Mine Storm

Mine Storm drew its inspiration from Asteroids, which also used vector graphics. At the start of each level, a mothership flies down the screen planting mines. The player’s ship appears in the middle of the screen and the mines transform into moving ships. The basic enemy moves in a straight line, with more aggressive versions homing in on the player. The aim is to clear all the mines, with the mothership returning to lay extra ones; it can be shot to stop it refilling the screen. Like Asteroids, the player has a ‘teleport’ option to use as a last resort. Once a level is cleared, the ship ‘warps’ to the next level with a neat effect.

The C64 version starts with a TRSI intro (Tristar & Red Sector Incorporated is a demogroup which formed in 1990), once again giving access to the built-in cheats. The title screen draws the name MINESTORM, with a clever diagonal scrolling message underneath. Pressing fire to start sees the mothership travelling down the screen just as in the original, complete with the ‘scaling’ effect that makes it smaller. The score and lives counters sit in the top border, helping to emulate the vertical display of the Vectrex.

One interesting twist with the C64 version is the replacement of the original Vectrex ship with the line-drawn ship from Thrust. Although the explosions do not look as big as the original game, they are quite effective — as is the warp on completing a level. Earning a high score lets the player enter their name, with the ship being rotated to shoot the letters that then travel across the screen into place.The C64 does a good job of emulating the Vectrex game. Spike and Mine Storm were available together on cartridge from RGCD, released in 2013.