Buzz Aldrin shot down two MiG-15 aircraft. After earning a Sc.D. degree in astronautics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Aldrin was selected as a member of NASA's Astronaut Group 3, making him the first astronaut with a doctoral degree. His doctoral thesis was "Line-of-Sight Guidance Techniques for Manned Orbital Rendezvous", earning him the nickname "Dr. Rendezvous" from fellow astronauts. His first space flight was Gemini 12 during which he spent over five hours on extravehicular activity (EVA) outside the spacecraft. Aldrin set foot on the Moon at 03:15:16 on July 21, 1969 (UTC), nine minutes after Armstrong first touched the surface,
Buzz Aldrin's Race Into Space of the mission launches, and new multiplayer modes. The developers worked to maintain historical accuracy, including all the actual major space hardware and several alternative proposals that were considered at the time, but did make some compromises and simplifications in the name of game balance and avoiding complexity. They also consulted Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin, who gave permission for his name to be used for the game. "Buzz Aldrin's Race Into Space" has two sides, the United States and the Soviet Union, unlike "LIFTOFF!" which supported up to four (the other two sides in "Liftoff!" were Europe and Asia).