Space Invaders
From Sega Retro
Space Invaders (スペースインベーダー) is a 1979 milestone arcade game developed by Taito. It was brought to a variety of home video game consoles and computers, including the SG-1000 in 1985. The SG-1000 version does not appear to have been released outside of Japan.
Contents
Gameplay
Space Invaders was the first fixed shooter game, and it is a progenitor of the shoot-'em-up genre. The player controls a laser turret that can move horizontally and must destroy waves of aliens invaders before they reach the ground. The game has a two-player alternating mode.
Each wave of aliens arranges itself in five rows of eleven invaders. They move left and right as a group, shifting downward (toward the player's turret) each time they reach a screen edge. The goal is to eliminate all of the aliens by shooting them. The aliens have projectile weapons that they occasionally fire at the player's cannon. The laser cannon is partially protected by four stationary defense bunkers, which are gradually destroyed from the top by the aliens (and can also be destroyed from the bottom if the player accidentally fires on one from below). As the invaders are destroyed, the movement of the remaining aliens speeds up.
When an entire wave has been defeated, another wave appears slightly lower than the last. Eventually, the wave spawns with the bottom row right on top of the bunkers. Then the next wave starts from the top of the screen, and subsequent waves are spawned progressively lower again. This loop continues until the game ends.
The player's laser cannon moves with 
or 
and shoots with 
or 
. The player has three lives and loses one whenever the laser turret is hit by an enemy. However, the game ends immediately if an alien reaches the bottom of the screen.
Enemies
| Octopus | |
|---|---|
| Worth 10 points. | |
| Crab | |
| Worth 20 points. | |
| Squid | |
| Worth 30 points. | |
| UFO | |
| This enemy occasionally flies quickly across the top of the screen and randomly awards 50, 100, 150, 200, or 300 points if destroyed. |
Photo gallery
Versions
Surprisingly, the SG-1000 port of the game was one of the most accurate of its time, surpassing the NES and MSX versions (which were the console's main competitors). Though it adds more color (the arcade version was simply black and white, with translucent overlays to mimic color), the SG-1000 version retains all the original graphics, whereas other ports (especially for Atari systems) redrew the invaders due to various graphical restrictions.
Physical scans
SG-1000 version
| Sega Retro Average | ||||
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N/A |
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| Based on 0 reviews | |
| SG-1000, JP |
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     Cover
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  Cart  Manual |
| SG-1000, TW |
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Technical information
ROM dump status
| System | Hash | Size | Build Date | Source | Comments | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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16kB | Cartridge (JP) | |||||||||||
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16kB | Cartridge (TW) |
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 https://sega.jp/history/hard/sc3000/software.html (Wayback Machine: 2020-09-28 02:34)
- ↑ Game Machine, "1985-07-15" (JP; 1985-07-15), page 8
| Space Invaders | |
|---|---|
|
Main page | Comparisons | Magazine articles | Reception | |
| Space Invaders games for Sega systems |
|---|
| Space Invaders (1985) | Space Invaders '90 (1990) | Super Space Invaders (1992) | Space Invaders (1996) |
| Space Invaders (Dreamcast) (unreleased) |
| Space Invaders VIC Dual Clones |
| Alpha Fighter (19??) | Invinco (1979) | Space Attack (1979) | Super Space Attack (1979) |