About Star Defender
Star Defender puts you at the controls of a small rocket at the bottom of a starfield while asteroids rain down from above. Your ship fires automatically, so all you need to do is slide left and right, line up shots and stay out of the way.
How to play
- The action starts as soon as the game loads, and your ship fires a shot straight up about four and a half times per second without any input.
- Asteroids come in different sizes. Smaller ones are destroyed by one shot; larger ones (the brown rocks) take two hits and turn grey after the first.
- A destroyed asteroid scores points equal to its size, from 12 points for the smallest to 30 for the largest.
- Asteroids that reach the bottom of the screen simply disappear. There is no penalty for letting them through.
- A single collision between an asteroid and your ship ends the game. There are no extra lives.
- Difficulty rises steadily for the first 90 seconds: asteroids arrive more often (from every 0.9 seconds down to every 0.3) and fall faster. After that it stays at full intensity.
Controls
- Keyboard: hold Left and Right arrows, or A and D, to move the ship.
- Mouse: the ship follows the pointer horizontally when it is over the game.
- Touch: press and drag on the game; the ship follows your finger.
Tips and strategy
- Survival matters more than kills. Since missed asteroids cost nothing, dodge first and shoot second.
- Big brown rocks are worth more but need two hits. Get underneath them early so both shots land before they reach you.
- Asteroids drift sideways as they fall. Judge where a rock will be when it reaches your height, not where it is now.
- Stay near the middle of the screen when you can, so you have room to escape in either direction.
- After about a minute and a half the game stops getting harder, so if you survive that long, the remaining challenge is consistency rather than adapting to new speeds.
Background
Star Defender belongs to the fixed shooter genre, where the player's ship moves along one edge of the screen and fires at enemies coming from the other side. The genre took off in arcades with Taito's Space Invaders in 1978, designed by Tomohiro Nishikado, and was followed by games such as Namco's Galaxian in 1979. Falling-rock variants like this one strip the idea down to dodging and aiming, which suits short sessions and touch screens.
Questions
- Do I need to press a button to shoot?
- No. The ship fires automatically and continuously. You only control its left and right position.
- Does it get harder?
- Yes, for the first 90 seconds. Asteroids spawn more often and fall faster until then, after which the difficulty stays constant.
- Is there a penalty for letting asteroids pass?
- No. Rocks that reach the bottom vanish without affecting your score. The only way to lose is to be hit.