Xari Arena 6-24-83

  

 

This is an early, but fully playable version of Xari Arena with some very interesting differences.  In this version you can make the paddle concave or convex by pushing left or right in order to reflect the shots at different angles.  Another important difference is that you cannot collect the fireballs, only reflect them back at the Xaris.  Unfortunately this works better in theory than in practice, and after focus group testing John decided to completely change the gameplay around to the masterpiece that we're more familiar with.  This is also the first prototype with the ending message.

This particular prototype is signed by programmer John Seghers himself.

 

Prototype Differences

Your paddle is very thin and can be flexed inward and out by pushing left and right.  The idea was that you could reflect shots at different angels, but it doesn't work very well.
You cannot collect fireballs, you can only reflect them back at the Xari's.
The Xari's are all in the center of the screen at the start of the level.  In the later version they come out a few at a time from a well in the center of the screen (which is not present in this version).
There are no fire extinguishers.
Your paddle moves much faster which makes it hard to line it up with the shots. 
The fireballs are different looking, they are shaped like asterisks *.
There are no intermissions between levels
The difficulty ramps up much quicker in this version.

 

Whoa!  What happened to my paddles?

 

It's Pong!

 

Concave...

 

Convex...

 

Somewhere in-between...

 

That's alot of Xaris!

 

 

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