David Theurer's 1981 arcade game, Tempest, was one of the first real 3D shooters. Creating what's now known as the "tube shooter" subgenre, you control a little claw-shaped ship as it travels along the outside of a web, shooting at enemies that spawn from the other end. It's one of the best games of all time the golden era of arcade gaming, in part due to the sharp, colorful, vector graphics. However, due to both the display and the rotating knob controller, Tempest never quite got a decent home port. That is, until Jeff Minter created an update for the Jaguar, Tempest 2000.
When Atari re-entered the video game market in the 90s, they typically made the mistake of updating their titles with "modern" graphics that failed to both capture and evolve the style of golden era arcade games. Tempest 2000 avoids that error by merely adapting it. It looks very similar, though a bit chunkier due to the raster display technology. The polished movement and effects give it a dizzying, enthusiastic sense of immersion, however, while maintaining its core minimalist features.
Your ship is still an abstract claw-thing, enemies still look like toy jacks, and so forth. Now though, the camera loosely tracks your ships movements, making the stages feel less static. Enemies perish with a satisfying crunch and a mess of pixels, with high score values that literally explode in your face. The core game is the same, with some extra power-ups, like an AI droid and the ability to jump off of the web to avoid enemies that have gotten too close. Accompanied with some thumping techno music, Tempest 2000 is a pure rush to play. Its approach to aesthetics was later borrowed in Geometry Wars, itself an iteration of games like Robotron 2084, which then went on to be mimicked by numerous other classic game reinventions.
Minter created a few other follow-ups, including Tempest 3000 for the Nuon DVD platform, and Space Giraffe for the 360/PC, though both suffered from overdone visuals that made them hard to actually play. The ultimate iteration is TxK for the Vita, which was so close to Tempest that Atari's lawyers harangued Minter to where he was unable to release it on other platforms. The visuals are like Tempest 2000, but crisper and more closely resembling the vector original. The stages now spin and collapse upon themselves, making them more involving without becoming too disorienting. It’s also filled with random congratulatory text (“Eat electric broth“) and odd digitized sounds, giving it a weird personality recalling the 90s shareware scene.
Developed by Positron and published by Square exclusively for the PlayStation in Japan, iS: Internal Section is a tube shooter in the vein of Tempest, constructed via colorful, flat shaded polygons and accompanied by techno music. In it, you have 12 weapons based on an animal from the Chinese zodiac, each suitable for specific enemy patterns. It's simple, but the real delight rests in its dizzying, entrancing visuals. As such, it's often regarded as the spiritual predecessor to United Game Artists’ rail shooter Rez. Further, levels are generated by the music, and you can even use your own CDs. It’s a good alternative to the trippiness of some of Minter’s other games.
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