The game that lets you try your own hand at landing the next Mars rover may not be as cool as advertised, but the real event probably will be. And the real event is coming up this weekend, with Curiosity scheduled to land on the Martian surface late Sunday night (or early Monday morning, depending on your time zone).

Well, he didn't go there to hang out, eat freeze dried ice cream and float his rat tail. Garriott, son of astronaut Owen Garriott and designer of the Ultima franchise, went to space to work.