Phantom Slayer (video game)

Phantom Slayer is a video game released by Med Systems in 1982 for the TRS-80 Color Computer and Dragon 32/64. Written by Ken Kalish, Phantom Slayer is considered by some an early forerunner of the modern first-person shooter genre.

Phantom Slayer
Developer(s)Med Systems
Publisher(s)Microdeal
Designer(s)Ken Kalish
Platform(s)Dragon 32/64, TRS-80 Color Computer
Release1982
Genre(s)Maze
Mode(s)Single-player

Gameplay

The player moves around a randomly generated maze, attempting to kill the eponymous phantoms by shooting them. As each level is cleared, a new maze is created, and the phantoms became harder (requiring more shots) to kill.

The game combines a relatively sedate pace and a then-rare first-person point of view (using simple fixed-perspective graphics) to produce high levels of dramatic tension for a game on such primitive hardware. The player moves around the maze, and his or her only indication that a Phantom was encroaching is an ominous sound, played when the Phantom is a few squares away from the player's position.

A power-up time is required for the player's weapon, leading to the player holding a position in order to charge the weapon while stalking (or being stalked). The phantoms can take multiple hits (usually two). Combined with their creepy ability to get in close and blind-side the player, this is effective for elevating the fear factor.

gollark: So your issue is just flexible working hours?
gollark: Are you suggesting that having to hunt/gather food isn't "work" for animals?
gollark: For example, a train station I'm aware of has a ticket office with 4 people at desks and basically no activity, even though they mostly just act as bad frontends for the automatic ticket system, for which there are also (not very good) automatic ticket machines.
gollark: There are some things which I think probably should be automated but aren't, though, and I think that's mostly just because some people want there to be humans around for whatever reason and pressure to "preserve jobs".
gollark: Oops, I said knowledge work twice.

See also

References
    • Phantom Slayer - Fan site, includes more screenshots and a (legal) download of the game binary, for use with emulators.
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