Kerbal Space Program

[Rome Existed]

It's a fun game and quite hard. Also funny when things go wrong and your astronauts die.

[Shagz]

I bought this several months ago on a whim. It's pretty fun. One might look at the cutesy Kerbals and think this is a kid's game, but it's not; it's actually pretty difficult, and kind of realistic, in a way.

[Nostalgia]

This looks awesome.

But I have severe bandwidth restrictions so indie games are out of bounds for me... In fact, so are most non-indie games these days...

[Nostalgia]

So...

I actually got the game a few weeks ago (downloaded it at work). It's so fun, and yes - very hard. Finally got to the Mun though.

[Munchies]

Wouldn't mind getting it but still to pricey at the moment for an indie game. Will wait till it's on steam sale.

[Nostalgia]

I'm surprised more RatSkepters don't play this game. It's so much fun, and sciency to boot.

Got 3 Kerbals stranded on Mars (or Duna). Their capsule is the only surviving part of a failed landing, and it's hatch is obstructed. Currently in the process of designing my first rover to roll the capsule so they can get out. Then I have to send another Viper Mk 2 on autopilot to go and pick them up. I'm finding it hard to get zero horizontal speed, so I'm not very good at landings yet.

[Shagz]

I just played this for a couple of hours last night, for the first time playing in many months. Messed around with trying to design a space shuttle-like orbiter. Finally got one into orbit, but it crashed upon landing.

I like the new atmospheric reentry effect. Also, I approve of how much more stable rockets are now; before, you had to put shitloads of struts all over the place to keep it from wobbling like crazy.

[Nostalgia]

My first space station. Launched in 3 separate parts and constructed in orbit.

[UndeadDinosaur]

[quote="MacIver";p="1863248"]My first space station. Launched in 3 separate parts and constructed in orbit.[/quote]

So far my achievements include...

• establishing eccentric low-Kerbin orbits;
• numerous launch pad catastrophes;
• accidentally performing an EVA during reentry;
• accelerating a capsule containing a crew of 3 to escape velocity, then running out of fuel.

It's one of my favorite games right now.

[LucidFlight]

[quote="MacIver";p="1800226"]I'm surprised more RatSkepters don't play this game. It's so much fun, and sciency to boot.

Got 3 Kerbals stranded on Mars (or Duna). Their capsule is the only surviving part of a failed landing, and it's hatch is obstructed. Currently in the process of designing my first rover to roll the capsule so they can get out. Then I have to send another Viper Mk 2 on autopilot to go and pick them up. I'm finding it hard to get zero horizontal speed, so I'm not very good at landings yet. [/quote]

After playing the demo, which I rather enjoyed, I tried to buy it on Steam during their recent special offer — something around US$19 instead of the usual US$27? Anyway, Steam's credit card processing gave me some crap about being in a different country. I tried buying it by logging in via a web browser and changing the country code, but still no joy. I might just have to shell out the full $27 and buy it on the Kerbal site, if I can. But, wow, it shouldn't be this difficult to pay for a game. I want to pay for this game! Just let me buy it! Ugh!

/rant

ETA

All right, I just purchased a copy through the Kerbal site directly. Yippee!

[Shagz]

Because I'm kinda bored, and also painfully dorky, how about we take a Trip to the Mun... just for the hell of it.

Liftoff!

We're keeping it pretty simple; it's just a small lander on a three-stage system consisting of four engines around a central frame for extra stability.

Jeb quips that it rides smoother than his daddy's Kerbillac:


Onto the second stage:


Third stage. Jeb looks happy to reach orbit without blowing up, for once:


Setting a maneuver node to rendezvous with the Mun:


Third stage is spent escaping Kerbin's gravity; now we have only a lander to get there and back:


Landing is not too hard once you realize that you just keep your engines aligned towards the direction you're moving, and don't come in too fast:


We're landing on the dark side; luckily, we brought landing lights:


Uh oh, something is off. We're horizontal, but the light on the starboard side looks different than the port side:


It seems we landed on the side of a massive crater we couldn't see in the darkness. Luckily, the lander stays upright:


Jeb taking in a sunrise on the Mun:


We liftoff and head home without a hitch:


Nine hours later:


Upon reaching Kerbin's atmosphere, we separate the pod from lander:


Hopefully, the lander doesn't land on someone's house:


Parachute deployed. Capsule lands. Mission accomplished.


Thanks for reading.

[UndeadDinosaur]

[quote="Shagz";p="1870186"]Because I'm kinda bored, and also painfully dorky, how about we take a Trip to the Mun... just for the hell of it.
[/quote]

Terrific work (by which I mean "play").

[Nostalgia]

So I've built a MASSIVE rover called The Rhino. But I'm having a hell of a lot of trouble attaching it to a rocket. I just don't have a decoupler strong enough to take its weight. I've gone back to the drawing board and I think I'm going to build a huge skycrane for it instead.

[Beatsong]

My 13-year-old son is obsessed with this at the moment. It's pretty much ousted Minecraft as his game of choice - and that's saying something. He's an incorrigible science geek and wants to be a physicist when he grows up, so it looks like a pretty good way to practice some of the thinking involved, and certainly fires his imagination.

[Shagz]

Sounds like you have a bright kid with a great future ahead of him.

[Nostalgia]

[quote="Beatsong";p="1870880"]My 13-year-old son is obsessed with this at the moment. It's pretty much ousted Minecraft as his game of choice - and that's saying something. He's an incorrigible science geek and wants to be a physicist when he grows up, so it looks like a pretty good way to practice some of the thinking involved, and certainly fires his imagination.[/quote]

When it comes down to it that's all KSP is - a physics sandbox. And it's gained a huge following in the scientific community. Your boy'll probably know of this already but if he doesn't direct him to Scott Manley's Youtube page. He's an astrophysicist who's done lots of KSP tutorials. He's saved many a Kerbal's life in my game.

[JoeB]

Scott Manley's videos are great! He always has some interesting spaceflight anecdote to add as well

Currently I installed the real size earth mod. Getting up to 7.8km/s orbital velocity is hard!

[Nostalgia]

The Rhino Mk 2's maiden voyage.



A large rover is something I've been trying to build for months. Finally settled on this design using a part from a space station parts kit as the main body. Finding a way to get it into space is a pain in the arse. After trying several ways including a slow assent with small engines and a disastrous attempt to get it into orbit on top of a spaceplane I finally settled on seven fusion engines.





After getting into a vaguely circular orbit a short burst of the engines and I'm en route to the Mun.





Once under the Mun's influence another short burst to reduce my velocity and then time to separate the Rhino from the rocket. Unfortunately I forgot to take screenshots because things got a little tense. I made sure to get the rover's centers of thrust and mass aligned - thus the ugly yellow thing on the end - but it still had the handling of an actual rhino. After five minutes of fierce key hitting I got my self righted and the horizontal velocity down to a few meters per second.







This is a one way trip for the Rhino. I'll need to send one of my maned landers to come and pick up Jebediah.

[Shagz]

Nice screenshots.
I'm amazed you were able to keep that thing stable during liftoff. Surely the center of mass is off to one side.

[LucidFlight]

After a couple of days of mucking around with several designs, I finally got a space plane into a stable orbit. It's single stage. However, I use action groups to toggle power for two normal jets, two turbo jets, and one LV-T45 engine.






Next challenge: see if I can land one of these things.