Buzz Aldrin's race into space (moon landing)

[MadHighway]

ALWAYS save money for the fall.

ALWAYS buy an extra rocket/spacecraft if you can.

ALWAYS get and KEEP Explorer reliability at 99% (docking needs this).

ALWAYS develop Gemini to a high degree (Apollo needs this).

ALWAYS launch several unmanned docking module missions.

ALWAYS have the copyright codes handy.

Also: get Explorer/Mercury up ASAP. I've even started with Gemini (successful suborbital in '59!!).

[MadHighway]

You have to get the patch which evens out the game's quirks (obscene difficulty, no buyer retraction).

I've landed on the moon with everything from the Saturn to a Gemini-Cricket and LM-XMS-docking module combo. In fact I never really use the Saturn; stick with Atlas and Titan-boosters.

[buster9877]

YES! SOMEONE WITH THE SAME STORY AS ME!

[Fireaxe888]

Whst'd the song?

[Caleb9849]

The red bar on both your rocket explosions looks maxed out to me, which implies to me that you failed a copyright check.

On top of that, you're not helping your chances by launching a lunar landing mission when you've still got a -23 safety penalty....

[TakumiFujiwara80]

I have 2 question.First.Why in missions where you launch 2 rocket together(JT)one rocket ALWAYS explode?Second.Why in some mission it warn me that i need t ohave a dock module in orbit before to launch my mission?How can i launch a dock module that stay in orbit?I never step my foot on the moon sob!

[Lenangreal]

you need at least 2 launch pads. the first one launchs the the dock module, the second the rest od the equipment.

obviously theyre part of the same mission

[TakumiFujiwara80]

Thank you 4 your reply.Anyway i found my answer in the BARIS tip.The dock module can be place in orbit with a docking mission and it will stay in orbit 4 one year.For the first question i found that the % of failure with a JT mission is really high. I land on the moon finally 3 weeks ago!I cried and laughing with my sis'...(i played with her)

[BBMSergey]

Yra! Mi na Lune!

We did it!

[AntonExtravis]

Sigh. Yes a rather difficult game, I've played it on and off for about 10 years, and I think I've only gotten to the moon about 3 or 4 times. And thats in the early to mid 70s. But I love it!

[roswellcrashsurvivor]

If you have a fully researched Saturn V - you should not ever see it fail and blow up like it does.

The only way this can happen is if you failed the copy-protection by entering the wrong answers.

[Kvartet]

my youtube nick is inspired in BARIS :D

[FedeTheDoc]

I've spent a lot of time on this game, I love it, even if it's too difficult.

You do a lot of dummy tests until you reach the highest security level, but your astronauts die!

I managed to bring man on the moon only once, with an historical lunar landing (but I hadn't a "-23" danger rate like you battleguy). It's a pity I didn't keep that game saved, now I'm playing again but after some successful mission I'm not able to complete the duration missions, grrr!

[Paul19807]

This would have been an amazing game if the AI wasn't so damn hard. That ruined it for me... it's basically unwinnable, even if I set myself on the easiest level and the AI on the hardest, they were still doing landings by 1970.

I read somewhere that this was because the AI didn't play by the same rules that we did - if an AI mission failed, the budget wasn't cut or something like that.

I hope they do a remake, because it really had a ton of potential.

[berighteous]

The AI has exactly the same rules. I've played many games where the soviets have one problem after another and you never hear from them again after 1965 or so. If you play aggressively, you can get the prestige firsts and the money and the other side is finanically crippled.

BTW the CIA intelligence is NEVER correct.

I've won the game many times. (and lost many MORE times!)

[0x777]

They actually did a remake (sorry for the late reply), to be found at raceintospace(dot)org. Someone sat down and slapped together an OSS version.

It's still insanely hard. Whoever designed the success/fail model didn't spend a moment pondering the laws of statistics and that 10% fail chance on 20 steps essentially means that you fail more than half the time.

[bigpoppa1234]

This game is exceptionally hard.

Some of the failures (on easy with human skipped soviet turns):

Guy die on Orbital EVA.

Gemini lose all power, crew dies in orbit.

Gemini blows up on the pad, crew dies.

Gemini slams into earth, crew dies.

Gemini hatch fails to open, 1 dies.

Apollo slams into group on re-entry. That one killed the 2 guys who actually went to the moon first IRL.

When I had a guy die on an eva followed by the 2 guys left burning up in orbit I quit.

Had bout 17 nauts in arlington.

[bigpoppa1234]

This was in one game. With it set to easy, and without the soviets (I set them to human and skipped them). I'd not even managed an manned docking by 1973.

[markwc2008]

I can'nt realley remember now but could'nt you play this game in multiplayer mode but you had to save your position in the game on a floppy disk then put it in the post and send it to your friend to take his turn?

[berighteous]

It was insane to test. There are so many possible hardware combinations for each mission, and I had to test every dang one of them multiple times to check the failures. There are a lot of crazy ways to die in this game.

My favorites are 1) tripping on a moonrock and cracking your faceplate on your space suit and 2)having a meteorite tearing a hole the size of a dime and having the crew sucked out the hole into space.

Yes, I've killed more men than Cecil B DeMille.

[FedeTheDoc]

>having a meteorite tearing a hole the size of a dime and having the crew sucked out the hole into space.

ahah, tell me that you are joking (or I have to play the game 14 years more until it happens)!

[berighteous]

It's an actual faulure. Technically they would be BLOWN out into space, but it's still nasty.

There are hundreds of ways things can fail in the game. Each step failure has several ways it can fail, and each has a degree of severity. The saddest failure I had was a parachute failure at the end of a successful moon landing in 1966.

[falconlem]

Yes you never wanted to launch that Saturn V below 80 percent.. even then it was usually a failure. Damn if they'd only fixed the modem on this thing it would be great for head to head online.

[berighteous]

I was the lead playtester on this game for 9 months, and did all the 3d models for the hardware, capsules and landers! Awesome game! great video. Man, so long ago...

You can get to the moon on the cheap if you're daring using a gemini/cricket combo with boosted titan rocket(dual launch)

[TehRedRisky]

out of interest did you enter the correct copy protection?

Could explain why they were blowing up

[battleguy01]

Copy protection? No i don't is that why.

[TehRedRisky]

It could explain it. It usually asks you how long a person was in space and if you get it wrong twice all your rockets will explode.

Look up BARIS at abandonia for the answers

[TehRedRisky]

i had the same problem with you when i was trying to get it on film!

95% safety on the rocket and it blows up!

[RothharSarris]

I remember this game loved it back then, wish they would make a new one going to mars

[Somagu]

I smiled.