Use the arrow keys to navigate menus, pages, and the space grid. Press the Space key or Enter key to choose menu options or fire shots on the grid. Use Escape to return to the previous menu or to pause and resume the game.
You are the captain of the new spaceship Sonic, the pride of the Earth starfleet. Your mission is to rid the Solar System of Earth's enemies, the mischievous Glornox. Your ship is equipped with ammo to destroy Glornox vessels and shields to fend off enemy attacks. But beware: your resources are limited. You must find or earn more during the hunt.
If you succeed in destroying the invaders, you will return to Earth a hero. But if your last shield fails, your ship will explode and the Glornox will pester Earth endlessly. Good luck!
Your computer shows the space around your ship as a simple grid of tiles. The computer labels the tiles with a row and column number, starting with row one, column one in the top left corner of the grid. To aim a shot at a tile in the grid, use the arrow keys or point at it with the mouse.
A tile might contain an enemy ship, a reward, a hazard, or nothing at all. At the start of the mission, the content of each tile is hidden from you. You must shoot a tile in the grid to reveal the object it hides. To fire a shot, press the Spacebar or click it with your mouse. You can shoot a tile only once.
These are the objects you may encounter:
You can hear how many shots, shields, and enemies remain in your inventory by pressing the I key. The same information is always shown at the bottom of the screen.
When you run out of ammo, you will face a series of challenges from local space merchants and the Glornox. A challenger first names the reward you will win or hazard you will avoid if you beat his game. The challenger next tells you how to play the game. You then try to beat the challenge to earn ammo, recharge shields, avoid enemy fire, or stop enemy reinforcements. If you lose the challenge, enemy fire might destroy your shields or new Glornox ships might appear for you to destroy.
You will continue to face new challenges until you earn more ammo to continue your hunt or run out of shields. These are some of the challenges you may encounter:
Now press Escape to return to the main menu and select New Game to start playing!