Space exploration is important to modern society, and will be very important in the future. Kerbal Space Program, a space exploration simulator by Take-Two Interactive, can prepare gamers for the experience of being in space.

Some people might imagine that Kerbal Space Station is realistic, but it’s actually not, although it’s not all sci-fi and futuristic, like some games. In the game, players make a ship and they can upgrade its parts. A player custom-designs his ship, launches it, and then completes missions. The characters in the game are called Kerbals and, let’s just say they aren’t the sharpest tools in the shed, yet somehow they build complex machines to launch into space.

There are three game modes: 1) Sandbox mode, where a player builds whatever he or she wants and completes missions that the player develops; 2) Science mode, where the parts players can use are limited, and career which was mentioned at the beginning; and 3) Physics Engine mode. This game is unrealistic. It uses Newtonian dynamics for the orbital physics, meaning if a player places a thruster diagonally to the bottom left, it will move to the top right, but a bit further when the player is close to a planet. That is pretty realistic, but when in an atmosphere, Newtonian dynamics didn’t work too well. It acts the same as in space so it’s weird.

Overall the game is good, but the upgrading part is fascinatingly big, since there are so many parts to get and so many versions of each part. The characters are not to terribly bright, which adds a comedic element to the game that doesn’t make sense, since they are further capable of space travel than us humans.

Play it at your own risk. Although it has some quirks, it is the closest most people can get to space travel for now, and that’s definitely worth something.