Space Shooters

I remember the first time I was exposed to a real space shooter. (By “space shooter,” I mean a game where you control a starfighter (or dragon, or some other flying object) and pilot it through a huge swarm of enemies. By “real”, I mean that ancient arcade-style stuff like Asteroids and Space Invaders don’t count, because they don’t look cool, they don’t involve interesting decisions, and they have a low reward-to-challenge ratio.) It was an arcade game called Nemesis that I glimpsed briefly on a ferry, to or from some Cub Scout activity I think. It was a side-scroller, which I guess was unique partly because it involved terrain; a lot of top-scrolling games feature enemies but no environmental elements like walls. Terrain helps distinguish one area from the next and reduces the monotony of a game. The other thing I noticed in the few moments I saw the demo was that the ship gained little “helpers” that followed it around and matched its firepower. And apparently they were invincible. That image kind of stuck in my head as a cool science fiction theme. Some time later, my parents got me a subscription to Nintendo Power, and among the incentives was a set of four guides – one full of NES games, one for Game Boy, another for Super Nintendo, and another that contained everything you’d want to know about Super Mario World. Probably the coolest sign-up bonus they ever gave, and not just because of the hints and maps – I was able to sort of experience by proxy a lot of games that I wouldn’t bother playing, let alone buying. But I digress.

The Game Boy guide included a section for a game called Nemesis – and to my delight it seemed to be in the same series as the arcade game that had caught my eye before. Actually both seemed to be sequels to a well-known game called Gradius. (I kind of liked the name Nemesis better, but Gradius is also very cool. But you have to pronounce it with a short A sound, as in gladius or graduate. I’ve heard it said “grade-ius”, but that’s not cool.) I’ve still never played that game, but I looked at maps and read about the innovative power-up method, which is noteworthy in itself and will be discussed later.

(Strangely, I had seen Lifeforce, a glorious sequel to Gradius, many times at a friend’s birthday parties. Evidently I hadn’t looked closely enough to make the connection, because when I saw the distinctive Moai enemies near the end of the game, I was surprised to learn that the game was connected to Gradius.)

What I’m getting at is that I was intrigued by the space shooter genre long before I ever played a game in it. Which is probably good, because if there is one consistency among space shooters, it’s that they’re very difficult. Most of them are unreasonably difficult, as in one hit destroys you. I’m happy to say that I’ve managed to beat a handful of these games, most of them in the Gradius series. I even created a short one for my senior project in high school. I don’t think I’ve ever come across an “Ideal” one though. Maybe one day I’ll try making one. But before I get into what I consider to be ideal, I will catalog what I consider to be the important distinguishing elements of space shooter games.

Extra Life Handling

There are two main ways games handle losing a life when you have extra lives available:

1. You lose all power-ups and return to the last checkpoint.

2. You lose all power-ups, and your ship appears at the bottom/side of the screen, with a few moments of invincibility in case you’re inside a solid object.

The second method is generally used in games with a two-player option, so that both players can be on the screen at all times. There are advantages and disadvantages. In one sense, not having to go back may mean that you can get through a tricky part just by having enough lives , since the screen usually scrolls continuously. (Boss battles are an exception.) On the other hand, if you continue right where you lost, it may be difficult or impossible to power up your ship before you encounter the next difficult area, increasing the likelihood that you’ll lose more lives. In contrast, returning to a checkpoint may give you an opportunity to power up again before you get the place that was giving you trouble.

Taking Hits

As stated before, space shooter games punish you severely for coming into contact with anything other than power ups or your own shots (or your partner, if it’s a multi-player game). Here are some of the common results:

1. You lose a life immediately. This is by far the most common result.

2. You have a health meter, and getting hit reduces it by one unit. You may also lose some of your power-ups, if any. Of course if you run out of health, you lose a life. Dragon Spirit gives you a three-hit health meter, and having that small bit of leeway makes that game feel much more reasonable than others in the series.

3. The UN Squadron method: You lose some health, and for a few seconds you’re in “Danger”, which means that another hit will cost you a life, no matter how much health you have left.

Shields

Even games with no health meter will sometimes give you a way of temporarily protecting yourself from at least some attacks. (Crashing into something will generally cause damage, shields or not.)

1. Timed invincibility: Protects you from everything, but only for a limited time. Not very common.

2. Barrier: Positions an object near your ship that blocks attacks coming from that direction. The object itself is generally invincible, but solid objects and some attacks can still get through it. R-Type features this type of shielding.

3. Limited use: Protects your ship from shots or contact with weak enemies. Generally absorbs a limited number of hits, and then disappears. This is probably the most common. This category has additional sub-categories

• A force field protects your whole ship, and it only takes damage when you normally would have taken damage.
• Your whole ship is protected, but the hit box is larger than that of your ship alone. This means that if you squeeze through a tight spot, your shield may vanish even though your ship didn’t touch anything. This is infuriating behavior, but the later Gradius games feature this type of force field. I guess it’s so you’ll keep needing to power up once your attack power is at maximum.
• The shield only protects a part of your ship. Later Gradius games give you this choice as an alternative to the full-ship force field, the trade-off being that the partial barrier can absorb many more hits than the force field.

4. The Ikaruga method: I’ve never played Ikaruga, but the idea of it is pretty interesting. All the enemies and shots you encounter are either Light or Dark polarity. Your ship can switch between Light and Dark at any time. If you touch a shot that’s the opposite polarity, you lose a life. But you can absorb shots that are the same polarity as you (and doing so charges your special weapon meter). You do double damage to enemies of opposite polarity. So you have this constant trade-off between protecting yourself and getting rid of enemies quickly so you won’t become overwhelmed later. Of course there’s no rule that Light and Dark enemies can’t be attacking at the same time.

Power-Up Methods

One of the main distinguishing features of a space shooter is the way that you power up your ship. Strangely, starfighter designers seem incapable of building advanced features into their vessels, although the ships are able to add abilities from items they find, usually after defeating a particular enemy. Here are the ways some games handle upgrading your ship:

· The classic method: As you defeat enemies (or just reach certain points in the levels), items will appear. Each item will add or upgrade a particular ability on your ship, such as allowing you to fire in multiple directions or increasing the strength of your shots. (Dragon Spirit and R-Type uses this method.)

· The Gradius method: In Gradius games, you have a power-up meter made of several boxes, each of which represents a different class of power-up: Speed Up, Missile, Laser, etc. More valuable upgrades appear farther to the right. The first power-up capsule you get lights up the first item (Speed Up), and each subsequent capsule advances the meter one to the right. At any point when you have an item lit up on your meter, you can press the Power Up button to activate that item and clear the meter. Or, you can wait to capture more capsules and advance the meter to a different item. This is quite an innovative power-up strategy; since powering up involves continual decision making, Gradius games feel less monotonous than a lot of other shooters.

· The Raiden method: I’ve only played the freeware flash game Raiden X in this series, but it has an interesting twist on the classic power-up method. I understand that the “real” games in the series are similar. There are three types of main power-ups: Laser (strong but only firing straight forward), spread (weaker but shots fire diagonally as well as straight), and homing (very weak, but beam curves to hit enemies, wherever they are). Each type is represented by a color, and power-up items rotate through the colors as they fly around the screen. If you pick up an item that is the same as your current color, your attack level will increase. (More shots, or stronger beam.) If you pick up a different color, your level stays the same but you switch to the other weapon type. So obviously you’re encouraged to stick with one type for a long period, so you can maximize its level.

· Purchased items: UN Squadron is sort of unique in that you purchase weapons before you start a level (or before you start a new life), using “points” you get from defeating enemies. You then have a limited number of those weapons to use in that level.

· Permanent Items: Space Battle for the Zune has items that appear randomly as you progress through the game. Each item increases some attributes and may decrease others. At the start of each level, you can choose which items to equip.

· No power-ups: Some games (Ikaruga is one) give you all your abilities at the beginning, and there are no power-ups to gather. The decisions are all about which weapon or ability is best-suited to each situation. There may also be a notion of upgrading your abilities as you use them, in which case you may have to balance sticking with one weapon to power it up against switching among them to stay well-balanced.

Terrain

Some games, especially the arcade-style, vertically-scrolling ones, have no terrain. Instead, the only things in your way are the destroyable enemies and their shots. I think it’s a lot more interesting when the game sends you through some actual terrain. Having a floor and ceiling creates an opportunity for new types of enemies, and walls to doge can help make individual levels feel more unique from the rest of the game. Also, platforms in the middle of the screen can create multiple paths through a level, adding to the choices the game presents you with. Terrain is more common in side-scrolling games, although Dragon Spirit and Lifeforce (in which half the levels scroll vertically) are exceptions.

Getting Started

Before I finish, I’ll mention a few considerations for anyone who, like me, is intrigued by the idea of a space shooter but doesn’t want to spend their whole life memorizing bullet patterns by trial and error. If I were to pick an ideal game to get started, it would have to be one of these:

· Lifeforce (for the NES): This game features the classic Konami Code, which in this case gives you thirty lives per continue instead of the usual three. Since the game also has you start new lives instantly instead of sending you back to a checkpoint, this means that with a reasonable amount of practice you can beat at least the first level without too much trouble. If you can lose no more than about 15 lives per level, your three continues will see you through the whole game. (Yes, that’s cheating, but that’s a valid learning strategy.)

· Gradius 3 (SNES): The really nice thing about this game is that it lets you choose your power-up configuration before you begin – that is, what kinds of missiles, what kinds of lasers, etc. I’ve found that the following configuration will let you cut your way through the game with a minimum of anguish:

• Hawk Wind missiles. They fire up when you’re on the top half of the screen, and down when you’re on the lower half. If you fly in the center, with Options (clone helper ships) above and below you, you can take out ground enemies pretty effectively.
• Double: It doesn’t matter which type you choose – you won’t use it, since it’s not compatible with Lasers.
• Twin Lasers. You can fire them and then dodge, and they’ll still travel toward where you fired at, unlike Cyclone Lasers. More importantly, in areas with solid matter you have to fire through (like dirt or the pellets in bonus stages), Twin Lasers will cut through it more thoroughly than other weapon types.
• Formation Options. Being able to fire from above and below your ship minimizes the amount of time you need to risk near the floor or ceiling. It also means that you can push your Options through a thin surface to fire on the other side without first going to that spot on your screen, like you’d have to do with standard Options. (The Rolling Option type has a similar advantage, but all that constant spinning can be distracting, and it just doesn’t look as cool.)
• Reduce-type Shields. This shrinks your ship so it’s harder to hit, but more importantly, it doesn’t increase your hit box, like all the other Shield types do. It doesn’t look as cool, and it only absorbs three hits (making it the weakest shield ever), but it’s worth it because your shield won’t go vanishing on you when you dodge through a narrow passage or between a pair of enemy lasers.
• Full Barrier. This will put your Shield at full strength if it’s partially damaged. Without this, you can only recharge your Shield if it’s completely gone, which means you’re vulnerable. (Speed Down is another valid choice. Normally you would want only one or two Speed Ups, but there’s one level where you have to have three in order to avoid the fast-scrolling walls. Once that part’s over, you’ll find that your ship is overly jumpy. If you don’t have Speed Down, the only way to slow down is to blow up, and then of course you have to start powering up all over. But I’d rather do that once than go without Full Barrier for the whole game.)

· Gradius Galaxies (GBA): This game is pretty hard, but it also includes a Save feature. You can start in any section of any level you’ve been to, and it backs up your progress with a battery. So while you may spend a lot of time powered down, you can try an area as many times as it takes to get through it.

Conclusion

That about covers the variations – beyond that, each game is a lot is about powering up and staying powered up, so you’ll be able to take out the endless swarms and monstrous boss enemies that come at you. The “one pilot vs. an entire alien army” theme is pretty epic feeling, and – as frustrating as it is to be constantly blowing up – when you do get past a frustrating spot, it’s rather rewarding. Now, if they could just invent starfighters for real, we’d be all set.