77. Lunar Rescue (Taito, Arcade (PS2), 1979)

When I started playing Lunar Rescue, I expected it to be similar to Atari's Lunar Lander (released earlier in 1979) and at first it appears to be an inferior knockoff: You are a lander descending down onto the lunar surface, dodging asteroids and trying to land on one of 3 platforms in order to rescue some people.

While Lunar Lander's focus was on simulating gravity and the challenges of landing softly, Lunar Rescue lands your vehicle for you as long as you are positioned above a platform. So the challenge here is dodging asteroids, which is relatively simple. You have limited supply of fuel that will slow (but never stop) your descent should you need to make a quick maneuver, but once you land on a platform the real challenge begins.

Now with your passenger in tow, your ship begins moving slowly upward, but now instead of asteroids, there is a swarm of alien ships, very reminiscent of Taito's own Space Invaders. In order to get back to your mothership at the top of the screen, you have to dodge and shoot through the enemy fleet. This requires some careful planning, since you can only move upwards, enemy ships can corner you if you aren't careful, as they can warp around the side of the screen but you cannot. I dig the whole 2 phases thing that the game is going for, it gives me memories of Ridiculous Fishing, one of my favorite arcade style games.

3/5, a really cool concept for 1979, even if the game isn't that fun mechanically