Gyruss

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Gyruss

Developer(s)	Konami
Publisher(s)	Konami Arcade Nintendo Entertainment System Parker Brothers Atari 2600 ColecoVision Atari 5200
Designer(s)	Yoshiki Okamoto
Release date	Arcade: 1983 (NA) Atari 2600: 1983 (NA) ColecoVision: 1984 (NA)
Genre	Tube Shooter Shoot 'em up
Mode(s)	Single player 1-2 players alternating
Age rating(s)	N/A Arcade Atari 2600 ColecoVision
Platform(s)	Arcade Atari 2600 Atari 8 Bit ColecoVision Atari 5200 Commodore 64 Nintendo Entertainment System Famicom Disk System
Input	Atari 2600 Joystick ColecoVision Controller Atari 5200 Controller NES Controller
Credits \| Soundtrack \| Codes \| Walkthrough

Gyruss is an arcade game released in 1983. It was ported to the Atari 2600, Atari 5200, ColecoVision, home computers, and the Nintendo Entertainment System.

[edit] Gameplay

It is a shoot-em-up through the Earth's solar system where the player's ship moves in a circular orbit around the outer edge of the screen while shooting at enemies in the center. The purpose of this game is to fly through the solar system and reach Earth (in the NES version, the player must reach the Sun). It features excellent synthesizer music score of Bach's "Tocatta and Fugue in D Minor".

The other planets that have you travel to before Earth are Neptune, Uranus, Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars. It only takes two warps to arrive at Neptune, but all others including Earth take three warps to get to. Each time you reach a planet, there is a Challenge Stage where you try to destroy as many enemies as possible. After reaching Earth, there is a Challenge Stage followed by a very fast "three warps to Neptune" stage. After this, the levels and the background music start over.

In the NES version, there is the presence of additional types of aliens you must deal with, plus power-ups and a boss creature you must defeat before the Challenge Stage.

[edit] Controls

In all known versions of the game, the player pushes the joystick and turns it as it is being pushed around in a clockwise or counterclockwise manner to move the ship around either clockwise or counterclockwise. The NES version offers an optional control scheme where simply pushing the D-pad to the left or right turns the ship around in a circular motion.