''Battle Squadron'' is a one or two player

vertically scrolling shooter A vertically scrolling video game or vertical scroller is a video game in which the Player (game), player views the field of play principally from a top-down perspective, while the background Scrolling, scrolls from the top of the screen to the b ...

released in 1989 for the

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers produced by Commodore International, Commodore from 1985 until the company's bankruptcy in 1994, with production by others afterward. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16-b ...

. It is a sequel to '' Hybris''. A version for the

Mega Drive The Sega Genesis, known as the outside North America, is a 16-bit Fourth generation of video game consoles, fourth generation home video game console developed and sold by Sega. It was Sega's third console and the successor to the Master Sys ...

was released in 1990. The game was later ported to iOS devices (2011), Android (2012) and in 2013 also to

AmigaOS 4 AmigaOS 4 (abbreviated as OS4 or AOS4) is a line of Amiga operating systems which runs on PowerPC microprocessors. It is mainly based on AmigaOS 3.1 source code developed by Commodore International, Commodore, and partially on version 3.9 develop ...

, Windows, OS X and

MorphOS MorphOS is an AmigaOS-like operating system designed for Power and PowerPC based computers. The core, based on the Quark microkernel, is proprietary, although several libraries and other parts are open source, such as the Ambient desktop. The p ...

Plot

Taking place many years in the future in another star system, a century long war is waging between the Earth Defense Fleet and the Barrax Empire. Two Earth Defense Commanders, Lori Bergin and Barry Mayers, were returning from a research and destroy mission regarding the latest Barrax technologies on planet Urania, when suddenly a Barrax cruiser materialized behind them, brought their ship in and took the commanders hostage on planet Terrainia. The player's mission is to rescue the Commanders and eliminate all Barrax threats in the process.

Gameplay

''Battle Squadron'' supports both mouse and joystick controlled play. The game is played from the perspective of elite fighter pilots of the Earth Defense Fleet, known as the Battle Squadron sent to rescue two human agents, Commanders Berry D. Mayers and Lori Bergin, from the clutches of the ruthless alien empire, known as the Barrax. The player's fighters carry unlimited projectile weaponry and a finite number of Nova Smart Bombs. Players acquire weapons by shooting down Barraxian Artillery Gunships which carry weapon Power-Up icons. Weapons include the Red Magnetic Torps, the powerful Green Emerald Laser, the two-way firing Blue Anti-Matter Particle Beam and the sideways firing Orange Magma Wave. Other pick-up items include Barraxian jewel caches marked by small green X's which are worth 1000 points each. The player has the option to increase the number and speed of enemy bullets therefore altering the game's difficulty. Notable features of the game are relatively big sprites (with

Predator Predation is a biological interaction in which one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common List of feeding behaviours, feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation ...

-esque cloaking effects applied to a few) and numerous weapon upgrades (supposedly 25 in total). Barraxian opponents consist of ground installations (generally gun turrets and launch platforms), ground vehicles, aircraft and numerous genetically-engineered living weapons. Enemies include: *Cargo vehicles that drop weapon upgrades upon destruction. *Four-craft squadrons of Barrax fighters that will release an extra, collectable Nova Bomb upon destruction of the entire squadron. *Two different varieties of gigantic, apparently robotic terror machines, functioning as the bosses of two separate levels. *What appear to be several giant faces in the terrain, once again, serving as end-of-level bosses. *The Barrax Nova Cruiser, the end-game boss.

Reception

In 1989, ''

The Games Machine ''The Games Machine'' was a video game magazine that was published from 1987 until 1990 in the United Kingdom by Newsfield, which also published '' CRASH'', ''Zzap!64'', '' Amtix!'' and other magazines. History ''The Games Machine'' ran head ...

'' rated ''Battle Squadron'' as 87%. It stated while the premise sounds similar to other games, "what makes this game work is its ultra-fast playing speed. And with multiple frames of animation for each onscreen sequence, it gives a believable feeling of really blowing up baddies and wiping out ground installations". It noted what puts this game ahead of other shooting games is "the rapid-fire animation, couple with effective sound and a long running music track containing the right amount of droning bass". The German edition of ''

Retro Gamer ''Retro Gamer'' is a British magazine, published worldwide, covering Retrogaming, retro video games. It was the first commercial magazine to be devoted entirely to the subject. Launched in January 2004 as a quarterly publication, ''Retro Gamer'' ...

'', in a 2016 special on

, highlighted that the 1989 version of "''Battle Squadron'' was simply brilliantly made; sparkling clean graphics and exquisite playability ensured sophisticated action fun".

References

External links

*
''Battle Squadron'' Soundtrack Remix
by the original composer, Ron Klaren * {{abime, id=72 * Downloadabl
demo versions
of ''Battle Squadron'' 1989 video games Amiga games AmigaOS 4 games Android (operating system) games Cope-Com games Innerprise Software games IOS games MorphOS games Multiplayer and single-player video games Piko Interactive games Sega Genesis games Vertically scrolling shooters Video games developed in Denmark