''Space Impact'' is a

mobile game A mobile game, or smartphone game, is a video game that is typically played on a mobile phone. The term also refers to all games that are played on any portable device, including from mobile phone (feature phone or smartphone), tablet, PDA t ...

series that was published by

Nokia Nokia Corporation (natively Nokia Oyj, referred to as Nokia) is a Finnish multinational telecommunications, information technology, and consumer electronics corporation, established in 1865. Nokia's main headquarters are in Espoo, Finlan ...

and its games usually came bundled with several Nokia devices. The first Space Impact appeared on the

Nokia 3310 The Nokia 3310 is a GSM mobile phone announced on 1 September 2000, and released in the fourth quarter of the year, replacing the popular Nokia 3210. It sold very well, being one of the most successful phones, with 126 million units sold wor ...

in 2000 and later included in other models released throughout 2001-2004, including

Nokia 3410 The Nokia 3410 is a mobile phone made by Nokia, the successor of the popular Nokia 3310. It was announced at CEBIT on 12 March 2002. The 3410 was the first Java phone by Nokia, as well as being one of the earliest mobile phones outside Japan to ...

, 5510,

Nokia 5210 The Nokia 5210 is a mobile phone manufactured by Nokia. Announced on 19 November 2001, it was released in early 2002. The 5210 is designed for use in tough conditions and is dust, shock and water resistant. It features rubber Xpress-on shells, WAP ...

, Nokia 2100 and 6310. The Nokia 3310's WAP enhanced versions (3330 and 3350) and the

versions gave the possibility to download extra Space Impact chapters via the phone's WAP connection (the service called Nokia Club). A Space Impact-themed Xpress-on cover was released for devices including Nokia 3410.

Gameplay

Space Impact is a

shoot 'em up Shoot 'em ups (also known as shmups or STGs ) are a sub-genre of action games. There is no consensus as to which design elements compose a shoot 'em up; some restrict the definition to games featuring spacecraft and certain types of chara ...

game and the player has the ability to freely move horizontally and vertically (with a few exceptions on some platform-like levels in ''Space Impact+'') but cannot increase the speed of the screen's auto-scrolling feature. The player can collect power-ups throughout the levels, which award extra lives or special weapons.

Series

Sequels for the original game later appeared: *''Space Impact II'', which debuted on Nokia 3510 and later appeared in Nokia's

CDMA Code-division multiple access (CDMA) is a channel access method used by various radio communication technologies. CDMA is an example of multiple access, where several transmitters can send information simultaneously over a single communication ...

models - Identical gameplay to the original, with new levels and enemies *''Space Impact+'' included in

Nokia 1100 The Nokia 1100 (and closely related variants, the Nokia 1101 and the Nokia 1108) is a basic GSM mobile phone produced by Nokia. Over 250 million 1100s have been sold since its launch in late 2003, making it the world's best selling phone handse ...

and Nokia 2300 - Features platform-style levels *''Space Impact 303'', available as a downloadable

J2ME Java Platform, Micro Edition or Java ME is a computing platform for development and deployment of portable code for embedded and mobile devices (micro-controllers, sensors, gateways, mobile phones, personal digital assistants, TV set-top ...

app for certain devices, starting with Nokia 7210 - redesigned gameplay layout for color screen. *''Space Impact Evolution'', specifically made for the

Symbian Symbian is a discontinued mobile operating system (OS) and computing platform designed for smartphones. It was originally developed as a proprietary software OS for personal digital assistants in 1998 by the Symbian Ltd. consortium. Symbian ...

S60 1st Edition platform, which first appeared on Nokia 7650 *''Space Impact Evolution X'', the sequel, which had two versions: one bundled exclusively with the N-Gage Classic and the N-Gage QD (on the "Extras" folder of the Support CD) and another made for Symbian S60 2nd Edition devices. *''Space Impact Light'', released for Symbian S60 3rd Edition. Its demo came bundled with the Nokia N81 8GB released in October 2007. *''Space Impact: Kappa Base'', released on the

N-Gage 2.0 The N-Gage service (also referred to as N-Gage 2.0) was a mobile gaming platform from Nokia that was available for several Nokia smartphones running on S60 ( Symbian). N-Gage provided numerous games with 3D graphics into an application featur ...

platform in 2008. *''Space Impact: Meteor Shield'', developed by Rovio and released first for Nokia N97 in 2010, and the first game in the series to feature 3D graphics. More recently, various clones and remakes of the game have been made for the PC and platforms like iOS,

WatchOS watchOS is the operating system of the Apple Watch, developed by Apple Inc. It is based on iOS, the operating system used by the iPhone, and has many similar features. It was released on April 24, 2015, along with the Apple Watch, the only ...

Android Android may refer to: Science and technology * Android (robot), a humanoid robot or synthetic organism designed to imitate a human * Android (operating system), Google's mobile operating system ** Bugdroid, a Google mascot sometimes referred to ...

, many of which offers an accurate emulation of the original game.

Reception

The original Space Impact is well remembered as one of the games of the popular Nokia 3310 handset. In 2010, CNET put it in its top 10 'greatest mobile games of all time', and said that it pushed the boundaries in what was possible on a mobile device.

References

{{Nokia 2000 video games Nokia games Mobile games Video games developed in Finland Video game franchises introduced in 2000 N-Gage games N-Gage service games Java platform games Shoot 'em ups Video games set in outer space Symbian games J2ME games

Gameplay

Series

Reception

See also

References