Somewhere in the depths of space is a coalition of aliens who are completely and unreasonably mad at a city on Earth. It’s hard to say why this is, whether that be a stray parking ticket or someone there drinking their koks without frapping it, but whatever it may have been that city’s got to go. The aliens won’t stop escalating their attacks until its shield is down and the city is wiped from the universe for good, taking all of humanity with it in one final massive explosion. It would probably be a little easier for them, though, if the city wasn’t defended not only by its shield but a massive gun capable of nearly-overwhelming firepower.
Shooting Like Vector Graphics Survived To the 90s
Utopia Must Fall is an arcade game yanked forward from 1983, when color vector graphics were at their peak with games like Star Wars Arcade and Major Havoc. While superficially similar to Missile Command, the game is more about heavy firepower than careful management of a limited resource (which also happens to be firepower) to defend a city against invaders. The aliens attack in waves and in between each one is the traditional “choose one of these powerups” selection screen, slowly transforming the cannon and all its aspects into an alien decimation device of unrivaled power. Which would be great if the aliens didn’t have a serious case of strength in numbers on their side.
Review: Tempest 4000
Tempest 4000 is a fantastic conclusion to Llamasoft’s work on the games and easily holds its place amidst the classics of Atari’s flagship arcade series.
They’ve also got variety on their side as well. From the starting asteroids to trails of enemies streaming across the sky, some hone in on the city to beat down the shield while others fly into formation to drop bombs. Bigger ships show up with high-explosive nukes, but everything can be shot down and the explosions don’t care if they blow up a city or its enemies. Performing certain feats like killing all enemies in a formation, not using your own stockpile of nukes, or blowing up enemies by catching them in the blast of their own bombs also adds to the counter at wave’s end, which when filled gives a bonus upgrade. A post-level double-upgrade is a perfect time to pick one that upgrades firepower and another that has no immediate effect but opens up a new branch of the tech tree, which gets more transformative as it goes. It may take a fairly long run to earn a regenerating shield that zaps any enemy too close that’s backed up by multiple laser stations on the ground while the main gun is now a high-speed multi-shot powerhouse, but there’s more than enough enemies to soak it all up and still leave you scrambling to hold on.
One of the quirks of vector graphic monitors is that as they aged they tended to have ghost lines show up where they shouldn’t. you’re able to see this reproduced on the title screen of Utopia Must Fall, although to an exaggerated extent, mimicking the phosphor not quite turning off as it should when racing from one line to the next as it zips around the screen.
Utopia Must Fall had a fairly hefty demo available back in June that was great fun, especially for anyone with a fondness for vector graphics, but the full game is about ready to launch into Early Access on September 9. You can see a four-minutegameplay trailer here, or if pressed for time a somewhat shorter one below.
