Rotor

You control a battle tank (the Rotor) which hovers in a 2D-labyrinth. Gravity
pulls heavily on the Rotor, making it fall towards the ground. As any contact
with walls or enemies is deadly, your main task is to avoid that. You may
rotate your tank freely and accelerate via an afterburner, thus manoeuvring
through the corridors — imagine a mix of Asteroids and Lunar Lander to get an
idea of the physics.

Scattered throughout the 18 different fortresses are boxes. Shoot these open
to find either a) Fuel: this will replenish your supply, which is drained by
shooting and accelerating. b) Sun crystals: Collect all to finish the mission.
c) Bombs. They will explode in 30 to 60 seconds, destroying your ship. You can
avoid that by leaving the screen quickly, or by picking the bomb up; this
earns you major credits, but your ship drops much faster due to increased
weight. d) Pearls. Collecting these advance the upgrade counter by one to
three steps; you may activate the current upgrade at any time, which will
improve your rotation speed, engine strength, weapon, shield etc. Boxes are
emptied by carefully flying very, very close to them and activating a tractor
field.

As if gravity and accurate flying wasn’t challenging enough, the game also
confronts you with various enemies. All of these are immobile and fire in a
straight line; the sheer mass of them makes avoiding the bullets a difficult
task nevertheless. Apart from turrets, there are attractors and repulsors
who’ll smash you into walls, and force fields that need to be deactivated by
finding and shooting a switch.

The tricky labyrinths together with the short supply of fuel, weight
constraints and clever upgrade system make Rotor more a game of tactics and
accuracy than arcade action. Wild shooting and careless flying will deplete
your fuel in no time; you’ll have to progress carefully to discern traps in
time.