Classic of the Month - Moon Cresta

Manufacturer:	Nichibutsu, Sega/Gremlin and Taito
Developer:	Nichibutsu
Genre:	Shoot 'em up
Year:	1980

When people think about early shoot 'em ups, games like Space Invaders, Galaxians and Galaga naturally come to mind, but there were lots and lots of others out there that were just as good, if not even a little bit better than [some of] those seminal games. For my money, Moon Cresta is one such game. If you haven't played it, at first glance you could be forgiven for thinking it's a Galaga knock off, with its looping formations of alien space ships and ability to team up your fighters for increased fire power, but it actually precedes Namco's classic by a year (or there abouts).

The game begins with a big, Flash Gordon-esque rocket emerging from the bottom of the screen. The tip of which detaches and is revealed to be your fighter - the rest of the ship returns to the bottom of the screen. For the first few rounds the player is faced by what appears to be just four aliens, but on shooting any one of them you discover they split in half and continue to dive bomb you. And tricky buggers they are too, looping and diving in very erratic patterns. The next couple of rounds are your typical looping swarms and everything appears to be quite mundane. However, clearing these two rounds leads to the bonus round, where you get the opportunity to dock with the middle section (or stage as the game calls it) of the big ship from the beginning. Succeed and for the next couple of rounds you have a three-way shot. As you'd expect, things get tougher to meet your new found fire power. If that wasn't enough, the next round throws fast and vast asteroids at you, which come careering down the screen at sharp angles. It's possible to survive this round just by avoiding the space rocks, but what self-respecting arcade gamer would do that when there are points to be earned for risking death to destroy them? After the asteroids is another ship-docking bonus round, with the third stage of the big ship now becoming available. Dock successfully and you have a third-tier monster capable of firing 5 missiles. Sounds great, but in truth you're now a considerably bigger target for the kamikaze aliens.

Dying in Moon Cresta has some interesting effects. Firstly, the three stages of the space ship are also your lives, so blow up the first stage and you are given the duel missile second stage to use, and so on. When you've grouped up two or more stages, when you are shot any one of the three stages can be destroyed, so it's possible to end up with just the bottom two stages or even the the top and bottom stages. All of which somehow made dying more interesting that just being given an extra life.

Another slightly unusual thing about this game is that there were variations produced by Nichibutsu, Taito Sega and Gremlin, each with slightly different rules sets and attack formations. These, according to Wikipedia, were the differences:

Taito Moon Cresta

• Wave 1+2 Eyes hover until several are shot.
• Birds 5+6 Birds are never invisble.
• Wave 9+10 Arrow Ships start with 1 flying downwards on first round and increase by 1 each round i.e. second time round there are 2 etc. until all 10 fly down at once.
• Aliens slow down in waves 1-4 if player killed.
• Free game at 30000.
• Arrow Ships fly faster at end of wave 4 plus from then on last alien flies faster i.e. round 5.
• Similar to Taito is Fantazia with different Sprite colours.

Sega/Gremlin Moon Cresta

• Wave 1+2 Eyes do not hover.
• Aliens speed up on 3rd round.
• 2 Arrow Ships drop on first round.
• No invisible Birds.
• Aliens do not slow down in waves 1-4 if player killed.
• Free game 30000.

Centuri Eagle Moon Cresta Clone

Different sprites used throughout but essentially the same as Taito version except aliens speed up on 6th round.

Nichibutsu Moon Cresta

• As Gremlin plus: Last Eye on waves 1-4 moves differently
• Last Bird is invisible Wave 9+10 Arrow Ships start with 3 flying downwards on first round and increase by 1 each round i.e. second time round there are 4 etc. until all 10 fly down at once.
• Arrow Ships fly faster at end of wave 3 plus from then on last alien flies faster i.e. round 4.

Super Moon Cresta

Same as Taito revision only aliens fire 1 bullet with increasing speed each wave plus player ships shoot faster.

The game got a sequel called Terra Cresta, which played more like Xevious and incorporated the original's stage docking as mid-level power ups. The video below from MamePlayer is of the Nichibutsu version and shows the first cycle of levels.

MTW