The toughest of the required stages lay here. Hopefully you've gotten the previous Challenging Stage achievements out of the way so you don't have to look back knowing that there's still a few more moments of frustration ahead. Fortunately, there's only one Challenging Stage left that will actually pose any amount of real difficulty to it.
Stage 25
After beating Stage 24, just restart so you can begin this stage with all five lives. You'll really need each and every one from now on, which is to be expected of nearly any 8Bit game from back in the day.
Stage 26
Unlike other levels before a Challenging Stage, you won't need to worry about getting a dual fighter due to how easy Challenging Stage 27 is. Shoot to kill.
Stage 27
This Challenging Stage is so easy that it's actually possible to describe where to shoot from. As per usual, there are five waves of enemies. The first place you'll want to be is in the far-right corner, as the Galboss train will make a sharp angle and fly right above that corner. Mash your fire key as soon as the first one appears over you and don't stop until they're all gone. For the second wave, try to position your ship halfway across the purple emblem just to the left of the far-right corner. This wave will go in a straight line down towards this position, so fire constantly once again when they appear above you. For the third wave, you're going to want to park yourself up above your third life (assuming you've restarted this level or have at least four lives). If the life in the far-left corner is your "first" life, then you'll want to stay above your third. It'll be the same routine as the previous wave.
The last two waves are similar to the first in that Galbosses will storm the corners after they finish making a sharp angle. Sit in the far left corner and repeat the process, then fly immediately over to the far-right corner and take out the final wave.
For finishing a Challenging Stage without a dual fighter, you'll earn an additional achievement. If you didn't find a Galboss in any previous stage, you'll get its achievement here. There are always Galbosses in this stage, so you'll definitely get the achievement just for playing the stage.
Stage 28
Another fluff stage, if you'd want to call it that. Just getting to the end will be a feat in itself at this point due to the speed of enemies and excessive fire rate they have, so you should be proud of yourself for finishing this one anyway.
Stage 29
Restart from Stage 28, unless you somehow never lost any lives, and fight your way through all of the enemies once again. This time, you'll have a prize waiting for you as you start the stage after this one.
Stage 30
This is the toughest regular stage remaining in the game. Getting a dual fighter through to the next stage is going to be very gruesome, especially since you'll easily be doing this over ten times due to the difficulty of the last Challenging Stage. You'll be replaying this one quite a lot.
Stage 31
The final stage. Unlike any of the others before it, this Challenging Stage is actually just unfair. The first good position to be in is to have your right fire directly under the G in "HIGH SCORE". I personally ended up putting a piece of scotch tape on my monitor so I could get it down better; you might want to try that out too if you're getting frustrated with setting that up. Fire two shots at the enemies that show up on the left, and then fire two more. This should get rid of the left strand of enemies in the first wave; if not, keep shooting at the right wave as they come over to the left side and you'll hopefully finish both strands off.
Next, stick to the left and wait for the second wave to come in, which starts with a Boss Galaga. You're going to want to shoot the Boss as soon as its above you, and then follow the strand as they move to the right towards the center of the screen to finish them off. This was by far the wave where I ended up failing the most, but knowing to stick left and trail right should really help you out so you're not stuck in the same boat for as long as I was.
The third wave comes in from the right corner. You can sit at the corner and shoot as they come in, but if you miss one, you'll probably lack the time to get over to the middle and shoot it before it flies off. Instead, stay a bit to the left of the medallions in the lower right corner so you can still shoot enemies quickly and get to the middle if things slip up slightly.
The last two waves are just like the first, which can be good or bad depending on how well you know that wave. Just try not to get overly frustrated with this Challenging Stage. The first time I perfected this one took me well over three hours to get right, so expect a long and gruelling ride to your final achievement and a tough completion.
Stage 32
If you've gotten all the achievements, then congratulations! You don't actually have to play any further, but you can keep going if you want to. Given that this is an 8Bit game, it's a good guess to say that there are probably 255 levels total due to storage "limitations", so there's plenty to do if you still feel like fighting those ships.
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