Invader Attack Demo

Casual as they might appear nowadays, arcade shooters can get pretty serious once you dedicate more than a few minutes to them. The levels get trickier as you advance through them, the enemies grow more savage with each one you put down, and the stakes get higher every time you lose a life. The final boss is the reward for your blood and sweat, but a place in the hall of fame is worth the trouble as well.

Invader Attack is a game that takes its inspiration from obvious sources, given the fact that it even shares a bit of its name with Space Invaders. Unlike the old classic, however, Invader Attack has a more modern approach to the genre, while still managing to appear simple and inviting. The graphics are smooth and the spaceships feel like they made from more than just exploding pixels, yet the gameplay is basically just as intuitive and straightforward at the same time.

The action takes place in space, where you must control a spaceship and try to take down the alien invaders that are attacking your homeland. However, you must mostly assume all that, given the fact that there’s very little story to talk about. No one would be impressed by a vertical shooter with a deep plot, on the other hand, so the lack of a proper story is not a major concern.

Your main goal throughout every level is to shoot each and every alien ship on the screen, using your ship’s onboard lasers to do so. The enemy shoots back, though, so you also need to watch out for their lasers. Some of the destroyed ships drop bonuses, which can be picked up for additional points, or something more special. Careful though, they can also drop instant death traps, which are pretty obvious anyway.

From a technical point of view, there are some upsides and downsides as well. For starters, the game looks and feels nice, especially when it comes to the minimal physics engine, which makes every hit carry some weight behind it. The enemy ships you destroy fall down and they can take you out as well, if you do not pay enough attention. The bad part is that there’s not much variety in the levels, which makes it difficult to enjoy your progress.

In the end, Invader Attack certainly won’t twist your brain into uncomfortable positions with all the new ideas it pushes through, but it certainly can be fun and addictive, for a while. However, the lack of diversity and bland level design make the experience rather short-lived, which is a shame, considering all the potential the game nurtures.