Unveiled at the Summer '82 CES in Chicago, the Vectrex is a stand-alone arcade system that uses vector (line) graphics instead of the usual raster or pixel images. Mine Storm, a game very similar to the Arcade version of Asteroids, is built in to this portable machine. In this game, transport lanes of intergalactic space have been seeded with mines from an alien vessel. You control a mine-destroying blaster that rotates on an axis and can fly and shoot in all directions (including off-screen) across the non-scrolling, star-studded playfield. Your job is to blast everything out of the sky so you can progress to the next level.
There are four types of mines which appear at different stages of the game. Floating Mines, which are shaped like three-pointed stars, simply drift through space. Fireball Mines, which look like four-pointed, semi-square stars with a dot in the middle, hurl a fireball at you when you shoot them. Magnetic Mines, which resemble four-pointed stars, will follow you wherever you go. Magnetic-Fireball Mines share traits of both Magnetic and Fireball Mines.
As you progress through the 13 mine fields in Mine Storm, the combinations of mines get more complex and harder to defeat. If you can somehow make it through the 13 stages, you will enter a new type of universe. Space dust and new aliens add more action and challenge to this new world.