Astrosmash ZX (ZX Spectrum)
by Aleisha Cuff

AstroSmash! ZX is a port of the classic shoot 'em up released in 1981 for the Intellivision video games system, created with AGDx. The Intellivision version was originally intended to be another game mode for Meteor!, an Asteroids clone. Meteor! got cancelled but the game mode, called Avalanche!, survived and gained its own release as AstroSmash!

The Intellivision system was better known for its sports games so this arcade style shooter was a breath of fresh air. It became so popular that in late 1982 it became the cartridge shipped with Intellivision systems.

Your planet is in peril! From above reigns down a nightmare of molten meteors and alien bombardment. Armed only with a fleet of remote controlled laser cannons, you must hold off the attack for as long as you can. In other words you ain't gonna survive this buddy.

AstroSmash ZX is a bit of classic video game mashup of Space Invaders, Asteroids and, to a lesser extent, Missile Command. You have a bunch of laser cannons and you must blast everything that falls out of the sky.

Your cannon can move left (O), right (P), fire (M) and enter hyperspace (Q) landing at a random, hopefully safe, location on the surface. A status bar at the bottom of the screen shows, from left to right, shields remaining, score, cannons remaining and current level. As the game levels increase the enemies get faster and deadlier.

 

Meteorites, which come in a range of shapes, sizes and colours, must be blasted before they reach the surface and, in the ZX version, damage your shield. In the original version there were no shields and upon reaching the surface meteorites would just decrease the players score. This enhanced ZX mechanic gives the game a bit more urgency.

Spinning bombs, which come in two sizes, must also be blasted or they'll destroy the players laser cannon if they reach the surface. Then there's homing missiles which track your movement and, you guessed it, must be blasted, or avoided. Although blasting a homing missile is the better option as it handily restores your shields too.

Beyond level three alien spaceships fly across the screen and start blasting you. Blasting them will give you an extra laser cannon and a whopping 100 points. The graphical style is very close to the original game. There's no music but the spot effects in the AY audio version are very Intellivision in flavour.

 

A mechanic in the original game, which was an original concept in itself at the time, was to have the game not only become more difficult as the levels increased but also to become easier again when laser cannons were lost. I'm not sure this concept has made it into the ZX version or it might just be my almost half century old reflexes playing tricks on me again.

From what I can tell it plays very much like the original. It certainly looks and sounds like an Intellivision game. It has a few improvements over the original and It's quite addictive. I always wanted another try to reach a higher level and beat my high score.

Sometimes blasting is not as responsive as it could be and on a few occasions it didn't respond at all. Yep, sure ain't gonna survive this buddy. I never pressed the Hyperspace button once as it was located well away from all the other controls so I'd have to look away from the screen to find it. When the levels increase the background colours are only either black or blue. The original game had more colours.

The developer has taken a classic Intellivision game, ported it to the Spectrum and improved upon it whilst retaining all the ingredients which made it such a fun game in the first place. Even though it has the odd bug I'd still highly recommend it.