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=                                    GORF                                     =
*                                COMMODORE 64                                 *
=                            FAQ / STRATEGY GUIDE                             =
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Author: Sashanan
Date: 26 September 2005
Version: 1.2

DISCLAIMER
This document is a copyright of Peter "Sashanan" Butter, 2004-2005. All
rights reserved.

You are granted permission to make copies of this FAQ (electronical or
physical) for your own, personal use. Furthermore, non-commercial, freely
accessible websites are allowed to upload a copy of this FAQ as long as it is
posted in its full, original form (including this disclaimer) and credited
to Sashanan.

You are not authorized to upload this FAQ on a commercial website and/or
charge for its viewing, or make money off it in any other imaginable way,
without my explicit written permission. Furthermore, you are not allowed to
edit this guide in any way, use it as a basis for your own guide, or post it
without giving proper credit. This is considered plagiarism.

This FAQ is protected by international copyright laws and failure to
comply with the terms in this disclaimer will result in legal prosecution.


===============================================================================
TABLE OF CONTENTS
===============================================================================

[1] Introduction
[2] Controls
[3] Game mechanics
[4] Level overview
[4.1] Astro Battles
[4.2] Laser Attack
[4.3] Space Warp
[4.4] Flag Ship
[5] Strategies
[5.1] Astro Battles
[5.2] Laser Attack
[5.3] Space Warp
[5.4] Flag Ship
[6] Information requests
[7] Revision history
[8] Final words

===============================================================================
[1] INTRODUCTION
===============================================================================

Gorf is a four phase space shooting game that initially comes from the arcades,
and has ports on several systems including the Commodore 64. This FAQ was
written specifically for the Commodore 64 version. I'm not exactly sure on the
differences between each version, but one thing of note is that the initial
arcade game had five different stages, of which the C64 version only took in
four.

Basically, Gorf plays as four simple space shooting games in one, although
each is controlled in essentially the same way. In the first stage, the player
has to mop up a formation of aliens in a style very similar to Space Invaders.
After that, two groups of aliens have to be defeated in a simple shootout. The
third and most challenging level in the game is the Space Warp, where enemies
appear in the middle of the screen and follow a circular pattern while shooting
at the player. In the final level, the player has to go one on one against the
enemy flagship. If all these stages are survived, the first level starts again,
but this time everything has been made more difficult.

Gorf isn't hard to learn, but it does take skill and experience to get through
the later levels. This FAQ is intended to help master the strategies that'll
see you through beyond the easy Cadet and Captain levels. You'll still need to
develop the necessary reflexes yourself, but hopefully this doucment will
point you in the right direction.

This FAQ is dedicated to GameFAQs friends Falsehead and Xythar, whose ears
never get tired of listening to a fellow gamer when he needs to rant.

===============================================================================
[2] CONTROLS
===============================================================================

Despite the differences between the levels of Gorf, your craft is controlled
in exactly the same way in each. You will start at the bottom of the screen,
right in the middle, and can move left and right along the width of the screen
by pushing the joystick in the appropriate direction. In addition, you can
move up, but not all the way. In the Astro Battles level, you can only move up
a little bit, and in the other three levels up to about a third of the screen's
height. Diagonal movement is possible.

You can fire by pressing the button. You are allowed to have only one shot on
the screen at a time; if you fire again when you have another shot still on
the screen, that one disappears. This means you'll have to make your shots
count as you can't just fill the screen with them, but at least if you do
miss, you don't have to wait for your shot to leave the screen. Finding the
balance between shooting quickly and not accidentally cutting your previous
shot short will take practice, but is key to becoming a good Gorf player.

===============================================================================
[3] GAME MECHANICS
===============================================================================

Gorf is divided into groups of four levels, which always come in the same
order: Astro Battles, Laser Attack, Space Warp and Flag Ship. The difficulty
of each is determined by how often you've been through them, and symbolized
through your rank. You start the game as a Space Cadet, then receive
promotions whenever you get through all four levels. The next cycle will be
harder than the last one, and this keeps up until you lose your last life.

You start each game with no less than six lives. The reserve lives you still
have apart from the one you're using right now are shown at the top of the
screen, next to your score. You can gain one bonus life in the course of the
game by completing the cycle of four levels once, bringing your total to seven.

The ranks you go through in each cycle are as follows:

Space Cadet
Space Captain
Space Colonel
Space General
Space Warrior

There may well be more after Space Warrior; if I ever get through that cycle,
you'll be the first to know. Checking FAQs of other versions of Gorf revealed
that those have a sixth level known as Space Avenger, so that's probably in
this one as well. Haven't been able to get there myself though.

Your objective in Gorf is twofold: on one hand, getting to as high a level as
possible, and on the other, scoring as many points as you can. Depending on
which of the two has your priority, you may wish to follow a slightly different
strategy. Both options will described later on.

===============================================================================
[4] LEVEL OVERVIEW
===============================================================================

This section describes each of Gorf's four levels one by one, outlining what
you're up against, what you're expected to do, and how points are scored in
this level.

---------------------
-[4.1] ASTRO BATTLES-
---------------------

Astro Battles is a classic Space Invaders rip-off; or tribute, if you prefer.
It's also the only level with a blue background, as opposed to the black on
all other levels. As the level starts, a formation of 24 aliens, in 3 rows
of 8, begins to build up roughly in the middle of the screen. When the
formation has finished building, which takes a couple of seconds, it will
start descending on you in Space Invaders style. This means the whole
formation moves to the left or right, until the ones at the far end reach the
edge of the screen. At that point the whole formation drops down a line and
moves in the other direction. Meanwhile, as you shoot at the formation and
clean up aliens, the entire formation picks up in speed.

The swoop toward you continues until either you destroy the entire formation,
or some of them reach the bottom of the screen. If that happens, you lose one
life, and the level ends. (Be grateful - in Space Invaders the game is over if
the enemy reaches the bottom!)

The aliens (obviously) also fire at you, dropping shots straight down which
will kill on impact. Fortunately you have an energy shield to protect you,
which hangs about an inch above your craft. Every segment of the shield can
absorb one enemy shot, but no more, so the protection is only temporary. The
shield also won't stop the aliens themselves from getting through, so your
protection is gone if they drop beneath the shield. Finally, whenever you fire
a shot, the shield briefly disappears to let your own shot through, which
makes you vulnerable for that same instant.

At the top of the screen, alien craft of various types sometimes pass by. They
can come from either direction and may sometimes even stop halfway and return
to where they came from. These are bonus targets which are harmless and don't
have to be destroyed, but net you some extra points if you get them anyway.

You gain 50 points for every alien in the formation you destroy, for a total
of 1200 for all 24 of them. Destroying one of the bonus aliens at the top nets
you 100, 200 or 300 depending on the type of alien. The one that appears at
the start of the level, however, is worth 250.

As the difficulty level rises, the alien formation appears lower and much
closer to your craft, and they will also fire more often. The formation does
not get any quicker on higher levels as far as I can tell.

--------------------
-[4.2] LASER ATTACK-
--------------------

This level pits you against two small formations of enemies, and is probably
the quickest and easiest in the game. The formations start in the top left and
right corners of the level, and each consists of one laser armed craft at the
front and four support craft arranged behind it. The laser craft will fly
quickly to a random position on the screen and fire a laser beam straight down.
A second after the beam disappears from the screen, one or two of the support
craft will leave formation and fly down at an angle, trying to ram you but not
putting all that much effort in it. Assuming they don't crash into you or one
of your shots, they leave the screen at the bottom and rejoin formation. In
the meantime, the laser craft finds a new random position and fires again.

When you destroy a laser craft, every ship that was still in formation behind
it goes into free mode and does the whole half hearted ramming thing,
continuing it until they are destroyed. The support ships are completely
unarmed and will never fire at you.

Since there are only ten enemies to deal with in this level, of which eight are
unarmed, and none of them really attacks you deliberately, clearing this stage
is often a matter of seconds. You get 300 points for each of the laser ships
and 100 points for each of the support craft, for a a total of 1400 points in
this stage. There are no bonus targets this time.

Higher levels do little to make this stage more challenging. It seems that
on Captain and Colonel levels, the support craft are a little more eager to
leave formation, but the difference is subtle and may be imagination on my
part. The formations also go from one location to another a little more
quickly; this is definite but still not much of a difference. The only truly
noticable change is on General level and higher; the support craft move much
more quickly now when they leave formation, increasing the risk of collision.

------------------
-[4.3] SPACE WARP-
------------------

This is where things get interesting. The center of the screen is a warp exit
point where enemy ships appear one by one, moving out in a pattern of ever
widening circles while shooting at you. And this time, the shots are aimed,
sometimes directly at you, sometimes nearby, and often trickier than they look.
Every enemy comes out, randomly chooses between circling clockwise or
counterclockwise, and keeps it up until you destroy it, it crashes into you,
or it reaches any of the screen's edges and escapes. No matter what happens,
the next one comes as soon as it's gone. This keeps up until you've had a total
of 16 ships (12 on Cadet level), after which this level is over.

While this level may seem simple - after all it resolves itself even if you
don't kill anything - it's easily the most deadly of the bunch as you're being
targeted directly this time around, by enemies which make good use of evasive
maneuvering. Especially in the later levels, where their return fire becomes
really thick, it's not uncommon to lose several lives in a row here.

Every enemy you destroy is worth 250 points, for a maximum of 3000 points on
Cadet level and 4000 on all others. That assumes you actually destroy all the
enemies and let none slip by.

Space Warp gets progressively harder on every cycle. On Cadet level, there are
only 12 enemies and they can only have one projectile on the screen at a time,
which is also slow moving. Captain level increases the number of enemies to
16, and their projectiles now move faster. On Colonel and General levels, the
enemies now shoot two projectiles at a time; both fast on Colonel, and
randomly slow or fast on General. On Space Warrior level, they'll have three
projectiles out at the same time. From Colonel level on, your enemies will
frequently shoot their projectiles in a near unavoidable pattern.

-----------------
-[4.4] FLAG SHIP-
-----------------

This is a bit of an anticlimax after Space Warp, but not by much. This time,
you're facing a large enemy flag ship one on one. It moves from left to right
at the top of the screen, shooting projectiles at you in the same way the
enemies in Space Warp did, but with noticeably worse aim. On all levels except
Cadet, the flag ship also has two lieutenants with it which will swoop down
to ram you, but with about as much conviction as the enemies in Laser Attack.
They'll die quickly.

There are only two complications to taking down the flag ship. First, it has
a protective shield much like the one you had in Astro Battles, which you'll
need to punch a few holes in first. Second, the only way the flag ship can be
destroyed is by hitting it precisely in its reactor core, conveniently
displayed as a red circle on the middle of the ship. Any other shot will damage
the flag ship (and send some debris flying back at you), but only a reactor hit
will actually destroy it.

Hitting the reactor requires a good shot, but as you destroy more of the flag
ship's fuselage, it will become easier. You'll be able to destroy the flag
ship soon enough, and probably find it a lot easier than the Space Warp you
just came from.

You earn 100 points for each of the lieutenant ships, and 20 points for every
non-deadly hit you place on the flag ship. A good extra bonus can be earned
by shooting down the bits of debris that fly off the flagship whenever you hit
it - they are worth 150 points each. Destroying the flag ship by hitting
the reactor core is worth 1000 points, after which the cycle of levels begins
at Astro Battles again, but this time at a higher difficulty.

Flag Ship gets a bit harder on every cycle much like Space Warp does. The
lieutenant ships, which are nothing more than a minor nuisance, appear from
Captain level on. Otherwise, the flag ship's shooting capabilities match those
of the Space Warp enemies on every level: one slow projectile on Cadet, one
fast projectile on Captain, two fast on Colonel, two randomly slow/fast on
General, and presumably three on Space Warrior (I haven't ever gotten through
the Warp on that level, so I can't say for sure). You get a bonus life for
finishing off the flag ship in the Cadet cycle.

===============================================================================
[5] STRATEGIES
===============================================================================

This section describes beginner and expert strategies for each of the four
levels in Gorf. I recommend mastering the beginner strategies first, even those
that conflict with the advanced strategies. They will get you through Cadet
and Captain level without much trouble. When you can do that, and you feel
fully confident with the controls, you can start learning the advanced
strategies and get through Colonel and hopefully General with them. For Space
Warrior and beyond, you are on your own. If you can finish Space Warrior,
you're better than I am.

---------------------
-[5.1] ASTRO BATTLES-
---------------------

BEGINNER STRATEGY
The alien formation takes some time to appear, and they're stationary and
harmless until the entire formation is there. If you want to make things
easier for yourself (and why wouldn't you want that?) mop up some of them
before the entire formation is there. As long as there are still red and
green aliens appearing, you can safely move in and kill some of them. When
the yellow ones start appearing, the formation will be done soon, so you'll
want to get out of the way and be to the left or the right of the whole thing
(I'd suggest being on the right at the start of the level).

When the formation is actually moving, there are two basics ways of mopping
it up: by row or by column. Shooting columns increases the time the entire
formation needs to get to the edge of a screen, meaning they don't drop down
as quickly. Shooting rows increases the distance between you and the enemy
directly. In Space Invaders, shooting columns is an important strategy, but
in this humble three row formation, it is not as vital. I'd only sweep columns
if there are still red aliens around (and they aren't *really* close yet), and
go for rows as soon as only greens and yellows remain. Make sure you only
nibble at the outside of the formation, never actually passing under it, and
you're safe from 90% of their return fire.

You may wish to try hitting the bonus alien right at the start of the level,
but during the level itself, don't risk it. Focus on clearing the formation.

EXPERT STRATEGY
At the start, before moving to the formation, wipe out the bonus alien that
always appears at the left and moves to the right. It's an easy shot with
practice (move your craft up a bit to shorten the distance), and a good 250
points.

Then immediately move to mop up the formation. Move your craft up as far as
possible to reduce the distance and allow for quicker shots. You should strive
to clean up at least the red aliens and from Captain level on, as many of the
greens as you can manage too. I like to start clearing the red ones from the
right, then the green while moving from left to right again, and ending up to
the right of the formation just as the last yellow appears. At higher levels,
where the enemies appear closer to you, this is actually easier to do. But you
obviously have less time to clean up the rest when the formation starts moving.

If you're after as high a score as possible, you may wish to stall ending the
level a bit to have more bonus aliens to shoot at. If you choose to do this,
leave about 4 yellow aliens alive. Don't shoot any more, or their speed will
pick up and you give yourself less time. I personally wouldn't risk too much
in this level, anyway; the bonus aliens after the first one are worth 300
points at best and usually less. Not worth risking lives over.

--------------------
-[5.2] LASER ATTACK-
--------------------

BEGINNER STRATEGY
Watch the laser craft closely, moving out of the way if a beam is fired
straight at you, and destroy the support craft as they attack you (but don't
take too much risk, there's no hurry). Watch for a laser craft to pick a
location high in the screen so that its beam takes some time to get all the
way down. As soon as one of them does this near you, quickly move under it,
fire, and move away again. You will be long gone when the beam reaches the
bottom of the screen, and around the same time the laser craft is destroyed
by your shot. Then just mop up its support craft as they come.

You'd do well to handle the groups one at a time and only move on to the
second laser craft when you've mopped up all remaining support ships. If you
don't, you risk becoming overwhelmed by up to eight support ships at once.
There's no gain in taking that risk, so no need to do it.

EXPERT STRATEGY
You don't really need to wait for a laser ship to appear conveniently high.
You can also move close to one wherever it decides to fire from, and wait for
the beam to stop. For about a second after the beam leaves its cannon and
before the laser ship moves again, there will be a gap which you can move into,
allowing you to destroy the laser ship quickly. You will have to move up as
far as you can to take full advantage of this. Then, as you destroy the laser
ship, move down again (you won't move faster than the beam so there is no
risk of crashing into it), firing at the support ships which will certainly be
moving right at you.

You can mop up an entire formation in one go like this, though often one
support ship on the left or right edge escapes. Don't take unnecessary risks
to destroy it right away, just let it go and take it on the next pass. Then
move on to the second laser craft and repeat. With a little luck and quick
reactions, you can devastate this easy level in less than ten seconds.

------------------
-[5.3] SPACE WARP-
------------------

BEGINNER STRATEGY
It is easiest and safest to hit your enemy close to the spawning point. Try
not to let them complete too many circles, but watch their projectiles (only
one at a time until Colonel level), move in and destroy them quickly. Don't
forget you can move up a bit as well as left and right; this will put you
closer to them and give you less time to dodge projectiles, but it will make
it a lot easier to place hits. Remember that if the maximum number of shots
is already on the screen (one at Cadet/Captain level, two at Colonel/General,
three at Space Warrior), there can be no more, so you know your enemy is
temporarily helpless. Use the time this buys you to move in for a point blank
kill. Just be sure to get back to a safe distance when one of the enemy
projectiles leaves the screen and a new one can (and will) be fired at you.
Typically the enemy wastes no time in firing a replacement projectile as soon
as a previous one disappears.

If an enemy gets close to the edge of the screen, just let him go. You don't
need to kill every one of them. Rather, be ready for the appearance of the
next one in the middle of the screen. The number of dots you see in the warp
indicates how many ships you're still facing.

EXPERT STRATEGY
This is where the big points are earned (or lost if you let everything go),
so make a conscious decision between your health and your score, and adapt
the risk you take in destroying enemies to this. There are no bonus lives to
be gained apart from the one at the end of the Cadet cycle, so if you're going
for points, you're doing that only for bragging rights. If you'd rather brag
about getting to a high level, forget about destroying enemies in the Space
Warp unless it's a safe, easy shot or they're getting in the way.

If you're avoiding an enemy, stay low and only move up when the enemy gets
close. You'll be able to let the enemy pass under you this way (assuming it
leaves the screen at the bottom at all). If you move up too quickly, the
enemy *will* move in for a ram and probably succeed, if it doesn't shoot you
down first. Even if you're going to let the enemy pass under you, be sure
you move in his direction and past him; if you sit still he will likely nail
you with a last minute shot aimed upwards.

From Colonel level on, you will usually find it safer to be near one of the
screen's edges than in the middle. In the middle, you tend to be boxed in with
two shots and unable to dodge. It's happened to me all too often that I get
killed here, respawn in the middle, and get killed again immediately by the
next opponent. Losing three or more lives within seconds is not uncommon here.
If your lives are more valuable to you than your score, stay near those edges
where most shots go wide and the few that do come your way can be dodged
easily by moving up or down, and go for shots of opportunity only.

If you're going for the kills and the points and don't mind losing a life now
and then, you will likely prefer to stay near the middle and take your chances
at dodging enemy fire. One way to quickly thin out the warp and rack up the
points is to move your ship precisely under the warp and timing your shots such
that they are in the warp's center *just* as an enemy appears, destroying it
instantly. With good timing you can easily destroy three, or four, or even more
enemies after one another without ever giving them a chance. But be careful
with this approach, because the enemy can still get off shots even with so
little time, so be ready to dodge fast. On Colonel level and up this strategy
tends to get you killed before long, so decide for yourself if you want to keep
it up at all. It works perfectly on Cadet and Captain but only the die hards
will want to keep trying it after that.

-----------------
-[5.4] FLAG SHIP-
-----------------

BEGINNER STRATEGY
Start by making a nice little hole in that shield, near the middle of the
screen. Hanging around the edges is useless since the flag ship will turn
there, making it very hard if not impossible to hit the reactor. Your best
chances are in the middle, so start by making a hole in that shield, say eight
or ten shots wide, so you can maneuver there and place your shots. You can do
it quicker by moving your ship up as far as it can go, but be mindful of the
flag ship's return fire. Unlike you, it is not hindered by the shield.

Then start putting shots into that thing, preferably aimed at the core. It *is*
possible to hit it with your first shot already, but in practice you'll
probably nibble away at the edges of it first before you manage to place a
killing shot. When you hit the flag ship, some debris flies off at a random
angle, so be ready to dodge that if it comes at you. Only one piece of debris
will be on the screen at any one time, so if you place more hits while it's
still falling, no more comes off. If you move close to the flag ship you can
often land three or four shots in a row and increase your chances of a core
hit a whole lot.

From Captain level on you will also have to deal with the two lieutenants.
They are usually helpful enough to come to you. Just shoot them down if they
come near and otherwise leave them be until they do.

EXPERT STRATEGY
Not much changes here, except the return fire becomes more dangerous later on.
Just do what you always do; punch a hole into the shield, move in as close as
you can, and place that reactor hit as soon as possible. The lieutenants will
get in your way somewhere along the way and be dispatched quickly.

You can earn a few extra points here by shooting at the flag ship's fuselage
first without trying to hit the reactor, which at 20 points per hit seems
hardly worth the risk; but the real points are in subsequently destroying the
piece of debris that flies off, which gets you 150 points each time. On Cadet,
this is easy to do a few times to boost your score a bit. On higher levels it
is probably not worth the risk as the flagship may well nail you with a quick
well aimed shot while you're otherwise occupied.  Better to take him down
before that happens.

===============================================================================
[6] INFORMATION REQUESTS
===============================================================================

While I've done my best to provide a complete FAQ on Gorf, I have only my
own knowledge and play experience to go by, and as such there are still a few
gaps left to fill. I welcome any reader contribution that can help provide
the necessary information. If you can help with any of the points below,
please mail me at [email protected] and your submission will be included in
the next version of the FAQ. You will, of course, be fully credited.

- I've only been able to get up to Space Warrior level, and I don't know what
ranks still come after that, and in what way (if at all) the levels get more
difficult after that. I'd welcome any insight on this; screenshot proof would
be appreciated on this one. I strongly suspect the next level is Space Avenger
as it is in various other ports of Gorf, but I'd like to be sure.

- Any insights on strategies for any of the levels are welcomed, specifically
if they get you through the higher levels safely. In case you were wondering,
my personal best is getting to level 19 - that's the Space Warp in the fifth
cycle, Space Warrior - and scoring 31410 points. If you can best me, I am
definitely interested in hearing about your methods.

===============================================================================
[7] REVISION HISTORY
===============================================================================

v1.0: (23 Feb '04) First version of the FAQ.

v1.1: (16 Mar '04) Added some info on level names and additional scoring
info for Astro Battles and Flag Ship.

v1.2: (26 Sep '05) Updated contact info, minor textual updates.

Updates may follow if I receive interesting reader input, or if I come up
with new strategies for higher levels myself. Barring that, though, this FAQ
is complete and finished.

===============================================================================
[8] FINAL WORDS
===============================================================================

ABOUT THIS FAQ
My sixth Commodore 64 FAQ sees the light today, and as always it's been a
pleasure to contribute to the retro gaming community. In time, I hope to write
FAQs on enough Commodore 64 games to make a real difference in the availability
of gaming advice for this system. I still have a long way to go.

For questions, comments, suggestions, praise and criticism, please contact the
author, Sashanan, at [email protected]. This e-mail address is for FAQ
feedback only. Whatever you wish to share about this document or Gorf, chances
are I'll want to hear it. Any serious mail will be answered.

If you wish to do anything with this FAQ except for just reading it, check
the Disclaimer section at the top of the FAQ to find out what you can and
can't do. When in doubt, you can always mail me.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Sashanan was born in 1980 in the Netherlands and is both a database programmer
and an incurable gamer, particularly fond of console RPGs and old Commodore 64
classics. His days are spent mostly trying to juggle way too many time wasting
activities at once, and usually neglecting one or the other.

This document is a copyright of Sashanan, 2004-2005. All rights reserved.
Disclaimer at top of document.

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