Pocket Gamer: As any right-minded arcade master will tell you, whenever you’re facing insurmountable odds with nothing but your lasers for company, you need the best possible interface available.
Most coin-op connoisseurs will cite the humble micro-switched joystick as their weapon of choice, because it allows for fluid movement, quick responses, and pixel-perfect precision in the heat of battle.
AppAdvice: Space Tripper ($3.99) by True Axis is a top down arcade shoot ‘em up (shmup) that will definitely keep you on your toes. Apparently, this same game appeared on many platforms before finally landing on iOS, as well.
TouchGen: Two years in the making, and itself a port of a game over a decade old, Space tripper has finally hit the AppStore… Was it worth the wait?
Space Tripper (also know as Astro Tripper on PSN and Steam for PC) is an arcade shooter where the aim of the game is to take out spawning enemies in arena based levels. Your ship faces - and shoots - in one of two direction (left or right), of which you can flip with a simple tap of the right hand of the screen. You can move the ship up, down, left and right by tilting the device. While I am a fan of tilt controls, particularly for racing games, when it comes to arcade games using tilt i’m generally skeptical. However, I’ll take the side of True Axis here and admit that touch controls wouldn’t work as well in this game, and would only complicate matters by covering the screen and conflicting with the simple direction and weapon changing hot spots.
True Axis's Space Tripper has made it past Apple's approval process and has docked in the App Store, meaning you can finally download the topdown PSN shmup for your iPhone and iPad.
