![]() Gradius III is really just a tragic case of what could have been. They truly define classic, old school shmupping with some very memorable soundtracks. Gradius I & II will always be classics to me, and despite some rough checkpoint balancing in a few spots, these games along with Raiden and R-Type form the triforce of classic shmupping. st5 (Asteroid, aka COCOPUFFS CLUSTERFUCK) remains an all-genre favourite of mine - an almost tangible sense of shearing and weaving through utter indiscriminate chaos. Not the hardest STG out there, of course, but a titanically involving one with booming presentation to match. st8 is objectively an anticlimax but honestly, I find it more of a reprieve. That said, when GV hits its stride from stages 4 through 7, it absolutely blazes - a nonstop procession of rivetingly intense, sinuously twisting stage and boss designs. It's a great game, but the similarly balanced yet more arcade-trim Gradius Gaiden is my pick of the series' home originals. By that same token, as a more experienced fan I find it a bit long-winded. The game itself I still consider a stellar introductory STG, nailing a balance of rigour (ruggedly long, involved course), concession (micro hitbox, milder recovery) and flash (still a great example of glitzy yet 2D-tight "modern" presentation). I'd like to think he woke up at least a few other latent fans of no-nonsense arcade gauntlets, haha. I went from a naively satisfied 5CC to a 2CC and then 1-ALL just to hear what he'd say when I made the loop! I still think that booming trash talk was a minor bit of consolised arcade design genius, much more arresting and personal than mere numbers or stats. the endearingly gruff announcer is pretty much my godfather. I do have some personal history with Gradius V itself though! It was actually my re-entry point to shooters and arcade-styled stuff in general. It's guys like you and pegboy and saucykobold that I read when I want to know a bit more about things. ![]() I'm a bit of a weenie when it comes to just about any iconic arcade STG series, tbh. Last edited by Perikles on Sat 4:39 pm, edited 1 time in total. Would love to hear what other have to say about this (and all other things concerning Gradius)! Also: what are your favourites, BIL? We have to know! I'd wager it might be easier to play V if you have no prior experience with other Gradius games and just play it tabula rasa, devising strategies according to the general premise instead of trying to implement time-proven solutions, or I just horribly suck at V, which is a very plausible explanation. Even during III's tougher sections I never felt as nervous as I did with V. I also find the game to be exceedingly stressful: the hitbox is so tiny that I constantly think I'm about to die to something, then I panick and lose a life for real. The extend scheme is not all that generous, hence every life counts. Granted, recovery in a lot of spots might be slightly to substantially easier than it is in II, III and IV, yet splurging on lives in hazardous situation hangs over the player as the sword of Damocles. Not only is it necessary to contrive a new mindset compared to all the other games (regarding the ship speed, the hitbox, a lot of the level layout and even the bosses), but the player also has to stay sharp for a very long time. I'll concede that I had (still have, actually!) considerable problems getting to grips with it. Since we already have an exhaustive thread for the Darius games and I just got a first kuso clear of Gradius V, thus completing the "canonical" saga (as well as several ports) I felt the urge to create a thread for this venerable series.įor I played V the last few days I must confess that I'm somewhat surprised that a lot of people around here consider it to be more accessible than most of its brethren.
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