Space Cadets

Become a Planet Detective and help six crewmates find somewhere to live for thirty days. Launch your rocket, steer through a scrolling star system, and follow unexplored signals on the mini map. Visit six animated worlds, from icy Frostbite to mysterious Murk. Send out a probe, inspect clues about air, water, temperature, food, shelter and energy, then question a tempting claim. Log each investigation to stamp your map. Compare the worlds, arrange your ranking, and choose four survival modules within a power budget. Use your collected evidence to explain your recommendation and discuss the practical trade offs with your class.

You pilot the Magpie, a salvage tug working the crowded orbits of the planet Kestrel. Your first job is a quiet relay satellite turning slowly. Open its dossier, then plan the chase on a live orbit map: drop a manoeuvre node, drag prograde, and watch the predicted path reach the target. Before each burn you predict what it will do, then fly it holding Space. Five more contracts follow, from a tumbling observatory you must tow to the moon Tarn to a spent rocket stage you deorbit. Each flight ends with a replay comparing your plan with what really happened.

You wake aboard Aster, a small orbital seed station carrying a garden to a new colony, and the lights are out. As its last engineer, with PIP the station intelligence beside you, you start at the power relay: turn the connector tiles until an unbroken circuit reaches the cabin lights. Each restored system opens the next repair: programming a rover to water the seedlings, tuning gears and coolant flow, sharing twelve energy cells, reconciling airlock interlocks, lighting a coupled solar array, scheduling the launch and plotting a safe route home. Every repair is a hands-on puzzle with feedback and hints.