e.g. ArmA, etc), is that the players are mostly oblivious to genuine tactical play or even organized goal-oriented gameplay. There's no discipline, never mind chain of command. Anyway that's off topic..

What's wrong with Steam, exactly?
We could have no NASA foray into games. Unless you really can't bear to cope with Steam, I'd give the game a try, so at least you know what it's like. Then you could possibly give NASA that guiding feedback mentioned above and which probably no one will dispute NASA sorely needs. I can think of what at least one formula that would pretty much guarantee success with gamers.

 

[EarthlingX]

What's wrong with Steam, exactly?

What is wrong with a company having access to your credit card info, all your private and public discussions, everything you do, and no your control over what they do with the data ? Unsolicited advertising from a single source ? Installing software on your computer which has direct access to data on your disk, without anyone but a company having insight into communication ?
Nothing, if a concept of Big Brother is not a problem to you.

I'm looking forward to your report.

 

[nimbus]

I'm looking forward to your report.

I guess I'll try it out. I split the rest of my reply to a separate thread, it was too off topic.

One thing NASA definitely needs to do, IMO, is develop or license (prolly the latter) a top of the line graphics (and physics if possible) engine. E.G. Crytek's latest engine. It's a huge failure to do justice to the experience of space, to render it in some crummy quality as Moon Base Alpha seems to be.

 

[EarthlingX]

I'm looking forward to your report.

I guess I'll try it out. I split the rest of my reply to a separate thread, it was too off topic.

One thing NASA definitely needs to do, IMO, is develop or license (prolly the latter) a top of the line graphics (and physics if possible) engine. E.G. Crytek's latest engine. It's a huge failure to do justice to the experience of space, to render it in some crummy quality as Moon Base Alpha seems to be.

Thank you. If there is something else i can do to help, i'm available.

 

[Valcan]

I'm looking forward to your report.

I guess I'll try it out. I split the rest of my reply to a separate thread, it was too off topic.

One thing NASA definitely needs to do, IMO, is develop or license (prolly the latter) a top of the line graphics (and physics if possible) engine. E.G. Crytek's latest engine. It's a huge failure to do justice to the experience of space, to render it in some crummy quality as Moon Base Alpha seems to be.

Thank you. If there is something else i can do to help, i'm available.

Well MOST mmos try to be in between as far as graphics. Crysis is a great engine it is just it requires a high end graphics card and such. To reach a broader audience they ussually go for a middle line.

 

[EarthlingX]

Well MOST mmos try to be in between as far as graphics. Crysis is a great engine it is just it requires a high end graphics card and such. To reach a broader audience they ussually go for a middle line.

Nothing wrong with Crysis engine, and graphical settings are no big deal. I play most of the games on middle or low settings, because i prefer fluid game to eye candy.

It's story what matters, where and how it is set, it's environment, approach to realism, and what can i do in the game, and with the game.

Something along this line :

But, if students could actually see the significance of a misplaced decimal point or a failure to adequately convert measuring systems can result in their really neat model flying for years in space only to smush itself to bits on the surface of another planet... well, perhaps they'll come to understand how those numbers truly translate.

One could imagine seeing high-school students working in groups to come up with the most efficient launch method for an imaginary spaceship, modeling the impact of more efficient thermal insulation on a community's power supply, basic chemistry labs on the PC for "take home" work, etc...

It's just that i think, that if something is financed with tax money, it should be free of proprietary standards, otherwise it's like getting unwanted advertising for which i pay. I can't swallow this, thank you.

I should've dropped this comment in the appropriate thread, which is offered above ..

 

[nimbus]

Crysis is a bad example because it's made to manage a ton of eye candy and physics all at once. I'm saying that the rendering quality for a NASA game with mass appeal has to look better than something from 10 years ago. It only needs to do a few things right: sharp rendering, not blurry textures, proper light management (e.g. real black shadows), for graphics to scale on slower machines..

It shouldn't be that hard. They can license Havok for the physics, and visual rendering can ignore pretty much all atmospheric effects..

 

[EarthlingX]

They don't need to licence anything, that's the point, and they (NASA) can have direct influence on how it works with participation, to the extent they (NASA) think appropriate.

Another virtual reality example, for collection :

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfusf2gAv6Q[/youtube]

 

[nimbus]

I don't get what you're saying. You mean there would be a gfx/physics engine developed by unpaid volunteers that'd have rendering quality on par with e.g. Crytek or id?

 

[EarthlingX]

I don't get what you're saying. You mean there would be a gfx/physics engine developed by unpaid volunteers that'd have rendering quality on par with e.g. Crytek or id?

What is wrong with http://www.ogre3d.org/ ? http://www.opengl.org/ ?

This is an example of a volunteer project : http://www.starwreck.com/ for which i think can compete quite nicely with others made with a lot more humongus budget.

You have heard or Linux, or should i drop a couple of links ? Do you understand what QT library is ?

 

[EarthlingX]

http://www.thespacereview.com : Does a moonbase make for a good video game?

by Jeff Foust

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

A scene from the new game “Moonbase Alpha”, where players have to act fast to save a lunar base. (credit: Virtual Heroes)

As the media landscape fragments, organizations like NASA have increasingly come to realize they need to reach out to “nontraditional” platforms to get their message across. The agency already has an impressive web presence, something that has evolved from a nice-to-have to a need-to-have. NASA has also made a major push in social media, such as Twitter and Facebook, even hosting “tweetups” at shuttle launches and in mission control. NASA is now making its latest effort to reach out to the public—or at least some slice of it—in a nontraditional way: a video game.

Unfortunately, it’s not possible for this reviewer, who had access to a beta test of the game last week, to evaluate the realism of the game itself—which hints at one of the flaws of this approach. The PC-only game (sorry, Mac users, no Moonbase Alpha for you, at least for now) requires at least Windows XP, a 2-GHz processor, and 2 GB of RAM. When testing this on a PC less than two years old that met or exceeded these requirements, the game ran very slowly and soon crashed with no explanation beyond the standard Windows dialog boxes. The flaw might have been in the graphics card: the game requires at least an NVIDIA 7000-series or ATI Radeon X1900 video card (and recommends an NVIDIA 9000+ or ATI Radeon 3600+), while this PC only had an NVIDIA 6000-series.

There is another issue with the game: its effectiveness in inspiring interest in studying science and engineering, as NASA hopes it will. The agency clearly hopes to emulate the success of America’s Army, which was developed primarily as a recruiting tool and has turn out to be very effective. However, the path between playing a combat mission on a PC and actually participating in a combat mission in Afghanistan or Iraq is much shorter and more direct than the link in Moonbase Alpha—after all, while you can play a game that involves a moonbase, you can’t yet go to one.

All this suggests that Moonbase Alpha isn’t a silver bullet for NASA’s efforts at education and inspiration. Instead, it is one tool in an increasingly diverse toolbox of techniques needed to reach out to a public no longer held captive by a limited number of mainstream media outlets. Whether it is an effective—as well as cost effective—tool is another question that NASA will have to answer. Now, how about an asteroid landing game…

 

[Valcan]

http://www.thespacereview.com : Does a moonbase make for a good video game?

by Jeff Foust

Tuesday, July 6, 2010

Unfortunately, it’s not possible for this reviewer, who had access to a beta test of the game last week, to evaluate the realism of the game itself—which hints at one of the flaws of this approach. The PC-only game (sorry, Mac users, no Moonbase Alpha for you, at least for now) requires at least Windows XP, a 2-GHz processor, and 2 GB of RAM. When testing this on a PC less than two years old that met or exceeded these requirements, the game ran very slowly and soon crashed with no explanation beyond the standard Windows dialog boxes. The flaw might have been in the graphics card: the game requires at least an NVIDIA 7000-series or ATI Radeon X1900 video card (and recommends an NVIDIA 9000+ or ATI Radeon 3600+), while this PC only had an NVIDIA 6000-series.

Like i said there is a reason MMO designers aim Broadly in there game specs.

 

[nimbus]

Now, how about an asteroid landing game…

Excitement alert!!

I don't get what you're saying. You mean there would be a gfx/physics engine developed by unpaid volunteers that'd have rendering quality on par with e.g. Crytek or id?

What is wrong with http://www.ogre3d.org/ ? http://www.opengl.org/ ?

This is an example of a volunteer project : http://www.starwreck.com/ for which i think can compete quite nicely with others made with a lot more humongus budget.

You have heard or Linux, or should i drop a couple of links ? Do you understand what QT library is ?

There you go.. I don't know what QT's about exactly (why specifically web-deployable?), but Ogre seems good enough. They only need what.. All the visual effects present on the Moon. Particularily shadows and lighting in vacuum,

but also detail elements you would definitely notice like heiligenschein. Realistic day/night cycles, earthshine and eclipses... All this stuff is just damn cool... and is it in the game right now?

Those screenshots of the game as it is now look terrible. Just terrible. It's never going to appeal to much anyone who isn't already bitten by the space bug already. Never mind if all they're giving you is bean counting tasks.

Another thing they could (ought to IMO) do is have a separate part of the game where you can tour a tentative permanent moon settlement.

Before you get to play it, there is a clear white on black screen plainly saying that this would all be possible (they'd have a quick brainstorm to churn out composition details) only if there were public interest manifested in funding the necessary work to make it happen.

 

[nimbus]

The game runs on a licensed engine (Unreal).

edit-
Just got thru the one "mission" it consists of. I'm a bad reviewer for this because I found it really cool, mostly because I'm too much of an enthusiast. So here's what's wrong with it, or what ought to be improved:

#The stars are fake (no constellations) and look bad. They're just random grey pixels. Astoundingly mediocre...
#Dust is already all over your suit and other manmade objects. It would be cooler and IMO worth it to somehow show for real how a brand new suit gets dusty.
#Dust spray is not realistic at all, just a cosmetic placeholder.
#Physics in general aren't convincing. You don't feel the low grav physics as well as you ought to.
#Graphics in general aren't very good. Just about everything looks minimally polished, like it's bits of off-the-shelf gfx/physics code and most basic textures. There are no genuine vacuum light dynamics. The landscape texture and lighting are mediocrely finished..
#Overall, the physics and graphics are very very far below what the engine allows. Unless there's some reason like them licensing only a low tier version of the engine.
#Controls aren't editable. Minor gripe but there's no reason not to match industry standard of letting players custom fit the game as they wish. It works to make the keyboard and mouse transparent, to help immersion.
#You can't switch to a first person perspective.. It's disappointing.

They ought to make this open source.. See if there's modders to build real quality esthetics and physics, as is done for e.g. Orbiter or Celestia. Let people build larger maps to explore, from probes' telemetry and photo data.

 

[nimbus]

There's a website for the upcoming MMO that follows this little Moonbase Alpha game. The prospective features of that MMO game sound pretty ambitious. There's also a forum for that, including one to make suggestions on.

Their charter:

We the signatories, known as the Astronaut: Moon, Mars and Beyond Team, and as representatives of our companies, being true of character and pure of heart, do hereby declare that we will undertake the great endeavor of creating a virtual vision at the request of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, NASA, in the form of an electronic game, beginning this year, A.D.: 2009.

In the true spirit of the project, we will seek with open minds to fashion an economically sustainable, educational, adventurous and inspiring work that remains committed to NASA values and history, while pursuing a new and groundbreaking vision for potential directions in human exploration beyond the confines of the planet Earth.

We will seek and engage the council of fellow human beings, of peers, scientists, the young, artists, visionaries, explorers, and of educators and facilitators. We will inhabit our creation with working methods of pedagogical science: reflecting, delivering and quantifying learning objectives in fields of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.

We will deliver to the world a new media direction in understanding, engaging, and virtually visiting the bodies of the solar system and beyond, in a scientifically honest and earnest fashion.

..
Reportedly the MMO game will run on Unreal 3. So MBA ought to as well... Makes the crappy graphics even more puzzling.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-m4pe6UAS2M[/youtube]

 

[EarthlingX]

SDC about it :

Game Review: Virtual Lunar Life on NASA's 'Moonbase Alpha'

By Jeremy Hsu
SPACE.com Senior Writer
posted: 06 July 2010
05:06 pm ET



Disaster unfolds rapidly at NASA's fictional moon base in 2025. A meteorite strike has damaged vital solar arrays that keep the life support systems running, oxygen levels are dropping fast for astronauts inside the base, and that darn repair robot just got stuck. What's a space explorer to do?

Welcome to "Moonbase Alpha," NASA's new free game now available for download for PC users on Valve's Steam online gaming service. Virtual explorers must try to restore oxygen by repairing damaged solar arrays, power couplings and life support systems during a 25-minute limit.

The game also allows up to six players to cooperatively race the clock online, and to tackle larger repair maps for a greater challenge. Players can hop aboard a lunar rover to cross the longer distances.

 

[EarthlingX]

NASA is promoting a game, which require a new machine, and you have to pay for it. No free editor, i see no mention of mods, nice, but not for me. Does it run on the phones, btw ?

I like Unreal engine, it's just that i can't afford to buy it, engine, tools, rights and such. It is not for me.

That charter is also nice, but forum is kinda lonely. Didn't take too much time to check it out, though.

Should we start another thread for this game, and then chew it slowly ?

For me, this game not open enough to allow more than superficial involvement. If students could design spacecraft, try it, design their own missions, that would be different. This is not the case here, or am i missing something ?

 

[js117]

NASA is promoting a game, which require a new machine, and you have to pay for it. No free editor, i see no mention of mods, nice, but not for me. Does it run on the phones, btw ?

I like Unreal engine, it's just that i can't afford to buy it, engine, tools, rights and such. It is not for me.

That charter is also nice, but forum is kinda lonely. Didn't take too much time to check it out, though.

Should we start another thread for this game, and then chew it slowly ?

For me, this game not open enough to allow more than superficial involvement. If students could design spacecraft, try it, design their own missions, that would be different. This is not the case here, or am i missing something ?

It has to run on DSL or Broadband modems.

Uses a high end machine.

The real bad part is only 112 people can play at one time.
Said all servers are full.


MOONBASE ALPHA TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS
Minimum System Requirements
• Win XP SP3
• 2.0+ GHZ Single Core Processor
• 2 GB of System RAM
• NVIDIA 7000-series or ATI Radeon X1900 Video Card
• 2 GB of Free Hard Drive Space
• DirectX 9.0c
Recommended System Requirements
• Win XP SP3 / Vista / Windows 7
• 2.4+ GHz Dual Core Processor
• 4+ GB of System RAM
• NVIDIA 9000+ or ATI Radeon 3600+ Video Card
• 5 GB of Free Hard Drive Space
• DirectX 9.0c for XP/Vista, DirectX 10 for Windows 7

 

[EarthlingX]

If i could run my own server, that would not be a problem, if it's only for four people, perhaps couple more .. World could have cell processing distributed among active players in that cell and other free computing resources.

It could still have lower minimum demands, and i would like people like this to be able to give their creative input, to see their images get a bit more alive :

http://www.spaceref.com : NASA Art and Design Contestants Create Multi-Media Visions of Lunar Life

PRESS RELEASE
Date Released: Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Source: NASA Education Office

NASA has selected the winners in the 2010 Life and Work on the Moon Art and Design Contest from more than 200 international student entries.

Participants envisioned an imaginative lunar lifestyle through various artistic media. Entries were accepted in many categories, including music, video, two-dimensional, three-dimensional and digital art. For the first time, poetry and short stories were accepted in a literature category.

Why not use this in a game ?

 

[EarthlingX]

http://www.youtube.com/user/Best0fScience

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PaI6BkDkgvs[/youtube]

TED talks: Our place in the cosmos. Carter Emmart demos a 3D atlas of the universe.

Carter Emmart uses astronomy and computational modeling to create scientifically accurate, three-dimensional tours of our universe.

"My job is to translate the difficulty of science into understandable stories." (Carter Emmart)

For the last 12 years, Carter Emmart has been coordinating the efforts of scientists, artists and programmers to build a complete 3D visualization of our known universe. He demos this stunning tour and explains how it's being shared with facilities around the world.

As the Director of Astrovisualization at the American Museum of Natural History, Carter Emmart directs their groundbreaking space shows and heads up development of an interactive 3D atlas called The Digital Universe. He coordinates scientists, programmers and artists to produce scientifically accurate yet visually stunning and immersive space experiences in the AMNH's Hayden Planetarium. Over the last decade, he has directed four shows: "Passport to the Universe", "The Search for Life: Are we Alone?", "Cosmic Collisions" and "Journey to the Stars".

Emmart's interest in space began early, and at ten he was taking astronomy courses in the old Hayden. As a child born into a family of artists, he naturally combined his love of science with his tendency for visualization. His first work was in architectural modeling, soon moving on to do scientific visualization for NASA and the National Center for Atmospheric Research, before joining the AMNH.

• http://www.ted.com/
• http://www.amnh.org/

http://www.haydenplanetarium.org : Digital Universe Atlas

Discover the Universe. Download our atlas.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=17jymDn0W6U[/youtube]
Download this video for non-commercial use.

Image of the Sun, Oort cloud, with ecliptic grid, showing closest red dwarves Wise 79, 81 binary, compared to Proxima Centauri, after running 'wisesim.bat' :

 

[EarthlingX]

I hope you tried the Digital Universe, it deserves a bit of time to read the manual. It makes me think, how to merge this with Celestia ..

An example of approach, which would be interesting to see in use with other machinery, or as in-game editor :

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GQDQKqO44QI[/youtube]

RoboThespian demonstrates how his movement routines can be created using Blender the open source 3D animation application.
The virtual robot drives the movements of the real robot hardware.

http://www.robothespian.com/

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLjQZsypGv0[/youtube]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0co1m7RNuUg[/youtube]

http://www.spaceref.com : NASA KSC Solicitation: LIFE-LIKE ROBOT

STATUS REPORT
Date Released: Monday, July 12, 2010

Source: Kennedy Space Center

NASA/KSC has a requirement for a 5'9" Life-Like Robot, brand-name Engineered Arts Limited, RoboThespian, or equal. The solicitation (14 pages) is attached and includes: terms and conditions of order, salient characteristics for life-like robot, and questions/answers to inquiries about the Request for Information (RFI) that was previously posted.

 

[EarthlingX]

About that art contest :

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NsGpK-sdKSY[/youtube]



artcontest.cet.edu : 2010 Life and Work on the Moon Art Contest Winners

Overall Winner

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dl8Tlv553s[/youtube]

Created by Dalton Mills

RESULTS:
http://www6.cet.edu/copper/2010_winne...

Special thanks to:
-My Family
-Donovan Polanowski
-Joseph Parker
-Mrs. Lisa Ulik

-Music: "Frost Waltz" by Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)

Artist Statement: I've always been curious about human space exploration, I enjoy everything about space: the math, the physics, the beauty, and the wonder. Reading the latest news about astrophysics and new discoveries is very compelling for me. Ive always been inventive, and being able to imagine and create what life and work could be like on the Moon was very fun. Watching footage from the Apollo missions was also very inspiring. I am very excited for the future of space exploration, and I cannot wait to see what will unfold in my lifetime.

..

Digital, Tashio Martinez, Project Ares, Poster
Architecture, University of Illinois, Urbana

..

Digital, Nicholas Milef, A Settlement on the Moon
West Springfield High School
Springfield, Virginia

..

3D, Nicholas Lambe, Engineering a New Vision in Space
Putnam Westchester BOCES
Yorktown Heights, New York

..

Darla Barolini, Moon Colony
Painting
Hastings High School
Hastings on the Hudson, New York

..

Rinachi Garg, Life on the Moon, Painting
Delhi College of Engineering, India

..

Marcin Kitala, Moon Base 0026, Digital Design
Politechnika Krakowska, Poland

There are also other formats.