Galaga '88

It features significantly improved graphics over previous games in the series, including detailed backgrounds, larger enemies, and greater ship details. A commercial success in Japan, but was not as successful as its predecessors outside of Japan. The game was praised by critics for its gameplay, graphics, and music, as well as for its new enhancements that changed and innovated the core gameplay. It was ported to the TurboGrafx-16, X68000, and Japanese mobile phones, and is included in several Namco compilations. It was followed by Galaxian3: Project Dragoon in 1990.

• Title — Galaga '88 • Developer — Namco • Composer — Hiroyuki Kawada • Series — Galaxian • Platforms — Arcade, PC Engine/TurboGrafx-16, X68000, mobile phone • Released — Arcade PC Engine/TurboGrafx-16 X68000 Mobile i-Mode EZwebFebruary 28, 2008 • Genre — Fixed shooter • Modes — Single-player, multiplayer • Arcade System — Namco System 1

• Illustration — Arcade screenshot Galaga '88 is a fixed shooter video game. Its plot involves the launch of a starship named the Blast Fighter to destroy the hostile Galaga forces and their home planet. Its gameplay is similar to its predecessors, Galaxian, Galaga, and Gaplus, as the Blast Fighter, the player must shoot each of the Galaga aliens, who fly into formation from the top and sides of the playfield. The aliens will make an attempt to hit the player by divebombing towards the bottom of the screen. Colliding with an alien or their projectile results in a life being lost. Atop each formation are 4 larger enemies known as the Boss Galaga, which take 2 hits to destroy. Like 1981's Galaga, these enemies can use a tractor beam to capture a player's ship, returning with it to the top of the screen. The player can reclaim the captured fighter by shooting a Boss Galaga holding one while it is divebombing. If they are successful, the captured fighter joins with the player's own to create a dual fighter that has additional firepower and a larger hitbox. A Boss Galaga can also capture a dual fighter; rescuing it in the same fashion instead creates a triple fighter, an even larger ship with wide, fast-moving shots. A triple fighter can also be acquired by finding pink-colored capsules. Galaga '88 consists of five "worlds", each one containing up to four stages, including a bonus stage at the end. Each world gives the player a chance to acquire up to two blue warp capsules by defeating large enemies and destroying obstacles; completing a bonus stage with two capsules warps the player to the next dimension, in which enemies and formations are different and generally more difficult. There are additionally two vertical-scrolling stages featuring two enemy formations and a boss. The game features four different endings based on which dimension the player is in when they complete the game.

The soundtrack for Galaga 88 was composed by Hiroyuki Kawada, a former game designer that created music for games such as Solvalou, Yokai Dochuki, and Valkyrie no Densetsu. Kawada expressed his admiration for its gameplay, and wanted the music and sound effects to convey a sense of entertainment instead of stoicism. For the Galactic Dancin stages, he created music that tapped into a wide variety of genres, like orchestra, tango, salsa, and big band jazz. Kawada based the idea off his "eclectic" taste in music, and wanted the soundtrack in Galaga 88 to reflect this. The music was created before the stages themselves were programmed; Kawada composed the tracks while the programmers choreographed the enemy movement to his music. Since Galaga 88 utilized the System 1 hardware, Kawada was able to experiment with the board's sound channels: "I loved bringing together the richness of the timbres in FM synthesis, the wave table synthesis that played a crucial role in the Namco sound, and the PCM synthesis that was indispensable for those low resolution real sound effects. When they were all combined and their distinctive colors were used to the fullest, it was possible to create a wealth of musical variety to complement the classic traditional sounds of the Galaga series."

A prototype of Galaga 88 was demonstrated at the Japan Amusement Machine (JAMMA) trade show in October 1987, presented alongside Pac-Mania, Bravoman, and Assault. Namco released the game in Japan in December 1987. In Europe, the game made its debut at London's Amusement Trades Exhibition International (ATEI) in January 1988. The game was released in April 1988 in North America, and was published by Atari Games in North America and Europe as part of its licensing agreement with Namco America.