Invaders Online
- Plays on
- Desktop · Phone · Tablet
- Price
- Free · no download · no sign-up
Invaders puts a whole arcade cabinet in your browser tab: 55 aliens marching in lockstep, four crumbling bunkers, a mystery UFO — all rendered on a humming virtual CRT with scanlines, flicker and the occasional burst of interference.
In 1978 a single game emptied wallets across the planet and invented the high score as we know it. This is a loving recreation of that machine — not just the rules, but the feeling: the phosphor-green cannon, the blocky white aliens stepping side to side, the red mystery ship whining across the top of the screen while you decide whether the shot is worth it.
The details that made the original tick are all here. Fifty-five invaders in five rows, each row worth its own points. The formation speeds up as it thins out, until the last alien is sprinting. Your cannon fires one shot at a time — miss, and you wait for it to leave the screen while the bombs keep falling. Four bunkers shield you, and they erode pixel by pixel under fire from both sides before the marching wall grinds them flat.
Around the game sits the machine itself: a cabinet with a glowing marquee, a coin door and working buttons, and a screen that behaves like a tube — scanlines, a rolling retrace band, gentle flicker and bursts of static when things explode. It is the closest a browser tab gets to standing in a dim arcade.
Every wave starts a little lower and a little meaner, and the only ending is the invasion. The goal, then as now, is the hi-score line at the top of the screen — and one more credit.
How to play Invaders
The job has not changed since 1978: stop the invasion, one shot at a time.
- Slide your cannon left and right along the bottom and shoot the marching aliens.
- Only one of your shots can be on screen at once — make it count.
- Bottom-row aliens pay 10 points, middle rows 20, the top row 30; the red UFO is a 50–300 point mystery.
- Hide behind the four bunkers — they crumble under fire from both sides, and the aliens grind through them.
- Clear all 55 invaders to start the next wave, which begins lower and faster. If they reach the ground, it's over.
Tips for Invaders
- Carve a narrow slot in one bunker and snipe through it — the classic trick still works.
- Clear the side columns first: the formation bounces between its outermost aliens, so trimming the edges slows the descent.
- Never let your one bullet fly at nothing — a miss leaves you defenceless for a full second.
- The UFO's value is a gamble, but taking it while the formation is high up is nearly free money.
- In the endgame, learn the last alien's rhythm before you shoot — it moves faster than anything else in the game.
Who made Invaders?
This edition of Invaders was built by crokocat game studio in 2026 — a faithful homage to the 1978 arcade landmark, rendered at the machine's original 224×256 resolution inside a virtual cabinet with a simulated CRT.
About this game
- Controls
- Move with the arrow keys or A/D and fire with Space on desktop — or use the on-screen cabinet buttons: LEFT, RIGHT and the big red FIRE. One shot on screen at a time, just like 1978.
- Supported devices
- desktop, phone, tablet
- Developer
- crokocat
- Genre
- Arcade
- Release date
- July 2026
- Latest update
- July 2026
Related categories
Frequently asked questions
Is Invaders free to play?
Yes. Invaders is free on crokocat with no download and no sign-up — it runs entirely in your browser.
How do I play on mobile?
The arcade cabinet's buttons work on touch screens: hold LEFT or RIGHT to move and tap the red FIRE button to shoot.
Why can I only fire one shot at a time?
That is the original 1978 rule — a single player shot on screen at once. Timing your shots is the heart of the game.
What is the red ship at the top worth?
The mystery UFO pays a random bonus of 50, 100, 150 or 300 points — sometimes the gamble is worth breaking formation for.
Guides & tips
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