I originally heard of it from Jenny Nicholson's video but didn't pay it any mind. It was only after I got in contact with The Mr E and became the science advisor of War Before Time that I decided to lurk. I finally made the leap of joining recently as I felt it might be helpful in the future due to certain things that I'm not currently at liberty to say. Plus I finally got over my bizarre hangups and decided to fully reconnect with this part of my childhood.

Mine is the Eye of the Universe, the main object you are searching for in the video game Outer Wilds that holds a near-religious significance to some of the alien explorers in it. I chose it because it represents my scientific curiosity and fascination with space exploration, as well as homaging one of my favorite games.

Whoo boy, mine are a varied bunch. You can definitely see I had an edgy teenage phase in there:

• Homestuck
• Kerbal Space Program
• Mass Effect
• Dragon Age
• Metroid (though I don't have a Switch so I've fallen off the wagon on that)
• The Legend of Zelda (ditto)
• Undertale + Deltarune
• Gears of War
• Rick and Morty
• Horizon (though I don't have a PS5 so I'm waiting for the PC port for Forbidden West to come out)
• Death Stranding
• The New Order: Last Days of Europe (a mod for Hearts of Iron IV I'm a team member on)
• For All Mankind
• Outer Wilds

I also really used to be into Dungeons and Dragons though I think I've moved on from it as I now disagree with the general mechanics and worldbuilding approach.

Currently I'm in my final year of undergraduate studies for a major in Materials Science and Engineering, with minors in Physics and Mathematics. My long-term goal is to get a PhD, though my specific graduate path remains uncertain. What I do know is that my primary research interest lies in computational materials science: specifically, applying deep neural networks to solve difficult or even intractable problems for conventional simulations. I am currently doing a senior thesis project on using a convolutional neural network to predict the fission gas flux of a nuclear fuel sample given a 2D image of its microstructure, and I hope to continue this avenue of research from there. I have been programming since I was 11 years old and combining it with my knowledge of materials science could provide a powerful interdisciplinary approach to finding novel solutions for the field.

I will admit that my interest in this isn't purely science-related: I realized that neural network architectures could also revolutionize a lot of aspects of 2D animation or animation as a whole. As someone who would like to see this artform revived but has little drawing skill, I think it would allow me to contribute in my own way. I could get a patent out of this if nothing else.

As for my dream job, I have wanted to work at NASA or at some other US national research agency like Livermore since I was a kid. However, I am willing to settle for more independent research. Fortunately, the line of computational materials science does not always require access to high-end lab equipment like materials science in general requires, which gives me more options for employment.

In the past few months I've stumbled upon promotional material for Talon, a pitch for an animated science fantasy adventure show that pitches itself as "LBT meets Avatar: the Last Airbender." The concept is set in a prehistoric Earth inhabited by dinosaurs with magical powers threatened by an alien invasion and is centered around Talon, a young Dakotaraptor who must assemble a team of other dinosaurs to fight off the mutated minions and bioengineered horrors of the alien invaders. I'm getting heavy Twilight Valley vibes from this and it seems quite ambitious.

Currently, the team is putting together an animatic for a Kickstarter to produce the pilot episode which would then be used to pitch to an existing network, Hazbin Hotel-style.

The creator's Twitter account
The creator's Twitter account

The associated series Instagram account with concept art

I took a look around the Hobbies board and noticed there was no thread dedicated to ongoing space exploration. As a lifelong follower of it, this obviously must be corrected!

To start, I wanted to discuss the launch of Artemis I, risen like a phoenix from the ashes of the Shuttle and Constellation. I remember following the latter program when I was a kid, only to be hit with disappointment when Constellation was cancelled and the new presidential administration made no concrete plans for manned deep space exploration. However, the renewed interest in the Moon that resulted in the beginning of the Artemis program has granted NASA much-needed direction that it lacked for decades, and I see a bright future ahead. Unless Elon Musk's antics screw it all up, of course, but I'd rather not think about that.


https://twitter.com/NASA/status/1592772202289430528

Last week, NASA took its first concrete step towards returning humans to the Moon with the launch of Artemis I, an unmanned test flight of the superheavy-lift Space Launch System and deep space Orion capsule that has launched the latter towards the Moon. I had the privilege of witnessing the launch in person at Kennedy Space Center, and I can say that it was a childhood dream come true for me.


https://twitter.com/NASA_Orion/status/1594852542097154048

Presently, Orion has just completed a powered flyby of the Moon and is about to enter a distant retrograde orbit, where it will stay for about two weeks before flying by the lunar surface a second time and returning back to Earth. So far, all systems have performed at or exceeding expectations - a remarkable accomplishment given the surprisingly troubled history of both Apollo and SLS' development. Artemis II, a manned flight to lunar orbit, is scheduled to launch in early 2024, depending on the results of Artemis I. TCombined with the activation of the James Webb Space Telescope last July, 2022 has shaped up to be a big year for space exploration.

In the past few months, I have fallen in love with Outer Wilds, a space exploration adventure game set in a miniature solar system where you play as an alien astronaut stuck in an endless time loop who must solve the mystery of an ancient precursor civilization called the Nomai. This game has a unique style that blends the aesthetic of camping with Newtonian physics-based gameplay and archaeology. I think many people on this forum would enjoy it. Unfortunately, I'm limited in what I can say because the entirety of the game's progression revolves around acquiring knowledge about the world - if I spoiled too much, I would be ruining the fun of playing through it yourself. Thus, I'll just leave the launch trailer here to see if anybody is interested.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKJUMMCJvGM

This game also has a DLC with a more horror-themed feel, though I would recommend playing through the base game's content first before exploring its content.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fb1igSbFlo0

The reason why I've decided to create a thread in the general gaming chat rather than recommendations is that Outer Wilds actually has a vibrant modding community that I'm following, and while the game's story is over, the fans are busy making their own planets and stories to share. The engine is very moddable and you can not only create your own solar systems but unique story content. I've attached a few trailers for some of the more interesting mods.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iUcBzdljHfE


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gM4QXLArqyY


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnBQqqIgHzw

I'm on the modding community Discord if anyone's interested in that part of the game.

Hello, all. I am gutza1, someone who has been in touch with one of the GoF's members, The Mr E, on Reddit for more than a year while serving as the "science advisor" for his ongoing fanfic, The War Before Time. I figured that, as he has many plans for the series, it might be good to establish a presence here so I can support him if needed. I also have a "fanfic" of my own cooking up that I'll be sharing relatively soon.

As for my background, I am 21 years old and currently an undergraduate student in my senior year studying materials science and engineering. Dare I say it, my childhood passion was not dinosaurs but space travel, as I grew up within driving distance of NASA's Kennedy Space Center and the possibility of exploring the cosmos captured my heart. I even wanted to study aerospace engineering in college, but eventually decided against it as I wanted a degree that was more broadly applicable.

My relationship with The Land Before Time is complicated to say the least. Even though I wasn't usually much of a dinosaur person as a kid, I watched a few of the sequels and fell in love with the characters and the strange, alien world they inhabited. Of course, my usual proclivities manifested as I would often daydream about the dinosaurs developing a technological civilization and scientific knowledge (little did I know that scientists had seriously considered this possibility - look up the "dinosauroid" or the Silurian Hypothesis to learn more). Thus, my childhood memories of LBT are fundamentally tied to exploration and scientific inquiry - something that I realized is a very different interpretation than many others here. When I saw VII and witnessed aliens make their presence in LBT, I was elated, as this was exactly something my space and science-obsessed child self had wanted all along. However, as time went on, I realized that the producers had a fundamentally different vision for the franchise than I wanted, and the TV show finally made me give up on it and move to other pastures.

I began to rediscover this part of my childhood after stumbling upon, of all things, a Hearts of Iron IV mod called "Equestria at War" that recast the world of My Little Pony as a fantasy dieselpunk setting. Playing it made me remember how I used to do something vaguely similar to the LBT world, and the memories started flooding back, helped in part by Jenny Nicholson's video. I also began to seriously do research into dinosaurs after having discovered the Silurian Hypothesis, and fell in love with the radical vision of the Mesozoic world put forth by modern science and works such as All Yesterdays. However, I didn't act much on it until I stumbled upon a drawing of Dagara, one of War Before Time's OCs, that The Mr E had posted on the r/dinosaurs subreddit. I nitpicked it a bit on its accuracy, but The Mr E instead asked me to give him feedback on Mentors of Yesteryear, WBT's prequel. I started reading and got hooked, and now I have remained in conversation with him for over a year. I can't say much about his future plans, but I think WBT has a bright future ahead of it.

In addition to my professed love of space travel, I am also an aspiring science fiction writer who has currently developed two settings: a hard sci-fi space opera, and an elaboration on my "civilized dinosaurs" ideas called Paravian, which is explores a species of dromaeosaur called Paravisapiens evolving sapience in the end-Cretaceous and developing industrial civilizations. Think of it as Mesozoic dieselpunk. I hope to develop it into an animated series at some point in the future.

As for my other interests, I have to admit that my first "fandom" experience was with Homestuck, which I discovered at 13. Despite its bad reputation it did make me interested in the power of 2D animation to tell more "adult" stories than is usually associated with the style. Currently, I am a major fan of BioWare RPGs such as Mass Effect and Dragon Age, as well as grand strategy games made by Paradox Interactive. I am currently the team leader on The Final Front, which is the space race patch of The New Order: Last Days of Europe: a narrative-driven alternate-history Cold War mod set in a dystopian timeline where the Axis powers won WW2 and the US is engaged in a three-way Cold War with them. I can talk more about my work on TNO somewhere else.

In the past few months, I have fallen in love with Outer Wilds, a space exploration adventure game set in a miniature solar system where you play as an astronaut stuck in an endless time loop who must solve the mystery of an ancient precursor civilization called the Nomai. This game has a unique style that blends the aesthetic of camping with physics-based gameplay and space travel. It was exactly the kind of experience I was desperately looking for when I watched LBT as a kid, and I regret that there was nothing like it when I was young. The LBT "fanfic" I mentioned I am working on previously is related to it - you'll see more in the future.

Anyway, feel free to ask me questions. I probably will be more of a lurker than anything, but I'm happy to connect with fellow fans of something that meant a lot to me as a kid.