Uridium
1986 · Horizontal Shooter · Commodore 64
Overview
Uridium (1986) is Andrew Braybrook's Commodore 64 shooter: a Manta fighter skims fifteen giant Dreadnoughts, strafing their defences before landing to destroy each one.
Deep Dive
Each of the fifteen levels is a single huge Dreadnought, named after a metal and ending with the fictional element Uridium. The player's Manta fighter flies low over the hull, which scrolls in both directions, and must flip sideways to slip through narrow gaps in later ships. Waves of enemy fighters attack while flashing ports release homing mines that cannot be shot. Once enough of the ship's defences are gone, a 'Land Now!' signal tells the player to touch down on the landing strip.
Developer Story
Uridium was released on 28 February 1986 for the Commodore 64 and ported to the ZX Spectrum, Amstrad CPC, Atari ST and other systems. An NES conversion came out in 1990 under the unrelated title The Last Starfighter, and Braybrook later made Uridium 2 for the Amiga.
Did You Know?
- The C64 cannot scroll a separate background layer, so the stars are drawn as characters whose pixels shift against the scroll, making them appear to stand still.
- It won Best Arcade-style Game of the Year at the 1986 Golden Joystick Awards and reached number one in the British all-formats chart.
Sources & further reading
- Uridium — Wikipedia
