How to play Vanguard online
- Fly the ship: arrow keys (eight directions, including diagonals)
- Fire: Space bar together with an arrow key; the arrow sets the direction of the shot (see the firing modes below)
- Start a new game: F12 (the console’s Reset switch)
- One or two players: F11 (the console’s Select switch)
- Change the firing mode: F4 and F9 (the left and right difficulty switches)
- Continue after your last life: press Space while “CONTINUE?” is on screen
Gameplay
Your ship moves through a tunnel made of several zones, starting with the Mountain Zone and passing through rainbow-coloured sections and the rocky Bleak Zone. Each zone has its own enemies: hovering Mists, Harleys that shoot coloured missiles, Helm balloons that drift across your path, Garimes that reach for you with tentacles, and Romeda rockets that try to spear you.
Fuel is always running down. A full tank lasts about 40 seconds, but every enemy or obstacle you hit adds a little back, so steady shooting keeps you flying. You get a full tank at the start of each life. Flying through an energy pod marked with an E makes you invulnerable for about ten seconds, so you can ram enemies. You cannot fire while the pod energy lasts.
The tunnel ends in the City of Mystery, where your ship is squeezed between two moving barriers. The boss, Gond, fires at you while the lower barrier rises towards the upper one. Survive it and you move on to a second, faster tunnel. You start with five lives and earn extra ones at 10,000 and 50,000 points.
| Target | Points |
|---|---|
| Harley | 50 |
| Mist | 70 |
| Helm | 80 |
| Romeda | 100 |
| Garime, Base, Kemlus | 100–400 |
| Barrier | 800 |
| Gond | 1,000–8,000 |
Firing modes and the continue option
The two difficulty switches choose one of four ways to fire. With the left switch on A, you hold the button and push the stick towards where you want to shoot. With the left switch on B, pushing the stick fires in that direction and the button stops firing. Setting the right switch to B adds automatic forward fire to either method. Your ship moves faster when it is not shooting.
If you lose your last life in the first tunnel, “CONTINUE?” appears for ten seconds. Press the button and you carry on from the same spot with five new lives, but your score goes back to zero.
Tips
- Keep shooting for fuel. Every hit tops up the tank, so a quiet stretch without targets is when fuel gets dangerous.
- Try the automatic forward fire. With the right switch on B you only have to think about the side and rear shots.
- Ride the Kemlus. In the Bleak Zone you can steer into the centre of a Kemlus to dock with it and get a free ride instead of shooting it.
- Be patient with Gond. The longer you wait before destroying it, the more points it is worth, but the rising barrier limits how long you can wait.
History
The arcade Vanguard was known for its multi-direction scrolling, four-way shooting and digitised speech. The 2600 cartridge came out in December 1982. It had to simplify the graphics and drop the speech, but reviewers liked how much of the action survived: Video magazine praised it as an excellent home translation. It went on to become one of Atari’s better-selling cartridges, and its continue feature was a first for a home game cartridge.
Similar games to play next
- Super Cobra – another arcade tunnel shooter where fuel keeps running out
- River Raid – Activision’s scrolling shooter built around fuel management
- Laser Gates – a fast side-scrolling flight through a dangerous tunnel
- Defender – Atari’s version of another early scrolling arcade shooter