Gradius is one of those games that I hear a lot about but I haven't really played outside of the Famicom port of the first game. Well I have a way of playing the PC Engine version so I thought might as well try it out.
This is a very good game for an early schmup and it can be pretty fun even if it's got things I don't like about schmups like dying basically being "redo the whole game idiot" a lot of the time and there's only like one boss if you don't count the final one which doesn't even feel like a boss fight.
Now I've never played the arcade version so if this was a problem there too then I didn't know but my god the slowdown in the later half of this game is atrocious. It might be some of the worst I've seen in the genre. Granted I'm sure there are worse out there but from what I've played, this is just not good. It made me not want to give it an 8 sadly.
So yeah it's a very good game flawed by a problem that may be a limitation of the PC Engine but again could be wrong but it's still a fun good time and it's nice to see it hasn't aged too poorly. Hopefully the sequel is better.
This is a very good game for an early schmup and it can be pretty fun even if it's got things I don't like about schmups like dying basically being "redo the whole game idiot" a lot of the time and there's only like one boss if you don't count the final one which doesn't even feel like a boss fight.
Now I've never played the arcade version so if this was a problem there too then I didn't know but my god the slowdown in the later half of this game is atrocious. It might be some of the worst I've seen in the genre. Granted I'm sure there are worse out there but from what I've played, this is just not good. It made me not want to give it an 8 sadly.
So yeah it's a very good game flawed by a problem that may be a limitation of the PC Engine but again could be wrong but it's still a fun good time and it's nice to see it hasn't aged too poorly. Hopefully the sequel is better.
2 Comments
It's really cool how the PC Engine was (and still is really) THE Shmup machine for a while, even outpacing the Genesis for a lil bit until it got its groove on. I haven't had much experience with Gradius, but I imagine this is another good port someone did.
Angel_Arle
1 year ago