Landing

By MrNoHelp 

Landing on planets is one of the duties that the prisoner can do aside from space exploration.

Acquiring the landing legs

In order to allow the envelope to land on planets and asteroids, it is necessary to complete the missions assigned by Salmeen, the mechanic.  After completing the missions, Salmeen will permanently take an emergency envelope and gives you the landing pods in exchange.

Landing on planets

Once the legs are installed, it is only possible to explore the surface of planets with breathable air. If a prisoner wants to land on planets with non-breathable air, then he/she ought to seek the spacesuit through the mission "The Space Suit". Landing on a planet costs a single Hydrogen Capsule. 

To commence a landing mission, you must click this button located in the lower left hand corner of the screen: 

Land on Surface

When decending to the planet's surface, clicking the mouse will activate the thrusters, slowing descent. Every time you do this, fuel is used up, and the amount you have left is shown by the fuel indicator: 

Fuel Indicator

An envelope thrusting on the way down to the surface

When nearing the surface it is important that the envelope is travelling very slowly to give the landing pods a chance to come out. This becomes easier as the landing pods are extended. The area that you land on must also be relatively level (flat) and not be cluttered with debris or objects.

Landed envelope

If the prisoner fails to land and explodes, he/she will go back to space and the used Hydrogen capsule is gone for good.

The prisoner must keep an eye on the fuel indicator, if the fuel is depleted while the envelope is still in the air, the envelope will crash. Likewise, if there is not enough amount of fuel for leaving the planet surface, the landing is considered as a failure (although any Minerals collected are still counted, and in the case of transport missions you will not lose any ET you may have picked up).

Why landing is important

Landing is not only an alternative way to acquire Minerals, but there are also several missions and envelope upgrades that require landing. It is also possible to encounter alien lifeforms in big domes such as surface Merchants,  those who seek transportation or NPCs that sell rare PID map fragments. In some cases, the prisoner will not find anything on the surface.

Meeting a lifeform             

Surface minerals

The color of the Minerals resembles the color of the mineral bricks that can be found through the galaxy. You only have to walk through the Minerals to collect them and the total amount collected is totally random from surface to surface.

Leaving the planet

If the prisoner wants to leave the planet, he/she needs to go the envelope and attempt to fly around the hatch to enter the envelope. Once the prisoner manages to enter the envelope, the total amount of minerals gathered will appear above the envelope, then the prisoner has to fly to the top of the screen. When the message "MISSION OK" appears on screen, it means that surface exploration was successful.

Successfully entered envelope