Political Commentary Disguised as a Video Game Review

In PM's defense, nowhere on the site is the article labelled as a "review". I can't speak as a regular reader of PM as to how one might take it, but I took it for what it was—an article that examines Moonbase Alpha's larger place in space exploration today, and juxtaposes the game experience against the reality of the current state of the field. The comparison which is inevitable given that the explicit purpose of Moonbase Alpha is a recruiting tool for said field. You can argue with its take, but I don't think PM is exploiting the "disguise" of a game review. Furthermore, political commentary is completely warranted in any discussion of a game when the game itself is inherently political.

While I haven't tried the game myself, my oldest son (not quite a teenager) has enjoyed it. Glancing over his shoulder, I saw that the graphics were pretty good.

The only "political" irony my son noted was the obvious one: the timing of the game's release compared to the new policy's explicit removal of a lunar base as being the centerline of NASA's HSF focus.

Agreed, it's not much of a review.

But, the author is correct on one point. The game is too boring to play.

The game is not a bad start but certainly in its present form is not going to hold anyone's attention (of any age) for long.

The political commentary seems to be seriously prevalent in the public forums because the overall exploration situation is by no means settled and a lot of people want to have a voice in its future direction. The game just serves to point out the issues.

Bill Nye, Science Guy -isnt he the Space Society President too- has an interesting and apparently heartfelt opinion: http://www.spacenews.com/commentaries/100802-never-imagined.html

The game does point out a basic problem and that is that it demonstrates little new technology and few new concepts. It is Apollo on steroids; nothing more. It fully represents the engineering solution that Constellation was and offers little beyond this. If Mr. Augustine and his panel are correct, and I for one have no reason to doubt them, then the US cannot afford the Griffin plan and it would not have been implemented on anything like a reasonable and politically viable schedule.

For those who want new technologies, new investments, new kinds of missions, a variation of Obama's plan makes much more sense and could be worked on a much more realistic schedule and budget.

Most surprising in all of this is that NASA and its management seem to have no opinions. They do not seem to be in the forefront of the discussion. But then, even when Constellation was alive, the same leaders failed to define good rationale or a meaningful plan. I think the bureaucracy that has become NASA has drummed individual thinking out of its people; certainly it has been drummed out of its present day management.

In another post about Wayne Hale's leaving, a poster points out that likely he was forced out of his job by his having taken a position on safety and flight worthiness. Similarly, a few years earlier, John Muratore took a position on Shuttle safety and was immediately forced out. These were two very competent and experienced people. You have to wonder about the discussions between people like Griffin and Gerstenmaier in forcing individuals out, both of whom probably had far more experience and were probably much deeper thinkers then either the Administrator or his Associate.

Is this the only way NASA has to deal with dissent? "You're fired".

In the Constellation situation, NASA should, on behalf of the nation, be leading and resolving the exploration debate. It did not happen prior to Bolden. It still is not happening.

It is a leadership issue.

It's commentary in the sense that it's saying, "Like NASA, this game doesn't know where it's going", which I think is a great way to both comment on the game, and on NASA as well.

There are FAR more attractive game concepts that could be created that actually are built with a strong business case in mind that creates continued revenue and enables growth over time. This game isn't one of them. You can see the obvious parallel between that view and the view of Constellation et al being a giant waste.

The only place the comparison breaks down is that in this case, the game was created by a commercial entity who could be doing things a lot more interesting and daring than just blindly go where many have gone before.

I wish Bill Nye would stop his condescending (and quite annoying) 'The Science Guy' nonsense. There are many other Scientists and Ph.D's in the U.S. and around the World whose opinions are just as good as his.

This month I've renewed all my subscriptions except that of "The Planetary Society". Alas as of late it's become more of a Ego Advocacy group than the Space Advocacy group I had joined back in 1989. Fine, Bill Nye as President of TPS can do what he wants ... but next year he'll probably have to do it without my membership dues.

Actually, if you look at the title bar at the top of the page, it reads "NASA Moonbase Alpha Video Game Review - NASA Game Review" which is also the text you get when you email or copy the link (into Facebook and other places) or bookmark the page.