Shmup ‘The Highscore’ Challenges Skilled Space Pilots For Big Points

The Highscore sees you attempting to last as long as possible while fighting bosses and waves of enemies, shooting strange aliens throughout space, non-stop, in hopes of scoring big (and surviving).

This intense, non-stop action shmupp has you continually shooting your way through an onslaught of enemies in hopes of making it towards a boss. Shooting is pretty simple; you have a basic laser that fires forward with unlimited ammo, but can be changed to blast outwards at an angle towards your side. You also have a huge, powerful beam that can be shot straight forward, eliminating anything ahead of you, but with very limited charge. As you destroy your enemies and most of their bullets with these beams, you can rack up a high score before you do, inevitably, die.

Meteors that float down from the top of the screen can be shot to unveil the occasional power-up, getting items that blasting everything on-screen to adding new upgrades to your ship that allow you to make extra shots. You also have a dash that you can use to avoid shots, but personally, with the amount of bullets and enemies raining down, this dash is something that I could not manage to use tactically.

Expect serious challenges when the big bosses show up. The first boss is a giant slime blob that erratically shoots at you. The next is a ship that splits into three drones and attacks from different angles, and you’ll need to destroy each of them to finish the boss.

After bosses, you’ll get some more health added onto your bar if you’ve lost some (and boy, I had), as well as a big boost to your points. If you do happen to die before then, and you will at first, your high score and how much time you have lasted will be reflected in your score. Then, you’re welcome to challenge it all again.

The Highscore is an intense game to play through, especially with the amount of enemies that are coming for you. Despite it being highly challenging, there is a compelling quality in pushing to go further within the game, facing another boss, and hoping to grab another power-up to keep yourself alive.

Frederic Drago, the developer behind The Highscore, has generously given us a bunch of keys to giveaway, which you can enter below. Otherwise, you can purchase the game through Steam.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

About The Author

Jupiter Hadley

Jupiter is a prolific indie game journalist, writing for Metro UK, Big Boss Battle, AlphaBetaGamer, and many more, all with a focus on smaller indie gems. She covers thousands of game jams and indie games on her YouTube channel, letting every game have a moment in the spotlight. She runs indiegamejams.com, a calendar of all of the game jams going on in the world, judges many jams and events.

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