Starmaster FAQ
version 1.0
(C) 2003 William Ornt
Table of Contents
-----------------
0. Legal Info
1. Introduction
2. Gameplay
3. Maps (coming soon)
4. Endgame/Scoring
5. Strategy
6. FAQs
7. Credits
Legal Info
----------
This FAQ is Copyright (C) 2003 William Ornt. At the current time I am giving
GameFAQs and _only_ GameFAQs permission to post/publish my FAQs. Please do
not e-mail me asking for permission to reprint this as it will not get a
response. If you find this FAQ on another site (with or without this
disclaimer) please let me know where it is posted, and I will deal with them
personally.
1. Introduction
---------------
Welcome to my Atari 2600 Starmaster FAQ! Recently I was taking a look through
the library of information on GameFAQs and found that, to my surprise, nobody
had written a FAQ on Starmaster, one of my all-time favorite Atari 2600 titles!
So, I decided I would go ahead and take up the challenge of writing a FAQ for
this game -- especially since there are still many Atari 2600 fans such as
myself out there. :)
2. Gameplay
-----------
In Starmaster, you control a ship and defend your four starbases from
enemy starfighters. When you first turn on the game, you will see your ship
drifting through space (the entire game is done from a first-person view) and
the Mission & Attack Control Computer (MACC, for short) at the bottom of the
display. By changing the Black & White/Color switch on the game console, you
can switch between the space view, and the galactic chart (a radar that
displays your location and the locations of the starbases and enemies.)
To choose a level at the beginning of the game, go to the galactic chart and
press the game select button. The top line of the MACC display will show a
letter designating the skill level; when you have the level you want to play,
press the reset button to start the game.
The MACC display shows several important things:
(E, L, W or S): Difficulty level. Also displays your score at end of game.
W: Warp calculator. Displays how much energy will be used when travelling
from your current location to the selected sector (100 units per space).
S: Stardate. Increments by one every several seconds. Shows how long your
game took -- is deducted from your score at end of game, so play fast!
E: Energy. Starts at 9,999 units. Is deducted as you travel through space (1
unit every couple seconds), as you warp (100-1,000 units per warp), when
you are hit (100-500 units per hit) and when you fire your laser (100 units
per shot). If it reaches zero, the game ends.
D: Damage. Displays letters indicating damaged component(s) of the ship.
The full MACC display is only seen when viewing the galactic chart. At other
times only Energy and Damage are displayed.
Each of the four levels varies in speed, length, and difficulty:
Level # Enemies Meteor/Missile Speed
---------------------------------------------------
(E) Ensign 9 Base speed (slow)
(L) Leader 17 1.5 x Base speed (medium)
(W) Wing commander 23 2 x Base speed (fast)
(S) Starmaster 31 2.5 x Base speed (fast!)
The enemies always begin in the same places and in the same groupings each
time you play on the same skill level. Enemies can be found in groups of one
to four, designated by one to four dots in a sector of the galactic chart.
A bow-tie shape represents the starbases, and a + shows your location.
The map is a 6x6 grid. You always stay in the same spot on the chart until
you use your warp drive to move to another sector. Bring up the galactic
chart, and use the joystick to select the sector you want to go to (a hollow +
sign shows your selection). Press fire, and you'll begin warping to that
sector. The color of the MACC panel will change to signify the sector you are
going to (or the sector you are in when you are not in warp mode):
Color What's in the sector
-----------------------------------
Red 1 or more enemies
Blue A starbase
Green Nothing!
On your way to the sector you selected, meteors will fly towards you. You can
avoid them by moving so they go off the end of your screen. If one hits you,
you will lose between 200 to 500 energy units, and your ship might be damaged.
You can also destroy the meteors with your laser, but each shot of your laser
cannon uses 100 energy units, so you're better off dodging them instead.
When you reach the sector, what happens next depends on where you went:
Enemies - If you went to a sector with enemy ships, they will appear and
attack you one at a time. You never fight more than one ship at a time, even
in sectors with multiple ships. The enemy starts out far away, and eventually
will move closer to your ship and back again. The enemy ships shoot missiles,
which basically are the same as meteors except they glow the same colors as
the enemy ship. Just like meteors, you can dodge them or shoot them with the
laser, and will lose energy and possibly be damaged if one hits you.
The object is to hit the enemy with the laser. One hit with the laser is all
that is needed to destroy a ship. It is easier to hit the enemies when they
are closer to you, but it is also harder to avoid their missiles that way as
you'll have less time to react. Enemies can be hit even when they're far back
but you'll have to aim carefully to do so successfully. Also it is useful to
note that the enemies only change the direction they are moving when they
reach the edge of the screen, although you can turn with your joystick to keep
them off the end of your screen for a moment (they can't attack you while not
on the screen).
You can still bring up the galactic chart in mid-battle, and warp away from
the sector if necessary. The enemy can still attack while you are viewing the
chart, so you should be as fast as possible if you do this.
Once an enemy is destroyed, if there are more left in the sector, the next one
will come to attack. If not, the MACC display will turn green, and you can
bring up your chart to go to another sector.
Starbases - If you take damage or are running low on energy, you need to dock
with a starbase. The base will move around in the same pattern as enemies,
but does not attack. (You can shoot the laser at it, and it won't harm the
base, but there's really no reason to.) To dock with the base, keep it on
the screen so when it is as close as it gets to your ship, it is over the X in
the middle of the screen. When you do so, any damage to your ship is repaired
and your energy is refilled to 9,999 units. Then you can head back to attack
more enemy ships.
Damage - As mentioned earlier, the ship might be damaged if you are hit by a
meteor or enemy fire. (Not all hits will result in damage - you will hear a
warning signal if it does.) There are four different types of damage, each
signified by a different letter on the bottom row of the MACC display:
(L) Laser destroyed. Since you can't attack the enemy, you should go to a
starbase and have it repaired.
(S) Shield destroyed. By far the worst damage you can take. If you take
any more hits before getting it repaired, your ship is destroyed and the
game is over.
(W) Warp engine damage. Doubles the energy required to warp from one sector
to another. Really not so bad unless you're low on energy.
(R) Radar destroyed. The galactic chart still displays your location and
the starbases' location, but not the enemies. Unless you want to waste
valuable time guessing what sectors the enemies are in you should get it
repaired.
Protecting starbases - The enemy ships move around the map as you play. The
enemies in the sector you are currently in or warping to will never move, but
enemies elsewhere will be moving around. When they are in a sector adjacent
to a starbase, they are attacking it. The more enemies there are around a
base, the faster it will be destroyed. When a base is destroyed, you see an
explosion (regardless of how far away the destroyed base is) and it is removed
from your galactic chart.
3. Maps
-------
(Will be here in next revision of this FAQ.)
4. Endgame & Scoring
--------------------
The game ends when one of three things happens:
(1) You destroy all the enemies (good),
(2) Your energy level reaches zero (bad), or
(3) You are hit while your shields are destroyed (also bad).
To see your score, bring up the galactic chart. The number at the top of the
MACC display (next to the letter indicating the difficulty level) is your
score. The game calculates your score as follows:
If you successfully complete the mission by destroying all the enemies, you
receive a bonus depending on the difficulty:
Level Bonus
------------------
Ensign 3,100
Leader 4,300
W. Cmdr. 5,700
Starmaster 6,900
Next, you receive 100 points for each enemy destroyed, regardless of whether
the mission was successful or not. Then, 500 points are deducted for each
starbase that was destroyed, 100 points are deducted for each time you docked
at a starbase, and 1 point is deducted for each stardate.
Back in the day, Activision promoted many of its games by giving away patches
to players who sent in pictures showing their best scores, and Starmaster was
one of these games. By reaching a target score at each level, players could
send away to receive these patches. The target scores for Starmaster are:
Level Goal
------------------
Ensign 3,800
Leader 5,700
W. Cmdr. 7,600
Starmaster 9,000
Pictures of these pataches are available at
http://www.atariage.com/2600/archives/activision_patch_page.html?
PatchName=Starmaster%20&ImageName=StarmasterSupreme
and
http://www.atariage.com/2600/archives/activision_patch_page.html?
PatchName=Starmaster%20Chevrons&ImageName=StarmasterChevrons
(remove the spaces in the above links)
Activision no longer makes these or gives them out, but I guess you could
print out the pictures and pin them to your shirt when you've earned
the right to. :P
5. Strategy
-----------
Starmaster is one of those games where there really isn't a single best
strategy, but there are some things you should obviously do.
If there are several enemies surrounding a starbase, attack them first. If
not, go for the enemies closest to your current location, since you want to
save your energy and dock as few times as possible.
When your shields are damaged, go straight back to your base and get it
repaired. Since you took a hit to get that damage, you really can't think
that you'll be able to avoid taking any more hits.
Don't dock too early if you don't need to, but save enough energy to destroy
the ships in the sector you go to. You should have at least 500 energy per
enemy, after warping, plus several hundred more to get back to a base. If
you aren't sure, you're better safe than sorry.
Dodge the meteors on Ensign and Leader levels. On Wing commander and
Starmaster levels, you may have to destroy some of the meteors with the laser
because they can't be avoided due to the speed.
Try to get the enemies while they're far away. It's tough, but you'll be less
likely to get hit than if you let them come right up to you.
Finally, if you play on an emulator, try pressing up and down at the same time.
The screen will move WAY up and down repeatedly as you do this, essentially
guaranteeing that you'll dodge the meteors and enemy fire. (OK, that's kind of
cheating, but hey...)
6. FAQs
-------
Q: What do the different explosion colors mean?
A: Red explosions occur when you destroy an enemy, and blue explosions happen
when you destroy a meteor or enemy missile. Yellow explosions mean either
you were hit, or a starbase was just destroyed.
Q: Why is the MACC display flashing yellow?
A: This means you have below 1,000 units of energy remaining and should
probably go back to a starbase.
Q: All four starbases got destroyed, now what?
A: Now you probably lose, since you can't refuel or repair anymore.
Q: How come the colors change when I leave the game on without playing?
A: That's a "screen-saver" type feature built into most of Activision's Atari
2600 titles. I dunno how effective it is at protecting your TV screen,
since all the same images stay in the same places, but it's fun to watch
everything turn weird looking colors.
7. Credits
----------
Besides myself (WilliamPorygon), I'd like to thank everyone else who made this
FAQ possible:
- CJayC, for posting this on his site
- AtariAge.com, for the pictures of the Starmaster patches
- Atariguide.com, for the original instructions from the Starmaster game
- All the dedicated Atari 2600 fans out there ^_^
Feel free to contact me through my e-mail or the GameFAQs boards with any
questions, comments, or anything else you may want to say regarding my FAQ.
