Blasteroids

Blasteroids is the spiritual successor to the legendary Asteroids, which Atari Games recast in 1987 into a more colorful, faster, and mechanically richer form. The basic principle stays the same – the player controls a spaceship amid a field of disintegrating asteroids and must destroy them before they, or arriving enemy ships, destroy him. Compared to the black-and-white vector original, however, Blasteroids offers full-color raster graphics and a substantially more elaborate ship upgrade system.

The player can collect power-ups that change the shape and abilities of their craft, from faster firing through shields to the ability to transform the ship into a more powerful combat version. The game also introduces battles with other AI-controlled spaceships, shifting it from purely environment-based survival closer to an action combat style. The cabinet version also supported up to three players at once, linked into a single arena, which increased both the chaos and the social dimension of playing in arcades. The transformation of the ship between its various forms was accompanied by striking visual effects, so even onlookers not playing could easily tell when a player had just gained a major upgrade.

Blasteroids never tried to replace its predecessor; rather, it offered an alternative, modernized take on the same core gameplay, enriched with color, upgrades, and multiplayer. In the context of Atari Games, it was a typical example of the company's approach to its older titles – instead of a plain remake, offering an expanded version with new mechanics for the audience of the mid-to-late 1980s. For players familiar with Asteroids, it's an interesting detour that shows how the genre evolved alongside the technological progress of the 1980s.

Why play it: a colorful, mechanically richer reimagining of classic Asteroids with three-player multiplayer.