Truxton (arcade game)

Truxton (known in Japan as Tatsujin (達人)) is a vertical scrolling shooter arcade game developed by Toaplan in 1988. Like many other shooters, the game is set in space, where the player takes control of a small spaceship across several planets. The game is played with an 8-way joystick and two buttons (a shot and a bomb button) through 5 large levels with non-stop action and 5 bosses.

Story
Taking place somewhere in space: an armada of Gidans, led by the evil Dogurava, is invading the planet Borogo aboard five gargantuan asteroids. After surviving an attack on an orbiting Borogo cargo barge, a pilot enters one remaining fighter and challenges the Gidans in a desperate attempt to quell the alien invasion and divert their asteroid fortresses in the process.

Gameplay
The player's ship starts with a basic weapon, the Power Shot. By picking up items the player can upgrade his/her ship. Picking an S increases the ship's maneuvering speed (up to four times). Picking a B increases the number of Truxton bombs. Picking up 5 Ps will increase the weapon level by 1 (maximum 3); up to 4 P remain if the player dies.

Picking up 1up or 2up icons increase the number of lives.

Weapon icons:

Pick up a red icon for a "Power shot" (multiple small projectiles in a spreading forward pattern). This is the ship's starting weapon, and is fine for handling groups of regular enemy ships, but not very powerful.

Pick up a green icon for a "Sun laser", also called an "Expert Beam". This fires a powerful, fast-moving green beam straight up. This is good for concentrating fire on boss enemies, but is rather difficult to use against large groups of smaller enemies.

Pick up a blue icon for the "Truxton beam". Holding down the Fire button causes this electric-blue beam to spread out in all directions. In the presence of boss enemies, the beam "locks on" to the boss, causing cumulative damage until the boss is destroyed or the player releases the Fire button.

Truxton bombs are area-effect bombs that, when activated, expand with a "skull"-patterned energy field around the player's ship and stays in place on the screen for about a second or so. While in effect, it destroys regular enemies and causes significant damage to boss enemies. Most importantly, it destroys any enemy fire in its area of effect, essentially acting as a temporary shield for the player.

Trivia

 * The soundtrack was composed by Masahiro Yuge.
 * The sequel to this game is Truxton II (Tatsujin Oh in Japan).