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"Whoowhee! If the folks back home could see me now! When I joined the Vanguard expedition I never thought I'd be flying through the tunnels of Aterria looking for a mythical City of Mystery."
"It might not be a myth."
"Captain, do you mean to tell me you really believe there is such a city, paved with silver and ruled by a giant called Gond?"
"Why not? It's right here in the flight log book we found in the Aterria excavations. That's pretty convincing."
"But that book's dated 1983. People believed in all sorts of weird things back then...flying reindeer, egg-laying rabbits..."
"When you've been on as many expeditions as I have, you'll believe anything can exist. This whole planet is pretty unreal. Take these tunnel walls, for instance...every color of the rainbow! I'd swear I was in heaven if it weren't for the rocks...
"Hey! Watch out! You almost speared us on that stalagmite. I know our spaceship has five live, but we still have a long way to go and we're going to need all the lives we've got. If this log book is telling the truth, these tunnels are full of dangerous flying objects: hovering Mist ships, Harley rockets, Helm balloons."
"Yeah. Garimes waiting to tear us with their tentacles and that other cozy customer, the flying Kemlus snake."
"Seriously, what do you think the log book means by 'Watch out for the rain of Romedas in the Bleak Zone'?"
"I think the pilot that kept that log book was out of his mind, that's what I think. Probably bitten in the head by a Kemlus snake."
"Well, if there is anything in this tunnel, we should be sighting it pretty soon. According to our tunnel map, we're entering the Mountain Zone. How's the fuel supply holding out?"
"Getting low. We'd better infuse energy pretty quick or we'll crash."
"I certainly hope the log is right about energy pods growing in the Mountain Zone. Pod energy is supposed to make us indestructible for 10 seconds. Why, if that's true, we won't need to fire out lasers."
"Oh sure, Just run headlong into an enemy ship and POW! down it goes. Listen, I don't believe in pod power any more than I believe in Mist ships. If there is anything like that on Aterria, I'll eat it."
"Well, I hope you have the stomach for it. Look what's coming!"
"Great Gonds! Mists as thick as hornets and twice as mad."
"And they're all yours. Fire at will...and while you're at it, keep an eye out for energy pods."
"Roger! City of Mystery, here we come!"
Game Information
Post your scores right here in this thread, and I will add them to the list. Remember to play the game with the recommended game mode and difficulty settings as shown above so that your scores will be consistent with everyone elses. The deadline for posting scores is Wednesday June 23rd at 1:00 AM (CST). |
Current High Scores
Best Tips
Challenges
TwinGalaxies Top 3
| Current Standings |
Scoring Points in Vanguard
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Hints and Tips
The Manual
As always, you really should read the manual. In case you don't have the manual, AtariAge has a typed copy available online. Here is the hint it provides:
- FIRING SLOWS YOU DOWN. Your spaceship moves twice as fast when you aren't firing. Hold your fire when you're passing barriers or diving for energy pods.
- MISTS AND HARLEYS. Keep the spaceship moving up and down to avoid missiles and lay down a barrage of lasers vertically, against the enemy's line of flight. A Mist can only fire once, so you can dodge its missile and then go for it.
- HELMS AND AMMOS. Try to hit these with your starboard and port lasers before they cross your path. Avoid getting caught between two balloons, since it is hard to fire without moving into them.
- KEMLUS AND ROMEDAS. Fire horizontally across their line of flight.
- STRIPPED ZONE. Don't try to shoot everything you pass; think mainly of surviving. Fire at barriers and Garimes through crevices in the rocks, but take care not to crash into the rocks. Don't fire at Paynes. You can't destroy them, and firing slows you down when you need a burst of speed to pass safely.
- CITY OF MYSTERY. If you want to earn lots of points, hold your fire until the last minute. The trick of course, is to dodge the missiles. Gond aims directly at you, so keep moving. As soon as you enter the city, move up to avoid the first missile. When it passes, move down. Keep changing your position until you run out of room, then fire.
We have played this game twice before in the HSC, check it out here.
oyamafamily
To decrease the risk of collision with the enemies and missiles, I often use the following tactics:
- Mountain Zone / Stick Zone: Ship positioned at the left side of the screen.
- Rainbow Zones / Bleak Zone: Ship positioned at the center of the screen.
- Stripped Zone: I always move the ship to the right because it's the side more confortable, with less risk of collision.
- City of Mystery: Sometimes I destroy Gond immediately; it's better to get 2000 bonus points than to lose a life.
- In the Bleak Zone, I often dock with Kemlus THREE TIMES per tunnel in order to earn 3270 bonus points.
--Zero
