I was expecting something more like a Garry's Mod toolbox environment with the ability to quickly place stars, planets, moons, black holes, galaxies, etc. The GUI is not very user friendly making it very cumbersome to try things out. It has a lot of potential, but they really need to focus on cleaning up the user interface so you don't need an astrophysics degree to figure out what is going on.

This game, although arguably just a simulation, is magnificent. It doesn't try to be a big game that appeals to everyone, but it does manage to appeal to the unborn astrological physicist in everyone I've seen play it. Its library of different scenarios and locations can keep even the most unmoved, unimaginative people entertained. The game file is less than 100mb and it can run on most computers, making it the perfect toy for 5 minutes between meetings or lessons. This is the only game i have ever seen that successfully makes education fun, and i think its because you can shape what you do and because its your choice whether you learn from it, it doesn't require that you understand any previous facts, save the easy to use controls, to be able to play any part of the game. My favorite part about this game when you are looking across a scale of hundreds of light years across at two galaxies that you have just sent towards each other and the smooth immersive graphics let you slip your focus away from anything but the spiraling motion of the two galaxies. My second favorite part is changing scenario to two solar systems crashing into each other, and knowing that my favorite part of the game sees this happen hundreds of times over on a far larger scale. This game deserves a 10 because it successfully puts the player in the shoes of god, and its your choice whether you are a creative or destructive god.… Expand

It doesn't matter if you look at it as a game or a simulation - it is bad either way: plenty of bugs, crashes a lot, simulations become inaccurate pretty fast, and once you finish the tutorials and play around a bit...it loses its interest. The developers shouldn't have released it this way, or, as other have said, they shouldn't have charged so much for it if they did.

Guys, this is a game that Carl Sagan, Galileo, Newton, and whoever else looked up in the stars in wonder would kill for, its worth its price, its not anything that you should pay more than 10 dollars for. But I love it, being able to distort the gravitational flow of entire galaxies and seeing the stars fly off in every direction in a grand web of stars and lights in a great cosmic dark. Maybe because im just a cosmos nerd. If you dont have any interest in the stars, dont buy this game… Expand

Oh dear, I've just crashed the earth into the sun and then fired a huge basketball at the remnants

I have 6 words for moments like this.

That
Was
Awesome

Let's
Do it
Again

Universe Sandbox is not a game at all, it is a simulator. Whether it is an accurate simulator, I would not be able to tell you as I have not got the faintest clue about astrophysics. I purchased it hoping it would be fun to smack asteroids into planets but in fact, it isn't. What is fun is to test theories or stories that you hear. For example, I was playing Dead Space 2 and documents you find in this game speak of a planet that is "cracked" (Had a large portion of it removed) and I was wondering if this would have had any effect on our solar system so I decided to try it out in Universe Sandbox. Turns out nothing spectacular would happen if this were the case! Still, Universe Sandbox gave me a unique opportunity to see for myself. And that's what it is good for: What-if scenarios. Don't treat this as a game because it is not and you will be disappointed.… Expand

This is literally the worst game/simulation I've ever played. I gave up after 15 minutes of trying to figure out the 747 **** worth of non labeled buttons you're provided. Unless you're a rocket scientist avoid this POS confusion of a collaboration of garbage at all costs. It's like the designers all came up with 50 different ideas and threw them all together on the day it was supposed to be released and then said here... have this.… Expand

This is a very fun simulation that anyone with a even a mild interest in planetary mechanics should own. Used properly, it is very educational, but it has a very serious flaw that makes it more an item of curiosity than a true simulator: calculations are based on your time step instead of a true interpolation of the movement equations. Basically, it appears to just calculate the positions from one frame to the next and interpolates the motion as a straight line between those two points. What this means is that if you set a step of 1 second per frame, you get a very precise approximation of the motion of the stellar bodies, but if you accelerate the process and set the steps to 1 year per frame, the planets and stars no longer travel along smooth curved paths, but along a jagged path of connected straight lines. Aside from being ugly, this also gives incorrect results and often sends planets hurtling out of their orbits at tremendous speeds, which would not have happened with a better interpolation. The bottom line is that you can correctly simulate only stable systems at high speed; you can't speed up the effects of a destabilizing force to see what would actually happen. For all this, it's still well worth the $10 (or less if you grab it during one of Steam's sales). I mean, seriously. Don't you want to know what would happen if aliens replaced our sun with a black hole? Or what would happen if half the planets started orbiting in the opposite direction? You know you do! I now know and I sleep better at night for knowing it. ;-)… Expand

Besides crashing at first and second attempts to run this game and then every 15 minutes, fun from gameplay meets 0. You are just setting physical attributes of stellar objects and see as they run away or collide. Even achievements are "gorgeous": play this game for 1, 10, 100 hours etc.

This is a fun simulation program. I wouldn't really call it much of a game, but it can be very fun. You can play around with galaxies, stars, planets, moons, etc. You can either go onto the already made systems and toy around with them, perhaps crash a few planets together, etc, or you can create your own planet system if you wish. The game allows you to make alterations to the cosmic bodies, such as making them a certain mass and size for example. However, despite it being fun to create and destroy various systems in Universe Sandbox, it also gets repetitive very fast. I think this game could've been made even bigger and more diverse. So far we only have the planets of the solar system to play with, as well as some of the known stars, and basically about a dozen of each of the other object types, but there is no huge variety of what sort of worlds one can create. You cannot for example create an entire sci-fi universe in great detail in it. So yes - a very well done program, but could've been more diverse.… Expand

a pointless yet complex simulator that inexplicably works, only when it wants to and relies on obscure windows files to do so. on those rare occasions that i have seen it run, i haven't gotten much out of it because of the cumbersome interface and my own lack of knowledge in the field of astrophysics.

most of the functions of this game can't possibly be figured out by anything less than an amateur scientist. be prepared to learn nothing unless you are well practiced in high forms of math and astronomy...

in the event you accidentally get this program to run, it is best used as a screen saver. also i'd have to say, best to wait for a 75% discount because it is very likely that you will never see this program running on your pc...… Expand

A rather decent space simulation, quite nice once you figure out how to work things. Contrary to what people have said, it is user-friendly, just takes a little getting used to.

This is a wonderful simulator, anyone with an interest in space, astronomy, or just wants to watch mercury whiz around the sun should certainly consider picking this up.

The UI is cumbersome at first and it will take some getting used to, they have done well to hide most of the complexity slightly out of sight until you look for it which certainly helps ease you into it.

For what it does and what it offers, it's exactly what it claims to be and I can't help but commend the design team for it and recommend others to try it.

All negative reviews I've seen either had technical issues with it, or were clearly expecting something different. I also don't get why people keep saying it's not a game, it doesn't even claim to be one... doesn't mean you can't have fun in it.… Expand

It's hardly a game. Yes, you can rule your own universe or mess with existing one, but flawed user interface makes it a real pain. After trying more or less all of the possibilities within this game, you'll probably stop playing... Crushing planets with each other, merging galaxies - it's fun.For the first time. Later on, it becomes rather boring. Nevertheless, it is a interesting product, i would recommend it for all physic / astrophysic wannabies.… Expand

I found this application handy for constructing star systems in a sci-fi RPG I used to run. It's also got some fair entertainment value if you have sufficient imagination or curiosity about how complex planetary systems tend to work.

And if you're not satisfied with what you've created, you can always blow up the planet/sun/galaxy and start over.

This simulator is pretty bad. It really should be free. Charging money for it is just insulting and a rip off. If it were free it would be ok. Its is plague with numerous bugs and crashes constantly. The graphics are bad. Everything rotates way too fast. Some galaxies when you zoom to them are just one star, pretty lazy. You can destroy a planet, but when you do this it completely disregards the laws of gravity. It basically just rolls away. Mars doesn't even have moons in this simulator. its not very realistic at all and its the worst $10 I've spent in a long while. It would be nice to have a refund, but oh well. Again this should be available for free. The creator this simulator should be sued.… Expand

Serving as sort of a "universal" lesson on your computer, Universe Sandbox does well in delivering a pretty accurate model of the universe to play with. It offers different simulation types such as, The Solar System, The Earth and Moon, etc. They provide insight, or better said a more in-depth look into the celestial bodies that inhabit deep space. It is obviously not a game, but it is a pretty well-done and worth-while title for those who are interested in the cosmos and enjoy casual simulation games. If you are really interested in this kind of stuff, like I just said, then it receives an 8/10 from, and I for one love to learn about space. Although, it helps if you've learned astronomy in school to better understand its mechanics.… Expand

I love astrophysics but this simulation has left me disappointed. In an hour of play I've experienced seven crashes, and as many in-game errors that didn't result in a crash but made restarting my universe a necessity. On my modern and overclocked system increasing the speed to the point where you can really see things happen (more than 1 second = 50 days) quickly results in gross inaccuracies occurring. There is a lot of potential, however I have been left very underwhelmed and the price tag is indefensible with the "game" in this state.… Expand

For anyone who likes astronomy and/or sandbox type applications, then this is the game for you. This game has planets, stars, galaxies, and all kinds of things you can think about. ( Including teapots :p ) So far I would rate this game 4 out of 5, with it's different varieties of objects you can change and edit to your will. And the varieties of features they have are amazing and plentiful. I have been playing around
with an object's mass, diameter, and velocity only to have everything
crashing into that particular planet or star, and I didn't even mess with
the other features because this one was particularly more interesting.
So to anyone reading this review I recommend that you go buy this game.
It has lots of features and the visuals are amazing when it comes to particles,
also different options and settings which will help you're gaming experience.… Expand

Nothing to do here. Once you finish the tutorial and look at the pre-programmed simulations you're done. I hope you enjoyed your 1 hour of amusement. To be fair some of it is neat. The colliding galaxies is mesmerizing, and I never really appreciated Jupiters incredible collection of moons before. But at the end of the day for something with this much scope it feels oddly shallow. Setting up your own systems is tedious, obscure and unfulfilling. "Congrats you made a dot that spins around another dot" What then, watch it for a few hours? The program also seems to glitch badly when you try to do some interesting things. For example if you set an object on a collision course with a planet at a significant fraction of light speed it just goes straight though it with no effect. Where was my earth shattering kaboom? 5/10 for being a visual aid slightly more useful than a coffee table book about astronomy.… Expand

I don't get it why people say it's very user unfriendly, like most simulation game you just have to be patient and eventually when you get how it works it is awesome. So many possibilities.