astronaut-moon-mars-and-beyond posts

Last February Big Download broke the news that the National Aeronautics and Space Administration was funding the development of an educational MMO project called Astronaut: Moon, Mars and Beyond. While that game isn't due to be completed for some time NASA is apparently whipping up a mini-demo based on the game that will be released soon.

Titled Moonbase Alpha (we wonder if there are some fans of the Space: 1999 TV series at NASA) the demo will be released via Steam "just before or after January 2010." There is little info on what the demo will be all about but from this YouTube video we can guess that Moonbase Alpha will have the player controlling a spacesuit-wearing astronaut on the surface of Earth's moon doing various tasks.

[Via Massively]

By John Gaudiosi

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, North Carolina – Epic Games has seen an influx recently in the number of massively multiplayer online (MMO) games in development that utilize its Unreal Engine 3 technology – an engine that was not originally designed for MMO games.

The latest entry in this Unreal MMO games category is the new subscription-based NASA MMO game, "Astronaut: Moon, Mars and Beyond." This game, which will ship next year, joins other Unreal Engine 3-driven MMO games like RealTime Worlds APB, NHN USA's Huxley, Acony Games' Parabellum and Sony Online Entertainment's The Agency and DC Universe Online.

"We're using Unreal Engine 3 for the new NASA MMO game, which will allow us to focus on gameplay and realism and not worry about things like multi-threaded rendering problems or issues with rigid body physics or network programming," said Jerry Heneghan, founder and CEO of Virtual Heroes.

"Unreal Engine 3 is simply one of the best, state-of-the art game engines available," said Daniel Laughlin, Ph.D., project manager for the game at NASA Learning Technologies.

It was Virtual Heroes work on another Unreal Engine 3 game, America's Army, that opened the door for Astronaut: Moon, Mars and Beyond.