MoonBase, a standalone module from the greater game which will serve as a test bed for many of the proposed scenarios in the MMOG, will be launched as a free download via Steam in January, and although Heneghan refuses to give too much away about its content, Laughlin is enthusiastic. “The team has done impressive work with NASA’s proposed lunar architecture to create an engaging scenario on the Moon, and I am hoping we can be testing elements of the full MMOG in 2010.”



The MMOG itself promises mission-based learning with players tackling all the problems that harsh space environments and complex technology can bring. These scenarios will be based on real science and encourage cooperation and team efficiency much like most fantasy-based MMOGs do, but there will also be an option to indulge in individual and solitary missions for the more independently-minded space explorers. Gamers will choose a profession and complete missions in their chosen capacity, establishing bases and outposts, travelling to the farthest reaches of the solar system, averting disasters and solving colony crises.

The base mechanics are built on the FPS, but add storytelling elements and simulation in what Heneghan says amounts to a new genre: the firstperson exploration game. The idea is to keep the excitement of a FPS while exercising your mental agility to the full, not just your trigger fingers. “The player controls the level of action they engage because all content is location based as opposed to time based, so if you are ready for some action all you need to do is explore a new geographical region and within a few seconds something will happen,” explains Heneghan. In other words, it’ll be the environments that will generate the external forces which create the basic conflicts for gameplay.

And then there’s the social aspect. Laughlin sees the game as eventually being able to facilitate problem-solving on a massive scale: “Instead of having two or three scientists working on a problem in an isolated location, we’ll have tens of thousands of interested people trying to solve it, and I think we’ll get much better, more creative and faster solutions that way”. For Heneghan, meanwhile, it’s a great framework which can support user-generated content. Although the initial release will not feature user-generated content, he says, there are plans to include it in later versions.



As for NASA, can this bold gaming vision inspire a new generation with the hard realities and dazzling possibilities of space? Can it help the aging institution recapture the sense of excitement that surrounded the Moon landings, when every child wanted to grow up to be an astronaut?

“We believe so, yes,” maintains Shariff. “Many of us have a display in our local planetariums called Touch The Universe, and if we are successful, that is exactly what the NASA MMOG will let kids – and us big kids – do. The really profound offspring of Astronaut: Moon, Mars and Beyond, is likely to be insight we do not have an inkling about yet. Some of the concepts we are looking at are amazing - some of the places we might go, and the real technology that will be needed - I can tell you honestly, looking at these things, this project is already jaw-dropping, and every day more so.”