Science!: A Look at Moonbase Alpha

[megalomania]

The whole issue with less and less people wanting to go into careers featuring the skills they are referring to as "STEM" related is a debatable one. I've oftentimes criticized a lot of the studies that have talked about Americans and our poor academic performance, especially competitively. Most such studies are usually slanted on a number of levels.

While hardly a case study, at my current university (The University of Texas), the college of Natural Sciences (which includes biology, chemistry, physics, mathematics, computer science and...fashion design) is the largest on the campus, beating out even the College of Business. The College of Engineering on the other hand is one of the smallest.

*Rest Snippitied*

The school of Fashion Design is in your faculty of Natural Sciences?!

What The Fuck is up with that?

Also that will mean that the fashion designers from your Uni graduate with a Batchelor of Science / Master of Science degree!

Its not that surprising that the Natural Sciences is one of the larger schools - Biology and Mathematics are usually very big courses taking a lot of undergrads each year because they don't need much in the way of facilities

Chemistry, Physics and Engineering need a lot more lab and workshop space!

EDIT - Not quite sure what happened with the quotation...

 

[NLS]

Is that game even possible to complete by yourself?

I think I tried, but I ran out of oxygen and time.

 

[sketchesofpayne]

Gonna download it right now. My friends and I are all about real-life space exploration.

 

[CaptainCrunch]

Don't forget about Orbiter [http://orbit.medphys.ucl.ac.uk/home.php] - it's a space flight simulator that's equally as free and realistic as Moonbase Alpha! They just released a 2010 update (it's been around since 2001) that adds even more realism and craziness, and you can fly pretty much anywhere in the solar system.

For serious space nerds and flight sim dorks only, because it's REALLY hard even with a joystick.

 

[Grahav]

I wonder if educative games will become a strong genre.It would be awesome, but ed games must be awesome to achieve that.

 

[Cannorn]

"The majority of the complex equipment developed by NASA requires specific tools in order to repair and demands a significant amount of time, manual dexterity, and technological knowledge. This level of realism would not only create an unrealistic learning curve to the game, but would also lead to player frustration and confusion."

Oh god, the frustration that would come from that kind of realism. It would make the game pretty much impossible.

Oddly I would leap at a chance to play one that simulated that level of realism as long as it trains/teaches you through it, then again I'm the sort of saddo that gets his joy joy factor out of stuff like that =p

 

[MMMowman]

The text to speech is abused way too much in this game. Not second will go by without the words "John MADDEN!" being said

 

[RevRaptor]

Space: 1999 the game?
Aww not about the tv series, really had my hopes up there. The Internet is a cruel and harsh place.
Man wouldn't a Space 1999 be awesome.