ProtoSTG v1.3xx Final

Title: protoSTG

Platform: PICO-8 (128×128) • Keyboard/Controller 

Genre: Vertical shmup • 1-hit kills • Score attack

protoSTG aspires to be a clean, readable vertical shooter: tap a 5-way spread to “paint” lanes, hold a precise focus beam for damage and micro-dodging, feed a 3-tier homing-missile gauge, graze precisely for points, and tear a modular boss apart—parts first or greedily straight to the core. There’s also a special “Golden” celebration if you dismantle the boss and meet tight chain/score rules.

Controls (default)

• B1 (Shot): tap = 5-way spread; hold = continuous focus beam + slow move (~45%).
• B2 (Missile): fires homing missiles based on a 3-segment gauge; holding B2 automatically taps L1 when available.
• B1 + B2 together (fresh press on both): Bomb/Freeze—Ship 1 = Bomb (bullet clear + heavy damage), Ship 2 = Freeze (~1.5 s stasis, then brief faster “catch-up”).
• D-Pad / Arrows: move (focus keeps movement slow). Settings allow button swap + music/SFX toggles.

Bomb safety: bombs only trigger if both B1 and B2 are freshly pressed on the same frame. Holding one button and tapping the other won’t bomb (prevents accidents).

Game flow

Title → Stage (structured waves) → Boss → Results → Menu. (Boss appears after a fixed number of waves once the field is clear.)

Scoring (quick view)

• Base enemy values + grazing (enemy/bullet) + chain multiplier (+20/30/50%) + boss part/core bonuses.
• “Big-score” display (e.g., 2.5939 = 25,939)—cosmetic display; math is exact.

Quality of life

Readable bullets, low clutter, parallax starfield, overlapping gauges become transparent near the ship, Settings (swap buttons, music/SFX), Up to 10 records are recorded per game session. 

Made by Thinkrs 

Hand coded in PICO-8 + AI refined with CHATGPT 5 Plus

Special thanks to:

Lazy Devs Academy

The Hidden Fortress

SpidersSTG