Kerbal Space Program

[Tupin]

I've always wanted a space simulator, but other ones seemed to either be completely overwhelming or unrealistic. I found out about KSP, and it's exactly what I wanted.

You design spacecraft, launch them, and try to keep them in orbit. It's sort of a sim, but very accessible to newcomers. Once you figure out the calculations to stay in orbit, of course. It's open, you could go to the Mun by transferring orbits, or you could brute force it and try to intercept it.

There are a bunch of mods too, anyone here play it?

[Tupin]

http://hackaday.com/2012/05/14/mapping-the-surface-of-a-video-game-moon/

This is what first brought it to my attention, pretty cool.

[Tupin]

Big bump, but it finally updated to 0.16. Now you can do EVAs.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B2WwO6e7peE

None of the EVAs are tethered, so orbital EVAs have to be done with MMU-type things, at least in the stock game. Oh, and they made it so some parts are designed for the one-person capsule and others for the three-person.

[Nebagram]

I've heard a lot about this game, mainly through the YouTube user kurtjmac, and I'm definitely going to look deeper into it once my pc gets back from the shop.

Even if my engineering skills are at the Jeremy clarkson level.

[Tupin]

I've heard a lot about this game, mainly through the YouTube user kurtjmac, and I'm definitely going to look deeper into it once my pc gets back from the shop.

Even if my engineering skills are at the Jeremy clarkson level.
There's an autopilot program that makes things like getting into a stable orbit and transfer orbits much easier. Especially when you want to go to the second moon, Minmus.

[Tupin]

Well, it's been a while since I updated this thread. KSP has changed so much in the mean time it's a whole different experience. A bunch of new parts, planets, and game mechanics, and still more on the way.

Anyone else check out what it's become since I made this thread?

[Drixxel]

An engineering friend of mine is rather into this and I played a bit of it fairly recently. Without having seen the state of it mid-2012 when you made the thread, I don't have anything to compare the current build to, but it's definitely a cool game. I find craft construction a little awkward and imprecise, but it's still a lot of fun tinkering around with all the different parts. There's a real sense of satisfaction to a successful launch, and even disastrous failures are entertaining.

[Tupin]

Like I said, since I updated this thread last, the game has changed immensely. When I first posted this, there were two moons to go to, both orbiting the home planet.

They've essentially created Kerbalized analogs for the whole Solar System. Docking finally has made an authentic Apollo mission possible, and they actually made it possible for you to send an unmanned probe into space.

Now, if they could just give EVAs a purpose...