Gradius Origins

I wrote previously about how I was introduced to the Gradius series. It caught my eye and imagination way before I played it, and Life Force (for the NES) and Gradius 3 (for the SNES) are among my very favorite games. Space shooters are super nifty, especially when they have great music. But the Gradius series started out as arcade games, and it was always in the back of my mind that what I was playing was a port of something larger. (The arcade games had better graphics, at least at first, and of course they were harder because they were designed to make people keep putting in quarters.) The Switch has ports of some of those games, but they were always over-priced relative to my level of interest. 

But this year they released a collection, "Gradius Origins", which includes Gradius 1, 2, and 3; Life Force, Salamander, which was the game Life Force was derived from (but with standard power-ups instead of the capsule system from Gradius); Salamander 2, which I had never heard of (and which I'm still not that interested in because it has some slightly icky stuff), and a brand-new game, Salamander 3. The price tag was still a little higher than I was interested in, but since I would probably have bought a new Gradius game for $15 or so by itself, I figured the collection would eventually go on sale enough to justify getting it. That was kind of a boring paragraph, but I am kind of stingy, even with video games, so it seemed relevant.

Anyway, the collection went on sale this week and I got it. I'm pretty happy with Salamander 3 in particular. It has a very similar feel to the NES Life Force (but still without the Gradius-style power-ups). On the easiest setting, it's hard, but not impossible, which is important. I beat it after a few days (and a few YouTube videos). The music is good, but not terribly catchy. I've gotten used to that in space shooters; I guess nothing competes with Life Force and Gradius 3. But it still disappoints me every time. But anyway, that game is very worthwhile.

It's also fun to play the original games. But I'm glad I waited for the sale, because, as expected, there are some issues. The first is that they are hard. This collection has an "easy" mode, which helps, and I'll probably beat the first couple of games at some point, when I'm in the mood to really try. But it's going to be painful. For Life Force / Salamander, it could have been much more manageable if they had given you limited continues. Since continuing lets you pick up right where you left off, having no restrictions is basically invincibility. (Salamander 3 does too. It's designed as an arcade game, even though it only exists on consoles. I think that was a mistake, although I get why some people would get nostalgia from it. But seriously, the words "Insert Coin" don't belong on a console game.) 

But the main thing I take away from these old games is something I suspected all along: the NES games are superior. I like the simpler music, and the red/blue ships in Life Force. I like the lower challenge, including the fact that your shields protect your whole ship, and not just part of it. And I really appreciate that the level design in the NES Life Force - on the arcade, two of the levels are basically just exercises in dodging asteroids, whereas on the NES they replaced those with an inside-an-organism stage and one that starts out with mountains and then turns into an Egyptian pyramid themed area. It gives the game a lot more personality than the originals had. And then there's Gradius 3. I had read that the arcade version of was ridiculously hard, and that's true. It's absolutely ridiculous, and not in a funny way. The SNES version is better in every single way. (But it's still interesting to see the origin.)

So anyway, it's always delightful to go and save the world using a starfighter and an arsenal of lasers and missiles. But I sure am glad those Nintendo ports were available decades ago so I could develop nostalgia, rather than just thinking "that's a nifty idea" based on the demo on an arcade cabinet on a ferry.