Space
explorers, ready your virtual engines — three game developers have signed on to
create NASA's massively multiplayer online video game (MMO), called
"Astronaut: Moon, Mars & Beyond."
NASA
plans to let Virtual Heroes, Project Whitecard and Information in Place take
the lead in creating a game that
emphasizes fun first and foremost. The game community sent in 800 pages
worth of responses to NASA's initial outreach on developing an MMO.
"The
single biggest point that was pushed forward by the game community was that you
have to let game design lead the development," said Daniel Laughlin,
project manager for NASA Learning Technologies at the agency's Goddard Earth
Science and Technology Center in Maryland. "It's easy to build a game
that's no fun. It's hard to build a game that's successful and fun."
A
playable demo of the game is slated for release before the end of the year,
based on a tech demo that uses Epic's Unreal Engine 3. Players will get to roam
around in a multiplayer experience focused on moon base operations, although
real astronauts on
the International Space Station may have to hold off until they return to
Earth.
"We've had to create a
new genre of gameplay, creating what we call first person exploration,"
said Jerry Heneghan, founder and CEO of Virtual Heroes. He noted that the full
game will emphasize player cooperation to master both harsh
space environments and complex machinery. Players would take on astronaut
roles such as roboticist, rather than becoming a grenadier or sniper in a more
combat-oriented game.
Eventually
players may get the chance to provide their own user-created content, ranging
from scouting out new paths for space exploration to creating and flying their
own ships. But unlike other space-themed MMOs such as EVE Online or Star Trek
Online, such ships probably won't be toting laser weaponry.
The
game developers also hope to have game missions connected with what Heneghan
termed the "near-future
reality" of space exploration. NASA has already created many concepts
of future space tech that the developers plan to incorporate into the game,
which has the added advantage of saving on game development costs.
"This
model has been proven with America's Army," Heneghan told SPACE.com,
pointing to how Virtual Heroes has already worked with the U.S. Department of
Defense in developing the Army's free and popular online game. "The
difference here is that we're talking about first person exploration, so it's
all about exploring the environment, expanding and building things rather than
shooting other players."
Each
game developer has already amassed considerable experience working with one
another on space-related games. Virtual Heroes and Project Whitecard are
finishing up a different project for the Canadian Space Agency, while Virtual
Heroes is also working with Information in Place on a "Virtual
Astronaut" project funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation.
Laughlin
said that he was pleased to see development of the game moving quickly, at
least for NASA. The MMO project first started in 2004, and NASA selected the
three developers just after the New Year.
"I'm
working with NASA and video games at the same," Laughlin said. "It's
the coolest job in the world."
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