Discovery of Sound
Encounter

Space Encounter 91

Free browser arcade game

Space Encounter 91 is a Space Invaders-style arcade game built into the Encounter website. It is free, runs in any browser on desktop and mobile, and needs no install and no account. What makes it different from an ordinary shooter is what it is made of: the game is the record. Every mission is an album, every round is one of its tracks, and the track plays while you fight your way through it — waves keep coming for as long as the song runs, so surviving the track is what clears the round.

It is the only way into the music. A planet's album player stays sealed in the solar system until you finish that planet's mission.

Play now Enter the solar system

How to play

  • Desktop — left and right arrow keys move the ship, space bar fires.
  • Mobile — touch anywhere on the playfield: the ship travels to your finger and fires for as long as you hold.
  • The track is the timer. Clear a wave and another takes its place — the round only ends when the song does. Survive to the last bar and the next round begins.
  • You start every round with five shields, shown bottom-left. Lose them all and the run ends.
  • If the invaders reach your line, the run ends immediately however many shields you hold.

The UFO

A UFO crosses the top of the screen from time to time. Shooting it pays its own points and then one bonus at random, so it is never predictable:

  • +500 points on top of the UFO's own value.
  • SHIELD +1 — one shield back, offered only when you have lost one.
  • A three-shot burst power-up, letting you fire a wider spread for a short time.

Missions and rounds

The first mission is Mercury, the debut album, and its five rounds are named after the missions that were actually sent to the planet: Mariner 10, Caloris, Bruce C. Murray, MESSENGER and 88 Days. Because each round runs the length of its track, finishing the whole mission takes roughly 25 to 30 minutes — the running time of the album. Reach the end of the fifth track and it is yours to play whenever you return.

You get three continues. Die with one left and you can restart the round you fell on with the score reset, rather than being sent back to the first track — though the attempt is marked, from FIRST CONTACT through to LAST CONTACT.

Leaderboard and the signed CD

Scores go to a shared online leaderboard, one per album, so you are playing against everyone else who has found the site. The top 5 players on each album's leaderboard win a signed CD of that record. The board is live from now until release day, so an early score is worth holding on to.

Why a game on a record label's site

Encounter is a jungle and drum & bass project on the label Discovery of Sound, built on 90s hardware — an AKAI MPC 2000, an AKAI S3000XL, an Amiga running OctaMED Pro. Space Encounter 91 belongs to the same era and the same idea: the music is not handed over, it is found. The website is a solar system, each planet is a release, and the arcade cabinet is how you get in.

Play Space Encounter 91