Vic Viper
| Gradius | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Genres | Scrolling shooter |
| Developers | Konami |
| Publishers | Konami |
| First release |
Gradius May 29, 1985 |
| Latest release |
Gradius the Slot July 2011 |
| Spin-offs |
Salamander Parodius Otomedius |
Gradius (グラディウス Guradiusu, /ˈgrɑdiəs/) is a series of shooter video games, first introduced in 1985, developed and published by Konami for a variety of portable, console and arcade platforms. In many games in the series, the player controls a ship known as the Vic Viper.
An early horizontal-scrolling shooter from which gameplay elements of the Gradius series were inspired. Although there is no canonical relationship between Scramble and the Gradius series, Scramble is implied to be a spiritual predecessor to the series, evident by its appearance in flashbacks during Gradius introduction sequences. (Gradius Advance) Scramble has been ported to other platforms; including MSX and Commodore 64. In 2002, Scramble appeared on GBA as one of the titles featured in Konami Collector's Series: Arcade Advanced as well as later Konami game compilations for Playstation and Nintendo DS.
The first true Gradius game introduced the concept of the 'weapon bar'. During the game, many enemy craft leave behind icons or 'pick ups' when destroyed. Collecting one of these will shift the section cursor along the weapon bar at the bottom of the screen. The player can then select the weapon highlighted if they want it. The cursor then resets. In general, the more useful 'power ups' are towards the right hand side of the bar, so the player may decide to stock up on pickups until the better item is available. This innovation allowed for deeper tactics on the part of the player and for greater freedom of weapon choice rather than relying on the pre-determined power ups common in other games in the genre. Originally released as an arcade game, its popularity resulted in ports to the: ZX Spectrum, Commodore 64, NES/Famicom, MSX, Master System, Sharp X68000 and PC Engine. More recently, ports to the Sega Saturn, PlayStation, and certain mobile phones were created. (Saturn, PlayStation and computer versions are all packaged with Gradius II as Gradius Deluxe Pack). In addition, the NES version was re-released for Virtual Console and the PC Engine version on the PlayStation Network. In territories outside Japan, the arcade version of Gradius was released under the title of Nemesis.
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