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My Played Video Games Review: Gradius for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES)

darthnavaPosted for Everyone to comment on, 4 years ago3 min read

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Gradius is a horizontal flying, action shooter video game developed and published by Konami of Japan for the arcades in 1985. It was ported to the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in 1986. It was the first game in the Gradius series that were popular shooters in video games consoles that succeeded the NES.

Gradius was the first Konami game to contain the famous cheat code known as the "Konami code" among gamers.

The Story

The peace-loving people of planet Gradius are menaced by the amoeboid Bacterions. Your mission is to fly your hyper-space fighter armed with laser cannons, force fields, and time/space warp engine to go at the heart of the Bacterion Empire. Go and destroy the Xaerous Superfortress - the mother brain of the Bacterion Bio-Computer.

NES box cartridge of the game (Image source)

The Graphics and Sound

The graphics are great at that time. It is a port of the arcade game which is very well-done by Nintendo. Your ship is small, but looks kind of detailed. Some weapons are about the size of your ship or smaller. But, the enemy bosses are also titanic in size. Some of the backgrounds look great as well.

The sound and music are a little bit above average. The sound effects are a variety of beeps and explosions. The music is good because that is what you can expect from Konami.

Gameplay sample of Gradius for the NES

The Gameplay

The gameplay is like an average shooter, but with a style of its own. First, you are scrolling through levels. Your ship fights off little or big enemies. The bosses are powerful and will take numerous hits before being destroyed. It is your standard "fire and dodge then repeat again" gameplay.

The unique style is the changes in weaponry that you can get. Destroying certain enemies will get you power-ups. These cool power-ups can be utilized to modify your weapons. Getting enough of these power-ups could add firepower but it also changes your powerful shots into deadly beams. You often have to change the basis of the weapon depending on the level boss. It is a better system than most shooters that seem to be only adding missiles or something.

The game controls are responsive. The movement is quite smooth. It is somewhat annoying at times that you can not control what weapon you have and often just accidentally getting a power-up can change it because you were evading enemies.

The game is difficult but you can actually beat it. But you will lack a great reason to play in order to finish it again. IMHO, it is a fun game no matter how you play it. You can always just pick it up and play casually for a few minutes.

My Verdict

Overall, this is a great video game gem of its time. While being identified as one of the first great side-scrolling shooters, it still is considered as one of the best of all time.

I say play Gradius on emulators for the quick save and autofire features available on the emulator for an easier time. Or you can always use the infamous Konami code while playing on the NES.

Not that wimpy? True bad-ass gamers do it the real way.

Let's keep on gaming in the free world!

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