Astro Blaster

Atari console exclusive

The player controls a ship (bearing a resemblance to the Battlestar Galactica) which can fire and move left or right. The player must continuously monitor the onscreen temperature and fuel gauges; if the ship overheats, its weapon is disabled, and if it is depleted of fuel, the vessel itself explodes. The player must battle through waves of enemies, which attack with varied formations and flight patterns. When a wave is destroyed, a new one appears.

Released: 31 December 1981
Platforms: Arcade Atari 7800 MSX ZX Spectrum
Genres: Arcade Shooter
Developers: —
Publishers: —
Modes: Single-player
Perspective: Third person Bird view / Isometric
Themes: Action Science fiction
Country: United States

About

Astro Blaster is a 1981 fixed shooter video game developed and published by Gremlin/Sega for arcades; in Japan, it was released by Gremlin's parent company Sega. It was designed and programmed by Gary Shannon and Barbara Michalec. The game uses speech synthesis and during attract mode a voice says "Fighter pilots needed in sector wars...play Astro Blaster!" It is the first video game to have a copyright registered in Japan.

Keywords

shoot 'em up
bullet time
slow-motion
vertical scrolling
speech synthesis

Media

The articlegameplay, story, development, reception

Gameplay

The player controls a ship which can fire and move left or right. The player must continuously monitor the onscreen temperature and fuel gauges. If the ship's laser overheats, it is disabled until it cools; and if fuel is depleted, the game ends regardless of how many lives the player has left. The player must battle through waves of enemies, which attack with varied formations and flight patterns.

When a wave is destroyed, a new one appears. The Warp function is usable once per sector or life, temporarily slowing all enemy vessels and making them easier to shoot.

Reception

In his 1981 book How to Master the Video Games, Tom Hirschfeld stated that Astro Blaster challenges players with 29 different attacks across six sectors, with each sector becoming progressively more difficult.