''Star Castle'' is a
vector graphics
Vector graphics are a form of computer graphics in which visual images are created directly from geometric shapes defined on a Cartesian plane, such as points, lines, curves and polygons. The associated mechanisms may include vector displ ...
multidirectional shooter
Shoot 'em ups (also known as shmups or STGs) are a subgenre 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 character mo ...
released in arcades by
Cinematronics
Cinematronics Incorporated was an arcade game video game developer, developer that primarily released vector graphics games in the late 1970s and early 1980s. While other companies released games based on raster graphics, raster displays, early ...
in 1980. The game involves obliterating a series of defenses orbiting a stationary turret in the center of the screen. The display is black and white with the colors of the rings and screen provided by a transparent plastic overlay. ''Star Castle'' was designed by
Tim Skelly
Tim Skelly (February 10, 1951 – death reported March 2, 2020) was a video game designer and game programmer who developed arcade games for Cinematronics from 1978 until 1981. He designed a series of pure action games using black and white vecto ...
and programmed by Scott Boden. Skelly created a number of other Cinematronics vector games, including ''
Starhawk
Starhawk (born Miriam Simos on June 17, 1951) is an American feminist and writer. She is known as a theorist of feminist neopaganism and ecofeminism. In 2013, she was listed in Watkins' ''Mind Body Spirit'' magazine as one of the 100 Most Spir ...
'', ''
Armor Attack'', and ''
Rip Off''.
A
Vectrex
The Vectrex is a vector display-based home video game console, the only one ever designed and released for the home market, that was developed by Smith Engineering and manufactured and sold by General Consumer Electronics. It was first released ...
port of ''Star Castle'' was released in 1983.
Gameplay
The object of ''Star Castle'' is to destroy an enemy cannon which sits in the center of three concentric, rotating energy shield rings while avoiding or shooting "mines"–enemies that spawn from the core, pass through the energy rings, and then home in on the player's ship. The player's
spaceship can rotate, thrust forward, and fire small projectiles. The cannon's shields are composed of twelve sections, and each section takes two hits to destroy. Once a section is breached, rings beneath it are exposed to fire.
Once the innermost ring has been breached, the central weapon is susceptible to attack, but the player is also more vulnerable at this point, as with the shield rings eliminated, the gun can fire out a large projectile that hisses with white noise. Moreover, the central core tracks player movement at all times. If the player manages to hit the cannon, it explodes violently, collapsing the remnants of the shield rings, and an extra ship is awarded. The next level then starts with a new gun and fully restored shield rings, but the difficulty is increased (the mines move more rapidly, the rings rotate more quickly, and the core tracks the player at a faster rate).
If the player completely destroys the outermost shield ring, the cannon will create a new one. The middle ring expands to replace the lost outer ring, the inner ring replaces the middle, and a new ring emerges from the core to become the inner ring. Therefore, in order to penetrate the cannon's defenses, the player must be careful not to completely obliterate the outer ring.
The three homing mines will destroy the player's ship on contact. The mines can be destroyed, but they are very small and difficult to hit, and the player does not receive points for destroying them. Mines are revived when shield rings regenerate (some variants keep three mines churning constantly so that a new mine respawns from the core as soon as one is destroyed). As the player progresses through the levels, the mines get faster and faster, forcing the player to keep moving to avoid them.
Reception
Michael Blanchet's 1982 book ''How to Beat the Video Games'' praised ''Star Castle'' as "a standout among the wave of free-flight games that emerged after ''
Asteroids
An asteroid is a minor planet—an object larger than a meteoroid that is neither a planet nor an identified comet—that orbits within the Solar System#Inner Solar System, inner Solar System or is co-orbital with Jupiter (Trojan asteroids). As ...
''", describing the game's increase in difficulty over time, rather than between
game levels, as the "catch" which made it challenging. In 1995, ''
Flux
Flux describes any effect that appears to pass or travel (whether it actually moves or not) through a surface or substance. Flux is a concept in applied mathematics and vector calculus which has many applications in physics. For transport phe ...
'' magazine ranked ''Star Castle'' 83rd on their Top 100 Video Games list, calling it "one of the all-time great vector graphics classics".
Legacy
In an interview, Skelly admitted that the stellar field was made using the shape of a woman from a nude magazine.
Atari, Inc. programmer
Howard Scott Warshaw
Howard Scott Warshaw (born July 30, 1957), also known as HSW, is an American psychotherapist and former game designer. He worked at Atari, Inc. in the early 1980s, where he designed and programmed the Atari 2600 games '' Yars' Revenge'', ''Raide ...
investigated writing a clone of ''Star Castle'' for the
Atari 2600
The Atari 2600 is a home video game console developed and produced by Atari, Inc. Released in September 1977 as the Atari Video Computer System (Atari VCS), it popularized microprocessor-based hardware and games stored on swappable ROM cartridg ...
, but did not see the game as a good match for the system from a technical standpoint. He reconfigured the concept into ''
Yars' Revenge'', which became Atari's top selling original game for the 2600.
A hobbyist-written clone of ''Star Castle'' for the Atari 2600 was eventually released in 2012.
Jim Nitchals of
Cavalier Computer wrote a clone for the
Apple II
Apple II ("apple Roman numerals, two", stylized as Apple ][) is a series of microcomputers manufactured by Apple Computer, Inc. from 1977 to 1993. The Apple II (original), original Apple II model, which gave the series its name, was designed ...
called ''Ring Raiders'' (referenced in-game as ''Raiders of the Lost Ring'') published in 1981. Anthony Weber of Stedek Software wrote a clone for Atari 8-bit computers called ''Star Island'' (1982).
References
External links
* {{KLOV game, id=9754
1980 video games
Arcade video games
Cinematronics games
Multidirectional shooters
Vector arcade video games
Vectrex games
Video games developed in the United States