Next Jump: SHMUP Tactics
is a cross between a vertical-scrolling Shoot 'Em Up, a turn-based tactical simulation, and a spaceship sim produced in 2017 by Post-Mortem Pixels.
The story is an Excuse Plot: Humans, elves, dwarves and orcs battle against the evil Dragon Empire because the dragons stole all the booze at the First-Contact meeting.
In order to attack the dragon motherships, your Space Fighter, modelled on the traditional weapon of the ship's manufacturer, must battle through 25 parsecs worth of Attack Drones, penetrate its hull, and kill its pilot, a massive, fully-grown dragon.
Tropes in Next Jump: SHMUP Tactics include:
- Attack Drone: The dragon's armada consists of a massive amount of robot fighters and three motherships.
- Deflector Shields:
- Many dragon fighters have one.
- The Shield and Offensive Shield accessories, the latter sporting Spikes of Doom. They can both tank one or two shots, but the latter allows you to ram enemy ships.
- The Shield-class fighter has a deflector that actually deflects! It's intended to bounce back enemy shots.
- Drunk Driver: All your pilots are blitzed. When you die, you even get told what the drink you had in your hand was (such as "the last bottle of vodka produced by The Dark One," for example). And no, they don't tell you not to drink and drive IRL either.
- Energy Bow: The elven Ballista is built around, as the name suggests, a huge crossbow that fires laser bolts.
- Enhanced Archaic Weapon: Star fighters are equipped with advanced versions of the manufacturer's traditional weapons: elven laser bows, dwarven quake hammers, and human power knives. The Red Legion also have a ship built around a massive Laser Blade and one built around a ramming targe.
- Extra Turn: This is the extra action variant - picking up energy dropped by destroyed enemy ships grants an additional action for one of the three turns in combat.
- Fantastic Firearms: The orcish starfighter is built around a gigantic wizard's staff that fires recursively-splitting bolts of magical force.
- Heroes Prefer Swords: The Sword-class fighter is a very respectable ship, with a great weapon and quick engines. It consists of a massive lightsaber that is utilized by ramming it into enemy ships.
- Hyperspace Or Subspace: Battles take place during hyperspace jumps, rather than realspace.
- Knightly Sword and Shield: The aptly-named Knight-class fighter can swap between the properties of the Sword (huge lightsaber) and Shield (a deflector shield that actually deflects things, ideally right back into the enemy's gob) fighters.
- Magitek: The unlockable Staff-class fighter is a massive wizard's staff attached to a starfighter as a Fixed Forward-Facing Weapon. It shoots energy balls that explode into a spread of bolts after a certain distance.
- Necessary Drawback: Since the Knight is two ships in one, it can only carry a single optional weapon.
- Science Fantasy: The traditional races: elves, dwarves, orcs, humans, and dragons, brought together (and set into conflict) by a mutual love of a certain elixir called "alcohol." They resolve this conflict by way of spaceship battles with appropriately-sized versions of their traditional weapons mounted on their ships.
- Spikes of Villainy: Inverted, as very few dragon ships sport spikes. The accessory "Spiked Hull" allows the player to make ramming attacks.
- Technicolor Toxin: Toxic weapons are a vibrant purple.
- Transformation Is a Free Action: The Knight switches between Sword and Shield mode at the touch of a button, even when the Sword's Laser Blade is engaged.
- Wave-Motion Gun: Some optional weapons, such as the Big Bullet, cost 4 Energy, which is all the energy a ship can hold without the "Extra Battery" accessory.
