Space Odyssey, the game announced by Neil Degrasse Tyson and a few key-developers at E3 this year, has now launched on Kickstarter, with the creators asking for a rather specific (pi) total of $314,159 to achieve their goal. At the time of writing some 1,700 backers have contributed nearly $100,000 towards that goal, so it seems likely to meet it. But what is Space Odyssey all about?
The debut trailer for the game seems rather vague and somewhat amateurish in execution, though it could be that that was the sort of retro-style that it was going for. The game itself is said to be part adventure, part exploration, part educational tool, letting players build their own solar systems, space stations and space ships in a physics driven universe.
The developers want the community to be involved in the development process and plan to use the Kickstarter funds to implement changes and ideas created by fans during the making of the game. Any mods they create, any popular ideas or concerns they might have, will be implemented into the final game.
While there will be many exciting ways to explore the in-game universe, players will have all-star science advisors with them on their way, giving them an insight into the inky blackness around them. The game will feature the voice and likeness of Neil Degrasse Tyson himself, as well as astronomer Amy Mainzer, astrophysicist Charles Liu, theoretical cosmologist Janna Levin and more.
The game seems ambitious, offering personal, space-faring missions and larger creation tools that see you build a solar system, planets and evolve life on them by carefully managing resources and atmospheric components. It will be interesting to see how well the game is executed, though it's good to see the developers will be factoring in a lot of community feedback along the way.
Space Odyssey is slated for a December 2018 release.
