Hey, Let's go to Space!

[Brome Teks]

You know what's awesome? Space. But how do you get there? Well, with this awesome new alpha game, you can build a rocket and go there yourself.

Gentlemen, this is the Kerbal space program.



With it, you can build a rocket with either the included parts or parts from the large mod community, and using realistic physics and rocket science, go wherever you care to. Be it orbit, or escape velocity into the sun, you can send these wayward astronauts everywhere. I highly recommend this game to anyone who likes space and rockets.

[Daryn]

I will have to check this out! Does it let you fail spectacularly as well?

[Brome Teks]

Ooooh yes. Very, very spectacularly.

[Slate]

First off, I thought the instrument at the bottom was a stargate and was very confused. Until I realized what it really was. Then while watching the ship fall apart, out of the corner of my eye I noticed the astronauts in the corner. After playing it again, I only payed attention to the astronauts. I played it over and over just to watch the astronauts realize the ship is failing.

:I
:I
:I
D:
D:
D:
K.I.A.

[Rys]

Hey, thanks; this is really fun (well, not for my first few groups of astronauts; they, ah, weren't exactly having fun...though on the bright side, the fact that the rockets kept exploding meant that it didn't really matter that I forgot to add parachutes). To any other Mac users out there: Fear not! This game works on Wine.

[Llamas-Rule]

Yea thanks for telling us about this game. I'd love to see if anyone can beat my rocket design.

[Brome Teks]

I don't know if you can really 'win' at kerbal space program, but if you're looking for best speed, I got close to 1/1500th the speed of light after leaving a really high delta-v engine running all night long, though kerbal has issues above a certain altitude it seems.

[Brome Teks]

Good news, everybody! The latest update has added the Mun (Moon), which if you have skill and grace, you can land on!

[Rys]

Now if only I could find a way to get rid of the Red Texture Bug without having to manually resave all of the texture files...

I also have the odd dilemma of try to choose between the Windows and Mac versions. The only actual difference appears to be the text font.

[Brome Teks]

Oh, there was a simple fix to that on the forums, I'll find it real quick.

Here it is, just follow the instructions, and don't worry, I tried it myself, it's legit.

[Rys]

Yes, I tried that, but it wouldn't even launch. (The program, not one of the rockets.)

[Brome Teks]

Did you put it into your KSP folder? It worked just fine for me.

[Rys]

Yes. Just the .exe, right, not the folder containing the .exe?

Are you running it natively? Maybe it doesn't play well with Wine.

[Brome Teks]

Maybe, Oh well.

In the meanwhile, when a mission to the Mun that was supposed to come home didn't pan out as planned, I got creative and invented the Lunar Rover: Kerbal Style.

[Rick Canaan]

Haha! Downloaded the game, tried it out, and LOVED it from the gitgo!

Got a question, though. How do you download the updates? I clicked on the Mun link, and it just led me in circles!

Help!

[Brome Teks]

Just go here, click download for your preferred system, and it'll give you the latest version. You can get new user-made parts in the forums by downloading them and dropping the folders into the KSP parts folder.

[Rick Canaan]

Just go here, click download for your preferred system, and it'll give you the latest version. You can get new user-made parts in the forums by downloading them and dropping the folders into the KSP parts folder.

Okay, that is what I did. I just downloaded the game today, so no doubt I have the latest version.

I guess what I need to do then, is start exploring the mod community. Any hints on how I might go about it? Or better yet, could you be so kind as to post some links to your favorite mods?

Thanks tons (of thrust!!) for your help, Brome!

[Brome Teks]

Here is the mod community's forums, most all good mod parts can be found there. You'll have to pick and choose, but really the C-7 flight pack is my favorite mod. That's the set I used to make my first moon lander as seen in the above pic.

[Rick Canaan]

Here is the mod community's forums, most all good mod parts can be found there. You'll have to pick and choose, but really the C-7 flight pack is my favorite mod. That's the set I used to make my first moon lander as seen in the above pic.

Awesome! Thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou!

But give me a few minutes, and I might be bothering you again because I wasn't able to get them to work! I'm sometimes so computer dumb like that!

Thanks, Brome!

[Rick Canaan]

I made a new texture for the parachute!!



To use it, go to your KSP folder, find "Parts", "parachute_single" and then drop this file into the "textures" folder! When it asks you to overwrite, tell it yes! Then, when next you deploy your parachute, you'll have your favorite website's name advertised across the sky!!

Here's another texture I made:



This one goes in your "RSCFuelTank" textures folder.

I left this image pretty much stock, just adding ourwebsite's name to it.

More when I next have time! In the mean time, enjoy!

[Daryn]

That's pretty cool! So are most of the images easy enough to modify and replace? That would be a nice plus for modders if they left things pretty much open.

[Rick Canaan]

That's pretty cool! So are most of the images easy enough to modify and replace? That would be a nice plus for modders if they left things pretty much open.

Yeah, it's just a matter of editing png files in Photoshop (or any other image editor which supports png).

It's not quite as simple as all that with most of the images, though. The pngs are laid out so that they fit 3D models, so you have tiles grouped in many of the images to fit on the varying planes of the model for which they're meant. So in editing them, you have to make sure to get the various parts of the image in the right places. If not, you can get quite a mess. XD

But beyond that, it is just a simple matter of editing them with a graphics editing program. You just got to be careful about how you edit some of the images.