Pixel Arcade
About this game
Star Swarm is a gallery shooter where the enemies refuse to stay put. Each wave flies in along a curved entry path, settles into a grid at the top of the screen, and then sends one, two or three fighters at a time on diving attack runs that sweep past your cannon and loop back around.
You move left and right with the arrow keys and fire with space, or use the pad and fire button on touch. Up to two of your shots can be in flight at once, which makes rapid tapping genuinely better than holding a key. Enemies in formation score 50 to 150; the same enemy shot while diving is worth double, so patient players who wait for the dive out-score players who empty the grid from the bottom up.
The signature mechanic is the capture beam. A boss enemy will occasionally drop a tractor beam over your ship. If it catches you, you lose that life, but the captured fighter reappears attached to the boss — shoot that boss down and your ship joins your current one as a twin fighter with double the guns and double the width to keep safe.
Between waves a bonus stage sends a scripted flight of enemies that never shoot back; clearing every one of them pays a large bonus. Dive-attack shooters like this arrived a few years after the fixed-formation cabinets and were the first to make enemy movement the main event.
FAQ
What is the twin ship?
If a boss enemy tractors your fighter away and you shoot that enemy down, you get your ship back alongside your current one — double firepower, double the hitbox.
Is it harder than a static gallery shooter?
Different rather than harder. Nothing marches at you, but the diving runs come from unpredictable angles.
Touch controls?
Yes, left, right and fire under the screen.
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