CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — For more than a quarter century, space buffs have gathered by the thousands near the Kennedy Space Center, craning for views of shuttles bound for another world.

They had to wonder what it was like aboard.

The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex seeks to answer that question with its first thrill ride, the Shuttle Launch Experience. Beginning May 25, space "tourists" will buckle themselves into a simulator and rumble their way into earth orbit.

Or so they will think. Seats will pitch backward to 60 degrees. Low-frequency speakers and mechanical shakers will flood the cargo bay with pounding roar and vibration. Pneumatic seat devices will deflate at just the right moment to create the sensation of increased gravity forces.

Then, main-engine cut off, leaving riders in silence. With another combination of pitch, sight and sound, riders may feel the sensation of weightless for a second or two. The shuttle's overhead payload doors will open and riders will be looking down on the whole of Italy.

It's an illusion designed to trick the brain into believing that you've gone from zero to thousands of miles an hour, from ground to more than 200 miles in space — in just a few minutes, says Kennedy Visitor Complex spokeswoman Andrea Farmer.

When the ride is over, guests will file down a long spiral ramp underneath a ceiling set out as a massive star-studded sky. On a screen at the bottom center of the spiral, the earth goes by as if seen from the shuttle. And along the inner wall of the spiral ramp, historical plaques commemorate each of the 116 shuttle flights since 1981.

The Shuttle Launch Experience is part of the Visitor Complex's mission to connect with beings from that sometimes-distant galaxy called youth.

They hope the ride will lure those beings and their mother ships back into an orbit energized by an invisible magnetic forced called curiosity.

The Shuttle Launch Experience will be "fooling the senses" says Winston Scott, retired astronaut from Miami who was involved with financing the ride through a former job post.

"Well, our young kids are used to that. They get a certain amount of it, although very, very, minute when they sit down with their laptops and play video games."

The ride will also attract people interested in engineering and technology, he predicted.

The Shuttle Launch Experience isn't the first high-tech space ride in Central Florida. Epcot's Mission: Space at Walt Disney World opened in 2003. But while Mission: Space is one facet of a generalized theme park, Shuttle Launch Experience is a magnet in an otherwordly universe that's all about space.

Another difference: the technology. Mission: Space uses centrifugal force to create the sensation of increased gravity forces (G-forces) — a combination that proved so overwhelming to riders that Disney introduced a toned-down version of the ride.

The Shuttle Launch Experience uses the pneumatic deflating device in the seat, coupled with the upward angle of the rider and images on the big screen to create the illusion of increased gravity forces.

The Shuttle Launch Experience "is as close to real flight as I think visitors could have come," says retired astronaut Charles Bolden, who conducts the ride's taped simulator "briefing" before the ride.

Maybe by the next time a shuttle roars skyward — now set for 7:34 a.m. June 8 — some of those people who stood watching the last launch will have taken the new ride and nod confidently that they are a little closer to knowing what it might be like.