Play this: pilot your own Mars rover in ‘Tempest’

The Chaos Collective has developed a brand new in-browser game that lets you experience what it’s like to be a rover on the surface of an unknown planet. Tempest is a real-time, multiplayer strategy game that pits players against each other in a race to collect resources while dodging storms, using power-ups, and stealing from one another’s stashes. The game was developed in just two days, and is fairly simple in concept — click on resources to collect them, and avoid the ominous black circles. While the developers suggest that the game is best played with friends, I found that the ambient soundtrack is well suited for playing alone and gave me deeper insight into what it must be like to be the Curiosity rover, wandering a lonely, barren landscape in the name of science.