SunlitZelkova

Thanks, this was a good read! It has very interesting info but it does feel like the average “all we need to do is use green energy and we can stop climate change” articles. That’s a lot harder to do than it sounds like. I wish them good luck convincing ranchers to aid in “cutting back on emissions”- in other words, giving up their livelihoods- when a large percentage of them don’t even believe climate change exists. Source- my mother’s side of the family all either are ranchers, were ranchers, or live in ranching regions. They have quite interesting things to say (and post on Facebook ) about climate change… among other things. I tried to find a proper outside source too but the data mainly pertains to farmers. Interestingly, many farmers accept the existence of climate change, but do not believe humans are necessarily causing it. While the acceptance and response to it is growing among farmers, I wasn’t able to find anything about ranchers. This makes sense as farmers stand to lose the most from climate change (crop losses) and gain from a response (more resilient farming practices et al), while ranchers would simply lose all around.

If you have the time, I would be interested in a clarification of this sentence. "Human level intelligence" =/= evolution, as sharks are older than us they are more evolved, without needing spaceships or smart phones to be considered so. I haven't seen people really saying anything akin to that "animals good smart animals bad" remark. It has to do with who is disregarding the environment and who isn't. If it was the rabbits somehow pumping CO2 into the atmosphere and dumping garbage into the oceans, humans would be off the hook and the rabbits would be under fire, despite humanity having the spaceships and rabbits being rabbits. I would also regard this as instinct rather than an opinionated choice, or a "moral" question. Thing presents threat so one kills it. This is widely seen across terrestrial species, at the very least. The alien's behavior is akin to a cat playing with its food before actually eating it or the sadistic traits found in some humans. As they are aliens it is likely they don't possess human "malice". Can a chimpanzee really be said to have "malice" if it attacks its owner without proceeding to eat them? EDIT- To be clear, I mean “if a chimpanzee attacks its owner without eating them can it really be said to have malice (with the limitations of what we know about animal emotions)” What difference would it make? Going by the logic that life on Earth is pointless if it ends in five billion years, human life is pointless if it ends in X amount of time until the universe ends, because if it can't be elongated, it is worthless. I am asking from a logical point of view. As an opinion it is certainly fine, just as I might enjoy my ice cream while chowing it down in a matter of minutes while you can enjoy it while taking an hour to eat it (for example).

Thanks for clearing your opinions up! What you have shared regarding Minecraft difficulty options has led me to retract my stance on the necessity of a “stock sandbox”. Just thinking very simply of what possible options there might be and the opinions shared in the thread, I don’t see why complex, custom sandbox saves would not be possible. What about explanations in a PDF manual? Must they be in the game itself?

This argument feels flawed. If saving non-human life is pointless because they go extinct when Earth becomes uninhabitable, does that not make saving human life pointless because they go extinct when the universe ends (in the best case scenario you describe where they spread through space)? Or do you consider interuniversal travel to be a potential thing? I’m gonna share some notes I took via casual googling about this while conducting research for a story in which I considered having rodents evolve to have human level intelligence after humanity went extinct. Note- if anyone sees something wrong please correct me! ” 1. An environmental stressor is required for it to develop. Primates had environmental issues [challenges] that “required” the development of management techniques and parrots had an environment that was being changed by climate change forcing them to develop skills 2. Technology use [intelligence] reflects natural behavior 3. Parrots and crows are a good candidate according to a researcher 4. Intelligence requires a large brain, and a large brain requires high levels of oxygen “ Rodents walking on two legs and wearing suits, driving cars to work and typing on keyboards is completely out of the question. In fact, that’s not even what intelligence means. A very interesting response I found regarding the question of whether “human level intelligence could evolve again” is that human level intelligence isn’t really a thing. Intelligence is merely a reflection of a species’ natural behavior. What suits humans does not necessarily suit another species. So expecting rodents to have to evolve to build fires to “have human level intelligence” is dumb, because that doesn’t correspond to how rodents behave- many burrow underground and thus don’t need fire to keep warm. The concept of fire denoting intelligence is forcing human behavior on species that don’t do what we do. Further more, “intelligence” is relative. From the point of view of a shark, which has had tens of millions of more years to evolve than us, humans are rather unintelligent- look at how many people drown each year! And they do this while deliberately entering the water while sharks only beach by accident. So a species can be intelligent without appearing similar to humanity. So then we come to the concept of space travel. What’s up with that? There is no tangible need to fly to space. Perhaps humanity would be more intelligent investing what it has into space in its problems on Earth over the decades since the 1920s. It could be argued that space travel is an expansion of our habitat, but for what? Fish don’t dream of putting on “Terrestrial Vehicular Activity Suits” and expanding on land, after all, they thrive in their limited environments. The concept of expanding into a habitat where can not even survive is… interesting, but does not seem to be well thought out*. It’s basically building a habitat on a lifeless rock or in the sky… but with no air. Remember, “intelligence” is a reflection of a species’ natural behavior. Land species are known to expand their range whenever possible, but expanding into somewhere they can’t actually survive seems like a rather inefficient use of time and resources**. But anyhow, my point in this paragraph is that space travel does not need to be the hallmark of an “intelligent” species. It reflects human behavior in that we try to expand our range wherever possible (perhaps most famously over the Bering Strait land bridge into the Americas), but considering other species it may not make sense to them to expand their range into the sky. Now to that one might say “but the Earth will be destroyed eventually”, to that I say… so? The universe will be destroyed eventually but that doesn’t make the existence of humanity tragic, and neither would the destruction of the Earth make the existence of any other species tragic, even if it was “intelligent”***. The gist of all of this is that a species can be “intelligent”, even by human standards, but not necessarily behave as we do, so expecting space travel to occur- or having it as a requirement for “intelligence”- is wrong. But assuming space travel is worthwhile for every “intelligent” species for some reason… I have to wonder, can any species actually be fit for something like space travel? Primates happen to be built for the complex physical requirements (like… opposable thumbs) needed for construction of things like space ships. And operating their controls. If humans had the physiology of rodents or crows (or whatever your favorite for post-humanity intelligence), I invite you to ponder- could we still manufacture spacecraft and then operate them? Remember, “intelligence” is a reflection of a species’ natural behavior. Our opposable thumbs first appeared because we actually needed them to survive, and then got to the point where we can send text messages with them by chance. But will a crow or rodent need their own “opposable thumb” equivalent after humanity is gone? Second, Earth’s oxygen content will need to get high again to start any species down the road to human level intelligence, in order for their brain to get bigger and more complex. Most climate modeling is focused on the next 100-maybe 500ish years, but what about millions? I genuinely do not know if this may happen again, but for the purposes of my story I decided the stars would likely not align again for humans, just as they have not (at least yet) for insects****. On an offhand note, I would say this means the possibilities of extraterrestrial intelligence are high- they just don’t do space travel or nasty things like pumping greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere. The problem is, the SETI people, who may not have much experience with things like evolutionary biology, are expecting humanity: alien edition every single time. It’s often recognized that aliens would likely look nothing like us, in response to questions about the possibilities of little green men, and thus I find it odd we (humanity/pop culture/SETI) simultaneously expect them to act like us. *Space colonization is the product of philosophers and otherwise non-scientifically-influenced scientists, during a time when imperialism was regarded as a proper thing, among other terrible backwards things. I can’t help but think that these weren’t serious proposals for space habitation, but instead were basically taking ideas about colonization on Earth and pasting them onto space. The idea has been built upon since then by people picking it up as a product of their heroes and inspirations, but without examining the context in which it was created. If one explores somewhere, they tend to then colonize it, but I assume this was looking at the Moon, Mars, and so on and going “solid planetary body = we can survive there” rather than actually thinking the feasibility through. After all, we explore the sea all the time and I have yet to see widespread proposals for undersea colonization. The immense faith some place in the inevitably of space colonization also feels a bit like the irresponsible use of “but people thought *X innovator* couldn’t do it in their time” at times. **It could be argued that the transition from aquatic to terrestrial life is an instance where “going to live somewhere you can’t live” has happened, but this was not on a scale comprehensible to humans. That was a “I dip my toe in the water unconsciously sometimes and ten million years later I have webbed feet” type deal, not “self sustaining Mars colony in 100 years!!11!!! LETS GO BRO1” thing. ***There are some who cast humanity potentially remaining on Earth as dumb: a societal level mental regression. But if we don’t consider people who accept death as “mentally regressive” (requiring people to kick and scream in agony at the end of their life to be “normal”) I don’t see why accepting extinction is “mentally regressive”. This seems more like a cultural trait passed down from manifest destiny rather than a sensible consideration of what scientifically constitutes “intelligence”. ****By insects I mean things like meganisoptera, not the tiny, rather lowly (in the food chain) things of today.

I thought everyone was writing about speculative evolution in jest lol. Indeed, this has been gone over in detail elsewhere and human level intelligence itself required a variety of factors we will likely never see again, thus human level intelligence re-occurring is extremely unlikely. As another said, not actually in a spaceship in Earth orbit being told to press one of two buttons or everything dies in 10 minutes. I would argue they would be just as bad. If I set rats loose in a fenced orchard, they aren't going to stop consuming until the orchard is completely dead, and then they all die, just as humans are doing to themselves now. The choice is certainly opinionated, I am wondering on what grounds one choice or the other can be called out as "wrong" or "immoral". Interesting (yet obvious I suppose), I didn't take such sentiments into account. I would classify this as instinct then rather than "opinionated choice". Most certainly (the effect would be miniscule). Going by the logic pop culture applies to what qualifies as a "world, life ending disaster", the world ended at least by the time of the K-Pg extinction event, and we are the freak post-apocalyptic mutants.

The vibe I am getting from "anti-sandbox" posts is that this difficulty of trying to create something configurable that pleases everyone is why sandbox isn't feasible for KSP2. I bring this to you and Pthigrivi because you are him have stated that sandbox isn't feasible because of the differing opinions. My point with that isn't to necessarily claim mine as the only solution per se, but instead to argue that sandbox is feasible by just settling on one thing and ignoring other opinions. If a mode isn't feasible for implementation in the game because people disagree on how it should look, by that logic we can't have progression modes either, because there are certainly disagreements on what should be added. "Anti-sandbox" is not literal. It refers to posts that describe sandbox as not being feasible because of the differing views on it. At least you and likely others have said that the progression modes may end up being good enough that sandbox is not needed, not only because progression modes are good but because sandbox's implementation would be problematic. I may be taking your statement out of context, please correct me if I am wrong. You may have merely been describing the sentiment of why "sandbox may not be needed" rather than actually advocating for it.

At least in my case, this has nothing to do with propaganda. As I said here To put it simply, choosing between the destruction of all human life or all non-human life is no different than choosing between Coke or Pepsi. I could make an argument like this (in favor of saving humanity) Or like this (in favor of saving the rest of Earth/Solar System life) But both are equally valid. In the case of tater's, what is interesting is subjective, so the rest of life may be what is truly interesting while the super predator humans that threaten biodiversity are the "threats to interestingness" whose elimination is acceptable. In the case of choosing to exterminate humanity, I could go on a tirade about how humans are evil for slaughtering cows and utilizing mental asylum prisoners to beat stray dogs to death, but in reality this is no different from a cat playing with a mouse it has caught before killing it, or a bird of prey massacring the nest of a smaller species for lunch. There is no "humans oppressing nature" because humans are part of nature too. The so called destruction of the environment is no different than termites burrowing in a tree to build a home and reproduce. But we don't call bears reproducing "destroying the environment", so we don't call termites reproducing "destroying the environment", so therefore humans decimating forests to build apartment complexes which babies will later be raised in can not be described as "destroying the environment". So at the end of the day it comes down to a purely subjective personal choice. There is no right or wrong, in the same way no one can truly say Coke is better than Pepsi. Or in your opinion are Pepsi fans "brainwashed" by "Pepsi propaganda"? or vice versa. This isn't really the same. Murder takes place away from you (hopefully 100% of the time), so you can't be considered responsible as you aren't there. What this choice is really like is if a runaway trolly was headed towards a switch track, and you were standing next to it and could flip the tracks. One route goes off an incomplete bridge and kills the passengers, the other runs over people tied to the tracks while the trolly continues unharmed. You can't run over to free the people tied down in time to save them. The tracks are already switched one way, so if you do nothing that still counts as a choice. Except in this case both parties are annihilated by choosing inaction. There are thriving feral guinea pig populations in South America, who have been successful for so long they have become their own species. Also... (quoting myself from a geoengineering thread in the Science & Spaceflight section) My favorite for any post-human intelligence is in rodents and crows. If my proposal already has rodents and crows (rivals IRL) collaborating, I guess we can throw in cats too

I fail to see your point. It doesn't need to be that hard. Sandbox in KSP2 should not be "select every particular possible physics tweak and then pick a selection out of 1000 different mods to build your experience". For the purposes of this discussion, sandbox in KSP2 basically just needs to be as close to KSP1 as possible. Anything else is just wishlisting. If people want to download a mod that bypasses colony creation, so they can plop stuff down whenever they want, or download a mod for X random thing, they can do that. By downloading a mod. That may make people upset but that's what happens sometimes. Again, mods can be downloaded to bypass it, just as I'm sure there are mods to eliminate whatever grievance one has with KSP1 stock sandbox too. Such an occurrence will also occur with the progression modes. I am sure there is some mechanic that some group of players are hoping for in Adventure, but will find missing. But that's okay, they can download a mod to rectify the problem. It just isn't feasible to make an option for every single player's personal preference. If that is not that case, then the entire game is doomed, because by taking into account "people have different experiences with how they play sandbox" instead of sticking with a stock sandbox, we must also take into account "people have different experiences with how they play progression modes" when improving the progression modes to be enjoyable... Going by the logic of the "anti-sandbox" posts, if sandbox can not be added to KSP2 without addressing every single player's pet peeve, we can't have progression modes either without addressing every single player's pet peeve. So Adventure Mode, too, must be a ridiculous amount of options and settings, ranging from actually utilizing RSS/RO in the game out of the box to Alcubierre drives being added. But if sandbox is problematic because of so many differing opinions, does that make progression modes problematic because of differing opinions? In which case KSP2 itself can't exist? No and no. To clarify the first sentence in this response, I fail to see your point because your question was "is sandbox needed in KSP2". I don't see how anything in your "phase 3" really has to do with that, unless you are elaborating on how the diversity of opinions on sandbox makes its implementation problematic in KSP2. Finally, I will say this. You may be asking the question for the purposes of a fun "brainstorming" debate/discussion, but the average person responding is (will be) just playing KSP2 and will take this to mean a literal suggestion for how the game should be, and so they give these defensive, perhaps even combative, responses. They have a thing they want to do- play sandbox or not play sandbox- and that's it, they are literally talking about what they want to do in the game, not engaging in some thought experiment. That is why you may fail to achieve with this discussion. People are partaking because they want KSP2 to be a certain way, not to enhance their cognitive experience. Speaking of which... I myself am partaking in the discussion at this point for the purposes of "cognitive experience", because this thread will obviously have no impact on the game (if release is in early 2023 sandbox is certainly finalized by now) and thus I otherwise wouldn't care Although, I do indeed want KSP2 to have sandbox and think implementation of sandbox in KSP2 is not problematic as stated before.

This is what my point was. Aircraft were in-house experimental vehicles for a long time, so it makes sense potential customers don't really think that much about Starship as a potential launch vehicle right now. This can backfire though. If your focus is just a mundane goal, the only objective becomes meeting that goal, regardless of anything else. The USSR set "goals" for its various state enterprises, cooperatives, etc., and they were met- quotas were fulfilled- but at a cost of poor quality control and much corruption. That's not to say that SpaceX will have those issues, but lofty goals =/= progress all the time. Also somewhat related, "lofty timelines" does also not equate to progress. The Communist Party declared that Korolev's OKB-1 was to land a man on the Moon in September 1968... after being given the go ahead in 1964. Rather Musk-like with his Starship test flight in July 2021 if you ask me. But the Soviets obviously failed with such a tactic, and it would be unwise for Musk to rely solely on such methods too (which I am sure he doesn't, but just wanted to point out).

Inaction can be just as evil.

"Unneeded" can imply removal though. If I talk about how I don't need my fridge that usually implies I am going to remove it from my home. The OP did not make it clear what his position was, and his opinion could have been misconstrued as advocating for the elimination of it as a mode. I assumed the question was asked on the basis of a "standard" sandbox mode. However people choose to use sandbox or with whatever mods doesn't matter- the issue at hand relates to "pure stock" sandbox mode. I must again ask why this question was asked in the first place. If the question did not have a baseline "stock" sandbox as its subject, how did the OP expect to get coherent answers? It's like if I asked how we could make the progression modes better and people started mentioning how RSS makes them enjoyable for them, or this mod or that mod. The question must be asked on the assumption that "stock" sandbox mode is the issue at hand, or the discussion is somewhat pointless because everyone has their own way of playing, their own mods they use, and so on. I am aware it is not intentionally about sides, but I read through the entire thread prior to making my first post here and it was pretty clear you could divide the opinions into two factions- pro-sandbox (whatever form it may take) and what I will now refer to as pseudo-anti-sandbox ("KSP2 is too complex to have a clear sandbox mode so it should not be present in the game and/or reduced to a difficulty option" and/or "the progression modes should be so good that sandbox isn't needed"). Note that the final "progression modes should be so good that sandbox isn't needed" can very easily be interpreted to mean that sandbox should not exist in the game at all if progression modes are a subjective "good". After all, from the point of view of someone who mainly plays sandbox, why would one even say that if they didn't mean that sandbox should be removed? If I said "Starship is so good we don't need SLS", you must see that that can be interpreted as meaning SLS should be gotten rid of, even if all I meant is that SLS is unneeded in a Starship-based mission architecture. Your original post can be misconstrued as low key advocating for the removal sandbox. Yes, in the beginning you say "does not need a sandbox mode", which you have clarified to mean that sandbox mode should not exist as a necessity, but then you say "Very few complete, good games Ive ever played include a sandbox mode". This could imply that sandbox mode does not need to exist for KSP2 to be a good game, and thus should not exist. It may not seem that way to you, but that first quote combined with the second makes it very easy to misinterpret it in the same manner as "Starship is so good we don't need SLS". You say "it could have exactly one mode". This literally means sandbox would be removed. You then mention instead having cheat codes in place of a selectable mode to provide the functionality of sandbox, but this is confusing as you just said sandbox mode should not be needed. This has likely led people to misinterpret your position as calling for the complete removal of sandbox. The reason it is confusing is you say sandbox isn't needed, but then propose keeping cheat codes in to make sandbox available- so why not just make those cheat codes into a selectable game mode? Especially if so many people are going to be using them/it. But, the emphasis of the thread isn't on alternatives to sandbox, it is about "how sandbox isn't needed", so the assumption becomes that this is about the complete removal of sandbox.

I think what tater means is that SpaceX is not going to make gobs of money just to keep it in their bank accounts and party on yachts, they intend to put it to use on *a thing*, this thing being a Mars colony. SpaceX’s goal is “to make money”, it’s just what they claim they want to use the money for that tater is talking about.

Wouldn’t this then be a discussion pertaining to how to make the other game modes more enjoyable? Removing sandbox will not automatically make the other game modes worthwhile. This then points to an issue with how the question was posed by @Pthigrivi rather than an issue with the idea of “defending” sandbox. As I said earlier- Rather than “defending sandbox” being problematic itself. Vague questions will get vague answers.

I went over these. Quoting myself from my earlier responses- 1. For space or surface colonial VABs- 2. For the orbital VAB- Now then, for This is problematic because a boom event isn't a standard progression event, it is also a tangible action inside the game- i.e., non-arbitrary, instead of merely needing X points to do a thing, it will indeed make sense that you can't do whatever major thing without more Kerbals. My original proposal assumed boom events could just be treated like how fuel is. They would still function as they do in other game modes. Just as you need to still fuel your spacecraft in KSP1 sandbox, there would be no issue with needing to gather the required resources to generate a boom event. It would be the same. Removing boom events from sandbox, or seeing them as contrary to sandbox, would be like removing ISRU from sandbox. Obviously, ISRU exists in KSP1 sandbox, and if that doesn't present a problem, having boom events and every other colony associated resource functioning in KSP2 sandbox should not be a problem. More on this from my original post (slightly edited as I found an error in terminology)- Finally If this is the case, you should not have asked this question to begin with. This makes it an impossible debate; every single pro-sandbox answer can be rejected on the grounds of "unknown problems", while every anti-sandbox answer is automatically correct because the pro-sandbox side simply has no way to create a competent response... because we just don't know how a lot of things are going to work.

Green. Not because of any particular logical reason (none exist), but because if pushed into the role of judge, jury, and executioner under the described circumstances, this is simply the decision I would make.

Sled or catapult assisted rocket launch site... in the middle of Moscow.

That quote from the article is interesting. It makes sense though, after all, it was only after aircraft were proven as a functioning vehicle that actual real world use began. "Military aircraft" did not exist until six years after the Wright Flyer. It makes sense that people wouldn't take Starship seriously until it is shown to work.

This is pretty weird. I don’t really know how to comment on it, I’m just pretty dumbfounded they would do this lol.

I think this is a poor metric for what is possible and what isn’t, because there are other factors that play into what gets made and what doesn’t.

We are discussing human rating for space though. You are correct- the Tesla is human rated on Earth- but not in space. If we built a standard cookie cutter house on the Moon, no one is going to call it “a human rated structure in space” because people can not practically live there. Likewise the Tesla does not qualify as human rated for the purpose of this discussion. The point is if it is human rated for space. The Tesla could not carry humans in space because it has no life support. The Apollo 10 LM could have taken humans to solar orbit, albeit on a suicide mission- but they could still do it.

But a minivan isn’t a submarine if it is driven into a lake… it’s just a sunken minivan.

Not human rated Otherwise Voyager 1 would be the most distant human rated object, because on Earth I can sit on it, and therefore under a definition of “human rated” which includes vehicles that can carry humans on Earth, Voyager 1 counts too.

True. In all likelihood though these could be easily implemented as options with the realism settings. If “sandbox” becomes an option in the settings menu at the start of a save instead of a selectable mode, other features pertaining to KSP1 sandbox could then appear as options once the sandbox setting is selected. Also true. The point of the comparison was not to insinuate that in the KSP series any grindiness was/is deliberate or malicious (or may necessarily exist in KSP2), but that if it takes weeks or even days to get something it can be a turn off. Even if it doesn’t feel “grindy” just having to wait at all can be a pain. No matter how engaging the gameplay I don’t want to wait two weeks to use the NERV and half a year to use a torch drive (if I so desire to use either of those immediately). Are there better examples of a tech tree being implemented in a good way?

I think that then may be a problem with the way the question was asked. The question is so vague that some people are getting up and arms that this implies eliminating "sandbox style gameplay" and some are talking about a form of sandbox other sandbox players don't use, which misconstrues the "pro-sandbox" position. @Pthigrivi I wasn't clear, but what I meant to say was not that I dislike it because of the particular way science mode works in KSP1, I just don't want to deal with tech trees or a grind at all. I.e. I don't want to have to spend hours just to be able to use the NERV. I don't think the use of sandbox as a shelter from the poor progression-based game modes is a problem pertaining to sandbox, it is a problem pertaining to those poorly designed game modes. A KSP1 style sandbox existing in KSP2 would not detract from the other game modes in KSP2, only poor design choices for those other game modes would. One thing I did not mention in my post was how the colonial VAB would work. In this case, I would see the mining of resources to build rocket parts for assembly in that VAB to be treated like fuel- just another physical constraint, not a progression mechanic. So KSP1 style sandbox is still possible in KSP2. The only difference would be that solar systems would start automatically discovered and you would not need to find them. The other, of course, being no currencies or tech trees of any kind. All parts would be unlocked. In the orbital and Kerbin VABs, there would be unlimited access to these parts (assuming you don't need to mine resources on Kerbin itself to manufacture parts). At a colonial VAB, you would be required to mine resources to manufacture parts- just as you still need to fuel/refuel in sandbox in KSP1- but there wouldn't be any need to climb a tech tree, for example as long as you gather the required resources you could manufacture a NERV immediately without having to progress through any tech tree (assuming of course you have built the necessary manufacturing facilities). The same works if in situ resources are required for producing colony segments. I don't see environment affecting what can be built being particularly ground breaking from KSP1 sandbox. This would also be treated like a fuel- you just can't build X type of building somewhere in the incorrect environment in the same way you can't send a spacecraft lacking in delta v to whichever place you like. The difference is the presence of a tech tree. Even if it wasn't just arbitrary points being rewarded, many (including myself) just don't want to deal with a tech tree. We want to be able to build what we want when we want. This of course assumes some form of points are still accrued to unlock different levels of the tech tree. On the other hand, utilizing colonies for progression could be even more restrictive in gameplay, because not only am I forced to do things to unlock a certain part, but I am now specifically forced to build a colony. The entire tech tree itself could be regarded as arbitrary. Why do I have to wait so many levels to build an Orion drive when these things were proposed for construction and launch to happen in the 70s and 80s? An example of how a grind can be annoying is in War Thunder. That game uses arbitrary points (research points) to unlock new aircraft. But even if the game was reworked to do something tangible like capturing objectives or hitting a certain target to unlock new things, people would still hate the grind. I think this could be applied universally across games with tech trees (although I am welcome to be corrected). Some people don't want to deal with that sort of thing, no matter how meaningful/non-arbitrary it is. That said, I am now leaning towards sandbox being a bit more of a cheat/option rather than a separate game mode. The way I see it has transformed, and now, for all intents and purposes it would just be the standard game mode but with the tech tree completely unlocked and solar systems visible. So my view is now this. We don't need sandbox game mode, but we do need sandbox. Instead of a cheat option though it might make more sense to place such an option in the realism settings menu when you start a new save.

To be fair though, the math has been done on this and a one way mission utilizing a Soyuz capsule would be somewhat feasible (at least on paper). Two people may have been a stretch, I suppose, but we don't know how big the rest of the craft was, there was a propulsion section (because it refueled in LEO) and it could have had a larger hab too. Remember, once they were on the surface they weren't supposed to survive long. I think they just took the "Mars has almost no atmosphere resulting in no need for aerodynamics" trope from The Martian and used it again. Headcanon for why she didn't appear to suffer too bad is that in The Martian, Watney accelerated to Mars escape velocity because the Hermes was doing a flyby, while in the show it is just Mars orbit. IMO though if Space Shuttles are already flying to the Moon anyways that isn't too much of a problem, especially if The Martian has done it before. This was intentional, inspired by stories from 9/11 of people going into the dust to rescue people and not being found (dead) days later.