Tempest 4000: A great trip on Switch too

Jeff Minter isn’t responsible for the existence of Tempest, as the first was conceived and programmed by Dave Theurer. Minter, however, loved the concept, developed the 1994 remake Tempest 2000 and has held the torch of psychedelic tube action ever since. With this he always sparks impressive pixel parties, where old-fashioned vector art in modern neon chic flashes across the screen as if the last 20 years hadn’t existed.

“Tube” by the way, because you move your spaceship on the edge of a tunnel while the opponents crawl along its inner and outer walls. Now, in the rarest cases, the tunnel is actually a tube, but a cross-section that is folded differently in each level: sometimes a triangle, sometimes a kind of crescent and if you’re unlucky a loop – which isn’t an advantage because you always have to keep the ship in moved in relation to its own position. Pressing the left button rarely causes a change of location from right to left, and that’s where the trouble starts for me.

Because actually I have no problem with moving video game cars from a bird’s eye view relative to their position. But in Tempest, for some reason, it’s a lot harder. My head just doesn’t want to be like the game, which is why I either think too long in some of the later loops or immediately bang into an opponent. It goes without saying that both are extremely unfavorable for progressing in a fast-paced arcade shooter.

And why is the ship moving so sluggishly? It’s not that easy to place this claw precisely in front of an attacker, which is why far too often I only roughly wipe the opponent instead of targeting attackers precisely. And such a sluggish control is not for me. I’m looking at you Super Mario Bros.!

But what really annoys me is the readability of the events or their occasional absence – a quite sensitive limitation in a game of this category. Somehow, Minter always seems to think that the motley spectral spectacle is more important than the action, and so with Tempest 4000 he ignites a retro-inspired firework display in which you can hardly tell what friend and foe are doing at the moment. The main thing is a pixel party! Who needs continues?

I don’t even think the actual game is that mature. Of course, Minter knows what he’s doing. With his almost 60 years of age, he worked on a whole series of such and similar projects, including Tempest derivatives, which felt only differed from the original in name. And yet you can find yourself in situations from which there is virtually no escape, which makes the screen deaths that follow all the more frustrating. If the enemies reach the edge of the tube, they represent fatal traps. You could dodge them, but unfortunately it’s so fiddly that it becomes a frustrating game of chance at the latest when several of them are right next to each other.

Okay, maybe I just don’t get Minter, although I’m really into glitzy arcade stuff. At least every few years I dig out one of his Tempest variants and let myself drift for a while in the splendid color frenzy with a cool soundtrack. In Tempest 4000, which has just appeared on Switch, you can even choose between three different playlists, find an alternative way of playing with Survival mode and in the Classic version you can continue after each level with the last high score and the lives available at the time. Old-fashioned idealists, on the other hand, start from scratch every time in Pure mode.

This is of course convenient, also works perfectly and smoothly on Switch and motivates you to attack both the local and global point lists – if you basically feel in good hands here. And I don’t want to hide the fact that I don’t find the hip retro trip very fascinating either. But this year I found out again that I prefer Geometry Wars or Crimzon Clover, which is just as flashy and playful but much more grippy.