Starship: The Game – SpaceX Launches Online Game to Celebrate Historic Flight 5 Launch

As anyone with an interest in space travel knows, it has been a historic week for evolution and innovation. SpaceX managed to make its amazing “chopstick” manoeuvre to land the first-stage booster of Starship.

As one of many celebrations, SpaceX has launched a game, called ‘Starship: The Game’, that is based on the unprecedented mission and its successful technique. 

SpaceX’s ‘Starship: The Game’ Offers To Launch Starship to Orbit

Starship: The Game is played within your browser and works on every device we’ve tested it on (mobile and computer browser).

The aim is for players to “re-enact” the launch of Starship and then take control of the first-stage launcher as they try to guide it back down to the “chopsticks” and re-enact the landing. The goal is to scale high in the sky in the meantime and propel the thruster upward using the space bar or on-screen controls. These also help to keep the thruster moving as it falls back to earth. 

When players are airborne, the goal is to collect as many of the boosters (stars) as possible while avoiding debris and aliens! 

The instructions for the game are super simple:

• Launch Starship to Orbit
• Catch the Super Heavy Booster
• Don’t run out of fuel
• Avoid the aliens

This game definitely has a sense of humour and harks back to some 80s and 90s console graphics and sound effects. We have a “chiptune” style soundtrack within the game and sounds that wouldn’t be out of place in a Mario game. 

The game is just a fun way to waste a few minutes, but it is good for parents and teachers to also have a game to point kids to that is relatively educational. At least, it shows roughly what happened on the mission and may spark some interest for young people (just make sure they know the aliens are added for a bit of fun). 

For us retro gamers, the game reminds us of a bygone era of Gameboys and clunky consoles…

A new trend in space games?

This isn’t the first time a space company has used a game to spread the word. Earlier this year Astroscale launched SPACE PROTECTOR, which they describe as “an immersive simulation that puts players in the role of a satellite operations engineer tasked with capturing inactive satellites using advanced robotics in a realistic space environment. This innovative game is designed to engage and educate players of all ages on the critical issue of space debris and why we need to address it.”

Starship: The Game is out now and playable at the link: https://starshipthegame.spacex.com/