SplasheryPlayground
Soft Landing, a still.

Arcade41.7° S, 111.1° W

Soft Landing

On the Moon it comes from the laser altimeter and camera of NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (the CGI Moon Kit): Tycho crater, Copernicus crater and the Sea of Tranquility, where Apollo 11 landed.

PlaygroundHow to play

Kind
Built from a recipe
Sound
Yes
Licenses
Public domain, Apache-2.0, MIT, BSD

How to play

Tap or press Space to play. ← → tip the lander, ↑ or Space fires. Land slowly and upright on level ground.

Its controls

ControlKindRangeStart
Play or pauseTap
PlayButton
WorldList2 choicesThe Moon
ViewList2 choices2D

About it

The ground here is real. On the Moon it comes from the laser altimeter and camera of NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (the CGI Moon Kit): Tycho crater, Copernicus crater and the Sea of Tranquility, where Apollo 11 landed. On Mars it comes from Mars Global Surveyor's laser altimeter: Gale crater, Jezero crater, Valles Marineris and Olympus Mons, colored by height. Heights are drawn taller than life so the shapes read; the site's card says how much.

Gravity pulls the lander down and the engine pushes it the way it points. Touch down slowly, upright and on level ground (the green lights mark flat spots) to score, with more for fuel left; land badly and it breaks apart. 2D is a true slice through the ground; the 3D button lifts the camera to show the whole patch of terrain around the slice, and the flight goes on.

Sources and credits

WorkByLicense
The Moon's ground: LRO's laser altimeter (LOLA) and camera (LROC), the CGI Moon KitNASA's Scientific Visualization Studio (Ernie Wright), from the LOLA and LROC teamsPublic domain
Mars's ground: Mars Global Surveyor's laser altimeter (MOLA), the MEGDR at 16 pixels a degreeNASA's Planetary Data System, the MOLA Science TeamPublic domain

Libraries

Apache-2.0
Basic Pitch, ONNX (lane Audio piano, October 21, 2026)
MIT
omggif 1.0.10
MIT
ONNX Runtime Web 1.30.0 (its modules)
MIT, Apache-2.0, BSD
PDF.js 6.3.289

Share it

This link opens it in the Playground. To put it on your own page, add the element and one script tag. Every option.

https://splashery.app/play/?toy=soft-landing<script type="module" src="https://splashery.app/play/src/element.js"></script> <splashery-toy toy="soft-landing"></splashery-toy>

Straight down

Through the middle of the world, the far side is 360° Photo, on Studio.

Fall throughIt stands 4.6° from the exact far side, the closest of any Splash.