Galaxy Defender
Orbit your home planet and shoot down drones, darts, splitters and bombers before they break its shield.
Space Shooter
Fly a fighter up through numbered waves of alien craft. Each wave is denser and faster than the last, and every fifth wave a mothership arrives with its own health bar.
Controls
| Arrows or W A S D | Move the ship |
|---|---|
| Hold Space | Fire |
| P or Esc | Pause / resume |
| R | Restart |
| Joystick | Move the ship |
|---|---|
| Hold FIRE | Fire |
On touch screens a control pad appears below the game. You can show or hide it with the Touch pad button above the game.
How to Play
- Press Start Game. Your ship can move left, right, up and down in the lower part of the screen.
- Hold Space or the FIRE button to shoot straight up. Enemies fly in from the top: scouts dive straight down, weavers swing side to side, gunners fire aimed shots at you and armored tanks need several hits.
- Destroyed enemies sometimes drop hexagonal capsules. Fly into one to collect it: R = Rapid Fire, W = Spread Shot, S = Shield, + = Extra Life, x2 = Score x2.
- Destroy or outlast every enemy in a wave to earn the wave-clear bonus. The Level counter in the HUD shows the current wave number.
- On every fifth wave a mothership moves back and forth across the top, firing fans of shots and calling in escorts. Watch its health bar and keep firing until it breaks apart.
- Getting hit by a shot or ramming an enemy costs one of your 3 lives. You blink for about two seconds afterward and cannot be hit. The run ends when your last life is gone.
Objective
Survive as many waves as you can and push your score higher. There is no final wave: the enemy waves keep growing until they overwhelm your last life.
Difficulty progression
Wave 1 sends 14 enemies (scouts and weavers only), and every wave adds 4 more, up to 64. Enemies arrive at shorter intervals and fly about 7% faster each wave, up to roughly double the starting speed. Gunners join from wave 2, armored tanks from wave 3, and tanks gain an extra hit point every 4 waves. From wave 2, scouts sometimes arrive in short columns of three. Each mothership has more health than the last (60 + 12 × the wave number), fires more often and calls escorts more quickly.
Scoring
| Action | Points |
|---|---|
| Scout | 50 points |
| Weaver | 75 points |
| Gunner | 100 points (takes 2 hits) |
| Armored tank | 150 points (takes 6 or more hits) |
| Mothership | 1,000 points on wave 5, 2,000 on wave 10, and so on |
| Wave clear | 100 points × the wave number |
| Score x2 | Doubles enemy and mothership points for 10 seconds |
Your personal best is stored only in this browser. Scores are for fun and are not official records.
Tips
- Stay in the lower middle of the screen. You have room to slide sideways, and gunner shots take longer to reach you.
- Kill gunners first. They are the only regular enemies that aim at you, and they stop firing once they get close to your ship.
- Enemies that fly off the bottom of the screen cost you nothing, so let a scout go rather than chase it into a crowd.
- Armored tanks show a small health bar once damaged. Keep a steady stream on one tank instead of spraying across several.
- Save risky pickups for quiet moments. A capsule falling through a busy lane is rarely worth a life.
- During a mothership wave, move with the boss so your shots keep landing, and step aside when it opens a five-shot fan.
- Use a Shield to fly straight through a wave: while it lasts, shots and collisions cannot hurt you, and rammed enemies are destroyed.
Related Games
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Stay alive in a deep-space arena as asteroids and drones close in. Your ship fires automatically.
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Alien Escape
Sneak past patrol drones and timed laser gates to reach each zone's exit before the clock runs out.
Related Guides
ShootersSpace Shooter Games ExplainedThe main styles of space shooter, the enemy roles they rely on, and practical tactics for aiming, firing and positioning in our shooters.Game DesignHow Enemy Waves Work in Arcade GamesAn explanation of how arcade shooters build and escalate enemy waves, and practical ways to read each wave and decide what to shoot first.StrategyPower-Ups in Space Arcade GamesA practical breakdown of power-up types in space arcade games, how designers use them, and how to decide which ones are worth chasing.
About Space Shooter
Space Shooter is a classic vertical-scrolling shooter built around numbered waves. Each of the four enemy types asks for a different response: scouts come straight down, weavers swing across the screen on a sine-wave path, gunners aim their shots at your current position, and armored tanks soak up several hits before they break. As the wave number climbs, the mix shifts toward the tougher enemies and everything moves faster.
Power-ups are dropped at random by destroyed enemies, with armored tanks dropping them most often. Rapid Fire roughly doubles your fire rate for 8 seconds, Spread Shot fires three shots in a fan for 10 seconds, Shield protects you for 8 seconds, Score x2 doubles points for 10 seconds, and Extra Life adds a life (up to 5). The Power chip in the HUD lists each active effect and its remaining seconds. Your personal best is saved in your browser on this device.
Categories: Space Shooter Games, Alien Arcade Games, Space Survival Games. Space Shooter is an original game made for Space Arcade Games. Its gameplay is arcade-style and fictional, not a scientific simulation (see our disclaimer).
Frequently Asked Questions
When does the mothership appear in Space Shooter?
On every fifth wave: waves 5, 10, 15 and so on. It has a health bar at the top of the screen and must be destroyed to finish the wave. It is worth 1,000 points multiplied by the number of motherships you have met, so 1,000 on wave 5 and 2,000 on wave 10.
Do I lose anything when enemies get past me?
No. Enemies that leave the bottom of the screen simply disappear. You only lose a life when an enemy shot hits you or you collide with an enemy or the mothership.
How long do power-ups last?
Rapid Fire and Shield last 8 seconds, Spread Shot and Score x2 last 10 seconds. Extra Life is instant and can take you up to a maximum of 5 lives. Collecting the same power-up again resets its timer to the full duration.
Does Score x2 double the wave-clear bonus?
No. Score x2 doubles the points for destroying enemies and the mothership while it is active. The wave-clear bonus is always 100 points times the wave number.
Can I play Space Shooter on a phone?
Yes. On touch screens a control pad appears below the game with a joystick for movement and a FIRE button you hold to shoot.