Serious Video Game SpaceStationSim Simulaneously Released and Adapted to Create SimCEV for NASA
Vision Videogames has simultaneously released and adapted it's SpaceStationSim video game to become an early version of SimCEV, a systems engineering and integration visualization tool for NASA. Bill Mueller and Greg Beauchesne described the process of development on October 31st at the Serious Games conference in DC.
Joppa, MD (PRWEB) November 3, 2005
Vision Videogames’ president Bill Mueller and Technical Director Greg Beauchesne spoke on October 31st at the second annual Serious Games Summit in Washington DC. The topic of their lecture was the progression of their SpaceStationSim software from PC game to an initial version of SimCEV, a collaborative systems engineering and integration visualization tool for NASA. Their topic covered the many issues a small company faces collaborating with a huge government agency like NASA. These lessons learned are valuable to other companies attempting a similar business plan. There is currently broad interest in the space industry to apply game technology like 3D visualization and active components to industrial strength systems engineering and life cycle management on space vehicles. The Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) is the new space vehicle that NASA will fly to the moon and to Mars.
Simultaneously, Vision Videogames has released SpaceStationSim through the space oriented distributor Learning Technologies, to the science center, school and museum store market. SpaceStationSim conveys the challenges of managing astronauts aboard the International Space Station while simultaneously building and maintaining the ship.
SpaceStationSim is a database-driven, astronaut/space vehicle simulator game capable of being adapted to visualize data from a variety of sources. Currently the software visualizes Vision's SpaceStationSim game-oriented simulation and in the future, will be capable of visualizing NASA’s own simulation data.
While it is unusual for a product to transition from a game to a serious tool, more and more game techniques are being used in industry to model sophisticated environments and equipment ranging from hurricane impact to military hardware and tactics. The second annual Serious Games Summit is where leading academics, training experts, military personnel, government leaders, foundations, and non-governmental organizations gather to discuss future collaboration and determine how game methods and technologies can further outreach, education and training goals. For more info, see http://www. spacestationsim. com/ (http://www. spacestationsim. com/)
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