Arcade Game Series: GALAGA

Welcome to the walkthrough for Arcade Game Series: GALAGA. The short achievement list for this game is pretty easy to complete, so you won't spend too much time fighting enemies in space unless you decide to go for leaderboard bragging rights.

Thanks to a level select feature, no achievement is necessarily hard to get, but some will take a few tries. You can select any level that you've played at least once, which really helps with things. The level select feature does disable leaderboards however, so if you're actually interested in that sort of thing, you'll have to go for it after you're done with the achievements.

For the sake of keeping things brief, you'll never have to play past Level 32 for all of the achievements in this list, so this walkthrough will only go up to that point. Galaga as a game is a simple enough concept as it is. Miscellaneous achievements and how to get them will be dotted in with "normal" levels that don't otherwise have specific achievements tied directly to them.

Mess with the game's settings as soon as you can and turn Choose Level on. Set the maximum amount of lives up too, because there's no reason not to. Changing any of these settings off of the default disables the leaderboards, but that's not really that important in the grand scheme of things.

You can also edit the key bindings to best suit your preferences.

As far as tips go, that's about it. The game is simple: move left and right, and then fire at enemies.

The first eight levels that you'll have to go through serve as a pretty good tutorial for what's to come. Below are some tips and other bits of information to help you through, as well as some info on how to obtain some of the earlier achievements of the set for this game.

Stage 1

For the first stage, just try to get comfortable with how the game works. Enemies will pop in from the sides of the screen in waves, and when all of them are in position, one enemy at a time will soar towards you and open fire. Try to watch out not only for their attacks, but the ships themselves; getting hit by enemies isn't exactly a great tactical strategy for defeating them, and you'll lose a life in the process.

This is also the best time to get one of a few miscellaneous achievements. Take note of those green enemies that sit at the top of the screen and turn purple when hit once. These are Boss Galagas, and they're related to quite a few achievements in the list. For a later run of Stage 1, try to shoot all four Boss Galagas until they turn purple, and then shoot enemies as usual. Leave about six or so around the stage and let the Boss Galagas swoop down and use its tractor beam. You're going to want to be directly under it as it comes down onto you, and you're going to want to shoot right before you get sucked into it. This will technically put you inside the tractor beam as the Boss dies, and you'll unlock the below achievement for escaping its tractor beam.

If you decide not to shoot before you get sucked in, you're going to have to try to hit it as you're spinning around in the beam, which is ridiculously hard to do and is incredibly luck-based. It's best to just go with the trigger finger method mentioned above.

• Escape Artist

  Escape from a Boss Galaga's tractor beam!

  
  

Stage 2

Enemies will now fire at you upon entry into the stage. Be careful about moving around. It's actually a better idea to focus on not getting hit instead of aiming at enemies sometimes. Additionally, two enemies will drop down towards you once all of the fleet has been assembled, as opposed to the previous one from before. Try not to put yourself in a corner; they might seem like safe spots, but backing into one could mean death since you won't have much time to move out of the way of an enemy shot.

Stage 3

This is your first Challenging Stage. None of the enemies will fire at you in a Challenging Stage, so this is purely a break from the action to rack up points. In later Challenging Stages, you'll have to defeat all of the enemies in each wave, but we'll worry about that when it's time to.

Stage 4

Things get even crazier from here. Up to three enemies will come hurtling towards you, and will fire more shots as they do. Although death has a much weaker sting with the stage selection option in the menus, it's still good to build up practice avoiding enemy fire. After all, this is just the fourth of 32 Stages.

You should also spot a special scorpion enemy during this stage if you refrain from shooting the yellow bee enemies for too long. Merely seeing it will give you an achievement, so don't worry about trying to shoot it. If you didn't find one on this stage for whatever reason, you'll surely find one later. And if you still haven't found one before Stage 8, then don't worry about it; you'll have a 100% chance of finding one on Challenging Stage 15. If you want to find one now, though, check the description for Stage 8.

• Scorpion

  Find the Scorpion that appears in battle!

  
  

Stage 5

For this Stage, we'll be aiming for a certain achievement. Just make sure you have at least two lives for this, because you'll have to lose one in the process.

During the level, try to get your ship caught in a Boss Galaga's tractor beam. Don't shoot while this happens, because you'll want the Boss Galaga alive. When it has one of your ships (now red) at the top of the screen, shoot the Boss Galaga to death. This should cause the red ship to attack you like any other enemy. Defeat it to earn a fairly simple achievement.

• Enemy Fighter

  Shoot down a red captured Fighter!

  
  

Stage 6

You'll get a bit of a break for Stage 6. Enemies won't fire at you when they spawn in, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't fire back. This is another good chance to get a new achievement. Hop back into a Boss Galaga's tractor beam (remember to have at least two lives) and don't shoot it down like you did before. Instead, destroy the Boss when it's flying towards you. This will prevent the red ship from turning against you and you'll now have two ships flying side-by-side to fight the enemies. Using two ships is going to be a big part of the strategy for Challenging Stages later on.

• Dual Fighter

  Form a Dual Fighter!

  
  

Stage 7

Another Challenging Stage. You won't be able to die on this one and you don't have to worry about killing absolutely everything, so it'll be smooth sailing to get to Stage 8.

Stage 8

This is just your average level, but a new enemy will spawn out of the bees if there are few enough of them left on the map and there are little to none of the other types of enemies on screen. If you want to surgically remove all the other enemies and leave about ten bees behind, one of them should turn into a set of three stingrays, just like they would with scorpions in Stages 4-6. You don't need to find a stingray right away, since these too appear in a later Challenging Stage.

• Stingray

  Find the stingray that appears in battle!

  
  

This set of levels is where Challenging Stages start to have achievements tied to them. These can be done as you get to those levels, or you can do them after you finish Stage 31 for your first time. It's up to you, but I'd recommend earning the achievements as they appear just so you don't have to do any backtracking later.

Stage 9

Enemies move a lot faster when they come into the stage this time, which means you'll probably die at least once here. That doesn't matter, of course, since death means nothing in this game. A plus to having the enemies come in faster, though, is that the stage is over sooner.

Stage 10

This stage is much like the previous one, where enemies will spawn in much quicker than any of the first eight stages. The goal for Stage 10 is just to get through it, so don't worry too much about dying. Heck, if you don't think you're going to make it with the lives you have left over from Stage 9, you can always reset to the game in the pause menu and try again with a full stock.

Upon starting this stage, you'll earn an achievement for seeing your new little medal in the bottom right corner.

• Stage 10 Reached

  Reach Stage 10 and view the stage emblem!

  
  

Stage 11

From now on, every Challenging Stage will have an achievement associated with it that requires you to defeat absolutely every single enemy that appears. This is best done by creating a dual fighter, which you should've practiced on the previous set of levels. In order to use it in Challenging Stage 11, you'll have to create it in Stage 10 and keep it alive until this one starts.

Above is a video showing you the general placement your fighters should be in to defeat all the enemies in the stage for your convenience. You should also spot a dragonfly enemy here, granting you another achievement.

• Dragonfly

  Find the Dragonfly that appears in battle!

  
  

• Stage 11 Perfect

  Get a Perfect Bonus on the Stage 11 Challenging Stage!

  
  

Stage 12

A standard level, which will be a great breather if you waited to get the Stage 11 Perfect achievement before continuing. If you wait long enough for the bees to transform, you'll now see three Galboss spawn. You can also see these later if you're not so lucky here.

• Galboss

  Find the Galboss that appears in battle!

  
  

Stage 13

This is just a plain old level, just like the one before it. Just try to finish, and you'll be done with it for good.

Stage 14

You're going to want to get real familiar with this stage, because you'll likely have to replay it many times to get a dual fighter for Challenging Stage 15. You should also notice by now that the enemies are becoming faster and faster as you complete more stages.

Stage 15

Challenging Stage 15 is actually a lot easier to get a perfect clear on than Challenging Stage 11, as long as you have a dual fighter. As one would expect, ship positioning is near impossible to accurately explain in words, and it's one of those things much easier seen than read.

If you didn't find a scorpion enemy way back around Stages 4-6, you'll definitely find one here, since they make up at least half of the waves for this stage.

• Scorpion

  Find the Scorpion that appears in battle!

  
  

• Stage 15 Perfect

  Get a Perfect Bonus on the Stage 15 Challenging Stage!

  
  

Stage 16

There aren't any tricks to Stage 16, fortunately. You'll notice a lot more enemies compose the rival forces than before, though. Things have gotten noticeably tougher since the end of Stage 8, and you're only halfway there, but that's pretty good progress for such a short game.

You'll be getting the last of the miscellaneous achievements in this quarter of the game. As before, there are two more Challenging Stages to practice and master, so don't let your skills dwindle.

Stage 17

This stage is pretty simple, and that's just about all there is to say about it. But when you lose all your lives or find yourself at the title screen again, come back to this stage and shoot a single enemy with your very first blast. Then let all your lives run out by standing still. By doing this, the game will consider the level finished and your accuracy to be 100%, granting you this achievement.

• Ace Pilot

  Get a 70% or higher hit rate on Stage 10 or above!

  
  

Stage 18

Once again, there's nothing too exciting about this stage, but you're probably going to want to get used to it due to the need for a dual fighter in Challenging Stage 19.

Stage 19

Thanks to your improvement in performance, you should be even better at Galaga than you were eight levels ago. This Challenging Stage should be just a little tougher than Stage 15, but not as hard as Stage 11 in terms of getting a perfect run in. You'll be seeing a whole bunch of mosquitos here too, which will give you another achievement.

• Mosquito

  Find the Mosquito that appears in battle!

  
  

• Stage 19 Perfect

  Get a Perfect Bonus on the Stage 19 Challenging Stage!

  
  

Stage 20

From here on out, stages are going to be pretty darn challenging. You might even have to restart once you hit Stage 21 and reselect it just so you can have a full set of lives.

• Stage 20 Reached

  Reach Stage 20 and view the stage emblem!

  
  

Stage 21

Stage 21 is just about as hard as Stage 20, which is to say that you may as well reboot Stage 22 when you get to it so you have all five of your lives back. Things will only get tougher from here.

Stage 22

This is a considerably more difficult stage just to get through, let alone finish with a dual fighter. Even with five deaths, you'll have only lost 90 seconds at most of your time, so it isn't actually all that bad in the grand scheme of things.

Stage 23

This Challenging Stage is actually just about as tough to perfect as Challenging Stage 15, which is to say that it's pretty easy. The problem lies not with the stage itself, but the setup. Stage 22 will likely leave you the most frustrated out of these twin stages, so try not to get too upset if things aren't going your way for a while.

If you didn't find a stingray in earlier levels, you'll certainly find one here, earning yourself a new achievement just for watching the screen.

• Stingray

  Find the stingray that appears in battle!

  
  

• Stage 23 Perfect

  Get a Perfect Bonus on the Stage 23 Challenging Stage!

  
  

Stage 24

Another actually difficult stage to finish. You'd best make use of the double fighters at the end of your perfect run of the previous stage, because you're really going to appreciate having two shots at once.

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.

• Galboss

  Find the Galboss that appears in battle!

  
  

• Single Perfect

  Without forming a Dual Fighter, get a Perfect Bonus on a certain Challenging Stage!

  
  

• Stage 27 Perfect

  Get a Perfect Bonus on the Stage 27 Challenging 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 30 Reached

  Reach Stage 30 and view the stage emblem!

  
  

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.

• Blue Spaceship

  Find the Blue Spaceship that appears in battle!

  
  

• Stage 31 Perfect

  Get a Perfect Bonus on the Stage 31 Challenging Stage!

  
  

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.