Star Squadron

Star Squadron is a classic vertical-scrolling space shooter in a bright cartoon style. Your fighter fires on its own, so all you do is fly: steer with the keyboard or the mouse, or drag anywhere on a phone and the ship follows your finger from a short distance, so your thumb never covers it. The sky scrolls past with a parallax starfield, drifting nebulae and planets, and the enemies come in authored waves: robot fighters in V-formations, space worms that weave in from the top, turrets bolted onto asteroids, kamikaze darts that take aim before they dash, gunships, spiky puffer monsters that pop out rings of shots, and shielded carriers that launch drones.

Carriers drop the power-ups. Spread fans your shots out, Laser turns the main gun into a piercing beam, Homing sends missiles after whatever is closest, Drones add little wingmen, Shield takes a hit for you and Speed makes the ship quicker. Each one stacks to level three and drops a level when you are hit. Three bombs per life clear every shot off the screen, and hits within two seconds of each other build a chain that multiplies your score up to ten times.

Every stage has a mid-boss and an end boss with two or three phases and clearly telegraphed attacks: laser sweeps that show a warning line first, ring bursts that charge before they fire and homing pods you can shoot down. Take no hits and the stage pays a medal. You have three ships and a continue from the start of the stage, and the stage select remembers what you have cleared. Once the campaign is done, Endless loops the waves with rising speed for a high score, and the Daily run gives everyone the same seed each day. Quick to pick up on touch, mouse or keyboard; press P to pause and M to mute.