Board Games Help Astronauts Learn About Mars - Off Planet Board Game Does the Trick

Imagine being cooped up in a Mars colony for five years, would test your psychological stability no doubt? If you are one of the first Mars astronauts, you might easily be in a base station doing research for that period of time. And even if it were just a few years, you would get pretty bored, between all the experiments, and you probably wouldn't have to sleep as much because there's less gravity, and you'd be less fatigued, so what would you do?

You'd play board games of course.

You would probably send requests for Internet websites you wanted to look up, and then you have to wait tell the Earth was back in range, so you could send in your requests. There would be certain times of the year when you couldn't send a message to Earth because it would be on the other side of the Sun, and depending on which country you are sending your messages to, you might not be able to send your e-mails because you'd be on the other side of the planet as it rotated, and the country on earth which you are sending a message to via a satellite that from that country might be on the other side of its planet.

An interesting article in Mars Daily titled; "Mars500 Gaming Helps Develop Electronic Helpers for Deep Space Crews," and it discusses the reality of isolation for astronauts, as the Russians are studying the psychology of living in confined spaces for long periods of time. In these games, astronauts, space colony personnel, or researchers can play by themselves, or take turns playing each other.

One could say this is nothing more than a high-tech version of solitaire, chess, checkers, or some other strategic game like; RISK. And indeed it is quite risky to be a researcher and Space Explorer on another planet in our solar system. Of course, this is why we should be thinking here - because board games could very well help astronauts in a Lunar or Martian colony, and if the games were set up correctly they might be like Trivial Pursuit, and the participants could learn as they pass the time.

Anyway, the concept makes sense, and it's interesting to watch the Russians try out their new board games, and electronic versions of the board game in their practice run where several astronauts were locked away inside of the capsule for the amount of time it would take to get to Mars, and back again + a year and a half on the planet. Please consider all this.