2019 marks the 50th anniversary of the moon landing, one of the most historic events in modern history. To celebrate, the U.S. Navy has collaborated with Google to create a game called “Journey to the Moon” that you can play through Google Assistant. The game lets you figure out what role you would have played if you were part of the launch team and it plays real audio recordings from 1969 and what the process was to make the successful lunar launch.
To start off the game, all you have to do is say “Hey Google, speak to Journey to the Moon” to any of your Google Assistant-powered devices. It will then take you to multiple-choice questions and at the end of it all, it will tell you which role you should undertake: Power & Propulsion, Flight Control, or Crew Survival. As you go and try to answer the questions, your device will play back actual audio recordings from Neil Armstrong and the other members of the Apollo 11 mission.
The game is pretty informative and if you’re a student learning about history, this is a unique way to learn it as you’re not just dealing with books but actual archival information from that year. Those who are just curious about this point in time may also learn something new and even try to imagine what would have happened if they were part of the team. And while of course, you can’t change history, there’s still a bit of high-stakes as you are tasked with making sure “the greatest moment in our history” actually pushes through.
You can play the Journey to the Moon game on any of the smart speakers that have Google Assistant support, including Google Home, Nest Hub, and a lot of other similar devices. You can actually just also play it on your phone using the Google Assistant app. It doesn’t seem to be available in all territories but for those that do have it, you can play it until August 17
We’re seeing games and other media content evolve into not just visual but also aural playing fields because of things like Google Assistant and smart speakers. It’s like we’re going back to the days of radio but this time around, with real-time and live interaction. It would be interesting to see what else Google and their partners will come up with in these terms.
