VESPER

VESPER — a gothic horror game for the Atari 2600.

The bell tolls. The moon bleeds. You are the bat — for now.

You're a fledgling bat over a moonlit graveyard. Swoop down, latch onto the villagers below, and drink. Fill the blood meter and you'll transform into the Vampire: faster, stronger — and suddenly the hunters and owls that have been stalking you all night are the prey. Meet each hour's feeding quota before the bell tolls, survive all six hours of the night, and greet the dawn.

Play in your browser: Play VESPER on Javatari

How to play

• Joystick — fly. Fire — dash, a short burst of speed.
• Touch a villager to latch on and drink. Hold still to drain them; wiggle the stick to break off early. Nothing can hurt you while you're latched, and you're briefly untouchable after each feed.
• The red bar left of the score is your blood — fill it to transform. The gold bar right of the score is the hour's feeding quota.
• The moon reddens as the night deepens. Everything gets faster every hour. The owl hunts you in every direction. From hour 3, hunters hurl stakes that track your flight.
• One touch from a hunter, an owl, or a stake while you're a bat ends the run.

Scoring: Villager drained 100 · Blood chalice 50 · Owl as the Vampire 150 · Hunter as the Vampire 200 · Hour survived 500 · Dawn reached 2000

Or download the ROM and play it in Stella, or on real hardware with a flash cart.