SHOCKWAVE — Anti-Grav Racing

// What is Shockwave

Wireframe racing on real hardware

Shockwave is a fast anti-gravity racer, rendered entirely as wireframe vectors — no filled polygons, no textures. It's a tribute to wipEout (1995), the PlayStation classic that defined the genre, rebuilt from the cockpit for the Vectrex.

Full-Speed Vectors

Cockpit-view racing down banking wireframe tracks — every rail, ship and weapon drawn as pure lines.

Race the Championship

Lap the circuit against AI pilots. Hold your line, hit the boost pads and finish ahead of the pack.

Weapons On Track

Grab pickups and fire missiles, rockets and mines — or drop a shield and hit the turbo to break away.

Real Speed Feel

Tight controls, thrust and brake, a HUD that reads your speed and lap — momentum is everything.

Pure Wireframe

The whole world is line art the way the Vectrex renders best — bright, sharp, alive.

Runs on a Vectrex

No emulator. Shockwave ships on its own cartridge and runs on real Vectrex hardware.

// The Race

Hold your line

Thread the wireframe circuit at speed: bank through the curves, ride the boost pads and stay off the walls. AI pilots race for the same line, so every lap is a fight for position. Manage your speed with thrust and brake, and use the track to your advantage.

// Arsenal

Weapons on the track

Drive through pickups to arm a weapon, then use it to break away or fight back.

MissileHoming shot that chases the ship ahead.

RocketStraight-line burst fired down the track.

MineDrop a cluster behind you for chasers to hit.

ShieldAbsorb the next hit and keep your speed.

TurboA burst of speed to pull ahead of the pack.

E-BoltAn energy jolt that rattles the ship in front.

The Shockwave cartridge: an orange RBCART circuit board with an RP2350B chip and a gold cartridge-edge connector

// RBCART · RP2350

Ships on its own cartridge

Shockwave comes on a custom-built smart cartridge that plugs straight into an unmodified Vectrex. At its heart sits a Raspberry Pi RP2350B: the game runs in C on a 150 MHz dual-core Arm processor, while a tiny 6809 program executes its display list — so the Vectrex does what it is best at: drawing vectors.

No extra boards, no separate computer, nothing to assemble — just plug in and race. USB-C on the cartridge handles firmware updates.