Achieved at : 2026-03-22
Rank : 2
(12% worse)
Lups : t.b.d.
Approved :
No
Vote progress : 20%
| General Rules: |
Play with default settings unless otherwise specified. No use of trainers, cheats, saved game files, auto-fire (when not default present in-game), emulator save states, or other emulator advantages. No use of code modifications that give the player an advantage over other players. 1 player only. No continues. It is discouraged and may lead to voters not accepting your score to - excessively point farm - use glitches or other game exploits |
| Specific Rules: | Play the game in 1 player mode with default settings |
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TGP
A.E. is a fixed-shooter originally released for the Apple II and Atari 400/800 in 1982 by Broderbund. The Atari 5200 version only existed as a prototype and was never released. Very little is known about this prototype other than it is from 1984. The original Broderbund game was by Jun Wada and Makoto Horai, but it is very unlikely they were involved in the 5200 version.
Like most fixed shooters, your craft sits at the bottom of the screen and can move left and right only. It can of course fire. Alien squadrons appear and swoop about the screen firing at you for a short time before disappearing again. The enemy craft are small triangles with tails resembling ray-like fish and apparently that is what AE means in Japanese.
If you can shoot the enemy craft, then some of those following in the attack will also be destroyed as they collide with the wreckage. Shoot the first enemy in the squadron and it is possible to destroy all of them with just one shot. Interestingly, your shots only move up the screen while you hold the trigger - let go and they explode. Only the explosion damages the enemies. If you don't let go of fire, the shot passes by them harmlessly.
If three squadrons are wiped out completely - destroying a squadron counts as a "Perfect Attack" - then the level ends and you go on to the next one, which has a new background. Speaking of backgrounds, each level has its own background. Some are there just for show, but others like the asteroids and caves have tunnels that your opponents can dive into and reappear elsewhere - a nice touch.
The unreleased version of A.E. for the 5200 is a similar to the Apple II and Atari 8-bit home computer versions in looks and gameplay. One thing that is noticeable is that each background draws very slowly compared to other versions and you will have quite a wait between levels as the background is drawn. It is a shame the backgrounds take so long to draw, because otherwise the game is just as good (or not, if you didn't like it) as other versions. It's not clear if the reason for this is that the game was abandoned before the drawing routines were optimised, or id that is a limitation of the 5200 itself. The tunes that play before each level sound the same as other versions.
This run was played on the 22nd March 2026. The emulator is Pantheon, running on PC. There are no adjustable skill levels and the score reached was 27,000 points.
Time stamps:
00:30 Between games.
00:32 Game starts.
00:44 First life lost.
01:13 Stage 2.
01:51 Stage 3.
02:24 Stage 4.
03:13 Extra life awarded for passing 20,000 points.
03:24 Back to Stage 1 with harder attack patterns.
04:02 Second life lost.
04:22 Third life lost.
04:33 Fourth life lost. Game Over! Final score 27,000 points.
Like most fixed shooters, your craft sits at the bottom of the screen and can move left and right only. It can of course fire. Alien squadrons appear and swoop about the screen firing at you for a short time before disappearing again. The enemy craft are small triangles with tails resembling ray-like fish and apparently that is what AE means in Japanese.
If you can shoot the enemy craft, then some of those following in the attack will also be destroyed as they collide with the wreckage. Shoot the first enemy in the squadron and it is possible to destroy all of them with just one shot. Interestingly, your shots only move up the screen while you hold the trigger - let go and they explode. Only the explosion damages the enemies. If you don't let go of fire, the shot passes by them harmlessly.
If three squadrons are wiped out completely - destroying a squadron counts as a "Perfect Attack" - then the level ends and you go on to the next one, which has a new background. Speaking of backgrounds, each level has its own background. Some are there just for show, but others like the asteroids and caves have tunnels that your opponents can dive into and reappear elsewhere - a nice touch.
The unreleased version of A.E. for the 5200 is a similar to the Apple II and Atari 8-bit home computer versions in looks and gameplay. One thing that is noticeable is that each background draws very slowly compared to other versions and you will have quite a wait between levels as the background is drawn. It is a shame the backgrounds take so long to draw, because otherwise the game is just as good (or not, if you didn't like it) as other versions. It's not clear if the reason for this is that the game was abandoned before the drawing routines were optimised, or id that is a limitation of the 5200 itself. The tunes that play before each level sound the same as other versions.
This run was played on the 22nd March 2026. The emulator is Pantheon, running on PC. There are no adjustable skill levels and the score reached was 27,000 points.
Time stamps:
00:30 Between games.
00:32 Game starts.
00:44 First life lost.
01:13 Stage 2.
01:51 Stage 3.
02:24 Stage 4.
03:13 Extra life awarded for passing 20,000 points.
03:24 Back to Stage 1 with harder attack patterns.
04:02 Second life lost.
04:22 Third life lost.
04:33 Fourth life lost. Game Over! Final score 27,000 points.