StarsAway

Fun for the fans of old shooters, but certain mechanics won’t be enjoyable for new gamers. The game has only one main mode and doesn’t mess around with any story. The only goal is to attain the target score while destroying foes and avoiding obstacles. The stage will repeat until you reach the score or die. Once you've reached the required score, you'll need to defeat a boss. The controls are responsive, and you can play with anything you wish (keyboard, mouse, gamepad). Only the mouse has some issue because the ship turns very slowly when you’re at the edge of the screen and sometimes a strange circle appears in the middle when you click the left mouse button. Aside from basic movement, you have a fire button for destroying enemies and barriers, boost and break buttons, and two roll buttons for getting through tight spaces. Two collectibles refill health and ammunition. Although ammo recharges on its own and you're never out, the fire rate drops dramatically when it's low. Each stage you beat unlocks a mini-game, but if you die, you’ll have to start from stage 1. I dislike the unnecessary and misleading targeting mechanic. The two crosshairs on the screen do not align. The …

This game is a modern homage to starfox with very similar gameplay + flat shaded retro graphics that have been given a modern flare with nice lighting and particle effects. Your ship can fly anywhere on the screen that's visible, but the camera never turns and you fly forward constantly. It's been a long time since I (and most of us, I expect) have played starfox, so I am glad that it has an adjustable difficulty level, with novice being a pleasant but not punishing challenge. Gameplay consists of picking up powerups and health, killing minor enemies and avoiding various buildings as they zoom towards you, and then eventually a big, hard boss. Unlike a lot of shooters you are rewarded for not firing constantly; your gun gets "tired" fairly quickly whenever you use it, so best to line up your shots and then let loose a volley of energy pellets. I appreciate this, as it adds strategy to what to fire at and when, rather than just constantly dodging like in a lot of bullet hell rails shooters. As you beat levels more challenges are unlocked including some minigames that are fairly similar to the main game (like flying thru rings with no enemies to dodge). There's no meta progression …

A great fun game with a real old school look and feel, with a really nice sound track. Perfect for playing in short bursts, so great for when your on the bus, taking a break or just have a few minutes to kill. For the price, you can't go wrong.

StarsAway is a genuinely fun & challenging rail shooter reminiscent of maybe Star Goose (1988)? 3 difficulty modes which is good but could use a tad more variety in the track with each run. For more niche curation, follow me at: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/27440015-CSH-Picone/

A simplified version of Starfox in which anyone can pick up. Excellent flying controls with full controller support. https://steamcommunity.com/groups/indieretrogamers

To be honest, the game is too simple and I don't mean difficulty wise. It has very little content (3 stages that loop and a few very rudimentary "mini-games" that you only unlock by playing the looping main game over and over), it is basically only fly and shoot and the accelerating/breaking doesn't really do what it is supposed to. You don't get faster/slower, the ship only goes further away from your camera or even into the camera so you don't see it anymore. I don't want to be rude because I really like those kinds of games but you are way better off playing others, like Ex-Zodiac for example. (If there's any issue with the comprehensibility of this comment I just want you to know that English isn't my first language)