Alpha Fighter - ATARI 2600

Alpha Fighter

An Atari 2600 game

Introduction

War didn’t start with an invasion. It started with a broadcast.

A distant armada known only as The Vale Fleet arrived at the edge of the system and began transmitting a signal that turns ships into obedient ghosts—autopilots hijacked, crews locked out, entire squadrons folding into formation without a single shot fired. In three days they took the outer colonies. In five, they silenced Mars.

Now they’re here.

You are the last pilot cleared to fly the ALPHA FIGHTER, a prototype strike craft built around an experimental core that can’t be overridden or rewritten. Fast, fragile, and lethal—made to slip between targeting grids, carve through swarms, and hit the heart of the enemy before the signal spreads to Earth’s defenses.

Your mission is simple on paper:

Break the fleet.
Destroy the three Motherships.
End the broadcast.

But the Vale don’t fight like an army. They fight like a single mind—adapting with every pass, rebuilding from wreckage, and closing ranks around their Motherships: CROWN, GOLIATH, and ECHO, each guarded by a different nightmare of cannons, shields, and living escort wings.

No backup is coming. No one else can get close.

If the Alpha Fighter falls, the sky belongs to them forever.

Controls

• Joystick: Moves the aircraft across the screen.
• Fire button: Fires missiles.

Game mode

• Single-player.

Game objective

• Destroy all tree mother ships

Scoring

• Destroying an enemy earns 10 points.
• Destroying a mother ship earns 50 points

Console setup

1. Press the fire button to start the game.
2. Press Reset to go to the initial screen.

Acknowledgments

• https://bataribasic.com/
  • Awesome easy to learn basic-like language
• https://www.randomterrain.com/ 
  • Amazing documentation on how to program the Atari 2600
• https://forums.atariage.com/topic/348849-revengs-sound-collection-in-bb/
  • Sound effects crafted from the awesome RevEng's Sound Collection in bB
• https://www.labelmaker2600.com/
  • Easy to use and flexible Atari 2600 label generator
• OpenAI image generator
  • Cool label image