Lunar Rescue

Lunar Rescue, also known as Galaxy Rescue, is an arcade game, released by Taito Corporation in 1979; it utilizes an Intel 8080 microprocessor (running up at 2 MHz), with discrete components and a Texas Instruments SN-76477 for audio. It was one of the first games from the company to display its year upon its title screen which also featured a Large Space Invader and six Split Medium ones from SIP2 (the Large one says "PLEASE INSERT COIN", and all seven of them tip their heads to the left).

The player must take control of a lunar lander module which starts out in the mother ship at the top of the screen; after a press of the button (or a preset period of time), it will be ejected and must descend around six rows of asteroids, in order to land on one of the six landing platforms on the Moon surface at the bottom of the screen. One of the six stranded stickfigure astronauts, waiting to be rescued, will then run over to the lander module, and get into it - and all the asteroids will then transform into flying saucers which can fire some bullets down at your lander as it starts flying back up to the mother ship. However, your lander can also fire bullets at these saucers with a press of the button; once you have flown back into the mothership the rescued astronaut will appear in the top-right corner of the screen (however if you are killed on the way back up the rescued astronaut will perish in the explosion). It is also advisable to watch out for shooting stars, that fly diagonally downwards across the screen - and once you have rescued all six astronauts (regardless of death toll) you will proceed to the next stage.