Blasteroids

Blasteroids
North American Arcade Flyer
Developer(s)	Atari Games
Publisher(s)	Atari Games (coin-op), Image Works (ports)
Designer(s)	Ed Rotberg
Platform(s)	Arcade (original) Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Atari ST, C64, MSX, MS-DOS, ZX Spectrum
Release date(s)	1987
Genre(s)	Multi-directional shooter
Mode(s)	Single player, Multiplayer

Blasteroids is the third official sequel to the 1979 shoot 'em up video game Asteroids. It was developed by Atari Games and released as a coin-operated game in 1987. Unlike the previous games, Blasteroids uses raster graphics, not vector graphics.

Home computer ports of Blasteroids were released 1989 by Image Works for the Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Atari ST, C64/128, MSX, MS-DOS, and ZX Spectrum. Additionally, though it had not appeared in a Midway Arcade compilation prior, an emulated version of Blasteroids was included in Lego Dimensions as an unlockable mini-game.

The gameplay for the game is basically the same as for the original; the player (or players in case of a 2-player game) controls a spaceship viewed from "above" in a 2D representation of space, by rotating the ship, and using thrust to give the ship momentum. To slow down or completely stop moving, the player has to rotate the ship to face the direction it came from, and generate the right amount of thrust to nullify its momentum. The ship has a limited amount of fuel to generate thrust with. This fuel comes in the form of "Energy" that is also used for the ship's Shields which protect it against collisions and enemy fire. Once all Energy is gone, the player's ship is destroyed. The ship can shoot to destroy asteroids and enemy ships. The ship can also be transformed at will into 3 different versions, namely the "Speeder", the fastest version, the "Fighter", which has the most firepower, and the "Warrior", which has extra armour.