Averaging Gradius

[tmont]

I could've sworn I saw a topic for this somewhere here, but a search revealed nothing.

 

Anyway, this guy wanted to see how the average person played the first level of Gradius. Pretty interesting concept, although I couldn't handle reading the entire article, because it was a lot of words, and stuff. The video is pretty dope, though.

 

Here's the article

 

Here's the video

[Cybergoth]

Uihjah... I wonder why there's so many going to the top of the screen at the volcano scene? Is that a safe spot or so? I usually sit at the bottom...

[JB]

"One person paused (thanks Mr. Riley, I needed the extra editing work)."

*laughs*

[sega saturn x]

I have never actually beaten the first stage, could never get past the damned volcanic rocks. I spent a good hour replaying that part too, before just giving up.

[Cybergoth]

I have never actually beaten the first stage, could never get past the damned volcanic rocks.  I spent a good hour replaying that part too, before just giving up.

 

Oh...

 

I've beaten Gradius dozens of times

 

For the volcanos just line up your sattelites so that they'll shoot everything that's coming before it hits ya

[Mark III]

And if at any time during the game you lose your satalites simply reach over and hit the reset button because you don't have a prayer.

 

 

Seriously is it just me or is this series unbeatable a few levels in if you lose your satalites?

Edited March 1, 2006 by Mark III

[tmont]

Seriously is it just me or is this series unbeatable a few levels in if you lose your satalites?

1026473[/snapback]

I don't know about unbeatable, but they definitely aren't fun. More scrolling shmups need to be like Darius Twin, in that you keep all your powerups even if you die. Having to regain everything you've worked the last 20 minutes for every time your ship drifts into a white dot is annoying.

[JB]

Yah.

 

Gradius is particularly hostile about powerups, as you respawn literally too slow to live in some cases.

The pinnacle of this is on Gradius 3. In the "tunnel" stage, if you cross the midpoint and then die, you can just turn the game off and go do something else. The screen LITERALLY scrolls faster than your ship can move and you will be crushed in the top-left corner about 3 seconds in on EVERY successive life.There are no powerups available in those 5 seconds, so an emergency speedup is impossible.

 

It's also possible to "overpower" your ship, making it too fast to control. And then you careen into the tunnel wall and respawn too slow to live.

*grinds teeth*

 

 

For a first try, Gradius 1 wasn't that bad, really. I hate the series with the burning heat of a thousand fiery suns, but there were some good ideas in the original game.

The problem is that the series evolution STOPPED there. Untill Gradius 5(which was farmed out to a new developer anyways), it's been the same game with new guns and harder levels(peaking in arcade Gradius 3, which even the masochists that make up the majority of Gradius' fanbase widely regard as absurdly hostile). There was no real attempt to fix the gameplay in the main series.

 

Salamander took the good parts of Gradius and fixed what was wrong(no giant powerup bar between you and your most-needed items, options can be recollected after death). It's also the orphaned bastard child spinoff that no one likes to talk about.

[Cybergoth]

Salamander ...It's also the orphaned bastard child spinoff that no one likes to talk about.

 

Maybe because most people here only know it by its U.S. name "Life Force"?

[JB]

Salamander ...It's also the orphaned bastard child spinoff that no one likes to talk about.

 

Maybe because most people here only know it by its U.S. name "Life Force"?

1026620[/snapback]

And the NES LifeForce had the Gradius powerup system spliced back into it.

The japanese had a LifeForce arcade as well. Which was our LifeForce + the Gradius powerup bar, as well as the basis for NES LifeForce.

 

Hence why I say Salamander. It avoids confusion. LifeForce has a 2 in 3 chance of being interpreted as something other than what I mean, if we assume even distribution. In fact, it's much higher as most people will hit the NES game.

 

I generally assume at this point that people are aware of the renaming. If they aren't aware of it, I'm going to have to explain I didn't meant the NES game anyways. So it doesn't matter.

 

 

 

 

Besides which...

 

TG16, Saturn, and PS1 are the ONLY systems to carry the original Salamander. Saturn and PS1 have Salamander 2. NES and MSX have Japanese Lifeforce-based games.

The MSX one is actually a new game despite carrying the original arcade titlescreen, bringing us to three entries in the series across seven platforms(5 home machines, 2 arcade boards). Four games if we count japanese LifeForce as diffrent than Salamander. That's it.

 

 

Gradius is on damn near everything.

NES, SNES, TG16, TGCD, PS1, PS2, Saturn, GameBoy, GBAdvance, cellphones, PS2, PSP, and THREE MSX-exclusive games, bringing the series to TEN games on NINETEEN diffrent systems(Gradius 1-5, Gaiden, Galaxies, and the MSX games).

13 consumer platforms and 6 arcade boards, touching every generation of hardware since the game's release.

 

 

In the US, things are even worse. 6 of the 10 Gradius games have made it here in at least one form, and 4 have made it to multiple platforms.

We've gotten ONE port of ONE game in the Salamander series.

 

 

 

Would you still like to quibble over my statement?

Salamander is the orphan bastard child that no one talks about.

REGARDLESS of what name you use.

[Cybergoth]

Salamander is the orphan bastard child that no one talks about.

 

Parodius?

[JB]

Salamander is the orphan bastard child that no one talks about.

 

Parodius?

1026864[/snapback]

Gets far more fan attention, likely due to the fact that it plays very similar to Gradius, and corporate support in it's native land.

Though Salamander IS ahead in US releases, and... I think tied in Europe. I know Parodius 1 SNES got a PAL release, as did NES LifeForce. All hinges on whether Europe got an arcade Salamander, which I DON'T know.

 

 

But I think the point was that Salamander "fixed" Gradius, and is shunned for it.

Or maybe it was that I'd like a US release of Salamander Deluxe Pack.

Or was I demanding a third... err, fourth... game?

*shrugs*

 

We'll go with C.

KONAMI! GIVE ME A NEW SALAMANDER OR SOLID SNAKE DIES!

[vdub_bobby]

That video is pretty cool, though maybe more confusing than anything. Would be really cool with 100+ different videos combined into one.

 

Good article, too.

Edited March 2, 2006 by vdub_bobby