Defender

Defender is an arcade video game developed released by Williams Electronics in 1980. A shooting game featuring two-dimensional (2D) graphics, the game is set on a fictional planet where the player must defeat waves of invading aliens while protecting astronauts. Development was led by Eugene Jarvis, a pinball programmer at Williams; Defender was Jarvis's first video game project, and drew inspiration from Space Invaders and Asteroids. Williams planned to display the game at the Amusement & Music Operators Association (AMOA) trade show, though development delays resulted in the team working on the game up until the show started. Defender was commercially successful, selling over 55,000 units to become the company's best selling arcade game. Praise among critics focused on the game's audio-visuals and gameplay. It is frequently listed as one of Jarvis's best contributions to the video game industry, as well as one of the most difficult video games. Defender was ported to numerous platforms, inspired the development of other games, and was followed by sequels and many imitations.

Defender put players in charge of a ship sent to protect mankind from wave after wave of attacking alien forces. Armed with smart bombs and the ability to use hyperspace to move quickly around the planet, the player ship must fight against Bombers, Pods, Swarmers, Baiters, and Landers - that can capture the humanoids and transform them into deadly and relentless Mutants. Fail to save the humanoids from freefall or Mutant transformation, and the planet is destroyed. Defender is a port with modern enhancements of the original 1981 arcade title released on Xbox Live Arcade on November 15th, 2006. On February 17th, 2010 Larry “Major Nelson” Hryb announced on Twitter that nine Midway Games had been removed from Xbox Live “due to publisher evolving rights and permissions”.

Released in conjunction with a 3D update of the classic arcade game on consoles, the Game Boy Advance version is also an update of the original, but retains its side-scrolling gameplay. The cartridge includes several variants of the game. The main mode is called "XGP". Its basics are the same as in the original: The player's spaceship flies left or right over a scrolling landscape that wraps around after a few screens. The goal is to destroy all invading aliens before they can capture the humans sitting on the ground. Besides updated graphics with various backgrounds and sprites for the enemies and humans, there are other differences as well: players can select from different ships, all with slightly different weapons and ratings for shields and speed. The XGP mode offers six different levels to complete. It can also be played by two players over the System Link. The cartridge also includes "Classic" mode, which is a port of the original arcade game. Finally, "XG" mode is the same gameplay-wise as Classic, but has been updated with graphics similar to the XGP mode.

On one of your patrols in deep space you encounter an abandoned base whose self-defense mechanisms are still functional. Upon detecting your presence the base launches several drones to destroy you. After having conquered three of these attack waves a force field containing of three layers will form at the bottom auf the screen protecting a SAM crawler. Your objctive now ist to shoot a gap into the horizontally moving force field in order to eliminate the SAM crawler while still being under attack by hostile drones. As soon as you breached the force field you have to pay attention not being shot down by the SAM crawler which will exploit the fact of you destroying the force field. The game comes with 16 game variations, some of them allowing you to use rapid fire while others make the attack drones invincible for your missiles or produce drones which clone themselves. Still some variants create a force field which will descend from above and is minimzing the space you are able to move in.

When you shoot rock, gem fall out. Get gem. More gem got without shoot = more combo point. Get 10000 point to become master of shoot rock. This was an entry for PICO-1K Jam 2022. The whole game fits in exactly 1024 bytes of compressed PICO-8 code.

Luminous of Stellar – is a s a top-down shooter sci-fi game with colorful ships and endless levels. Choose your own flight in space with two game modes endless and classic!

Akka Arrh is a previously unreleased prototype game created 1982 for the arcade. It saw it's first release in 2022 as part of the the Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration.

Round Invaders is an action arcade game with a fresh take on the famous Invaders arcade. Now the enemies come in circles, rays and ovals! Enjoy the plopping sounds while saving the Earth and rising your Score.

The Earth is under attack from the invading alien war machine! Take control of the Solar Blaster fighter ship and strike back! An action packed space shooter where you’ve got 2 minutes to get the high score.

An arcade shoot-'em-up which flips Defender by 90 degrees. You fly your ship through various waves of different types of enemy ships similar to those found in Defender - i.e. there is a baiter-type, pods, swarmers, landers (except that they don't land). There is also an added feature of an energy balloon; blast this twelve times and your firepower is increased. Your armament initially consists of a Defender style laser system. A function carried over from the sequel to Defender - Stargate - has also been included, inviso-flight. This makes you temporarily invisible and immune to enemy attack. The ship can go in four directions, and re-trace its steps to get an enemy that has been missed. You also have a long range radar scope to see what's coming up, and what's been left behind.

The mutants are back and this time they're faster. In your Mk.II Fighter you have to stop the Raiders flying across the planet and picking up Earthlings and turning them to Mutants when they reach the top of the screen. When all Earthlings are gone then it's game over. If you shoot a Raider holding an Earthling then it will drop him. You have to catch the Earthling and place him back on the surface. Other aliens to worry about are Hive, Dynamo, Technofighter, Firebomber and Lure. To help you in your fight you have a long range scanner, smart bomb, energy cloak, Hive convergence indicator and hyperfate. Guardian II is a Defender style 1 or 2 player horizontally sidewards scrolling shoot-em-up where you can go left or right. The joystick is used to steer your ship while the fire button fires your weapon. As well as your main playing area you can also see your radar, score and lives.

Starcosmic Invaders it's a game similar to Space Invaders in which you take command of the Earth's best fighter ship as you battle an enormous armada of alien starships.