Permit me a formalist critique: Gradius as a series starts making more sense when you realize it’s a game where you can have up to seven hit points. That’s at least when it started making sense to me, and it started finally clicking here at Gradius V. You start to realize that collecting those capsules is less like grabbing power ups and more like discrete meter management. Many games give you bombs as a last resort, but Gradius gives you something a lot more dynamic. Upon collecting enough to unlock a force field, which absorbs three hits, you can collect a few more and hover your meter over the force field slot, and then activate it again when you lose your shield, thus giving you a grand total of 7 hits before you need to collect more capsules. The result of this, when it works, is this beautiful little tension of trying to evade enough bullets until you can manage to fill your meter. It’s wonderfully tense.
Gradius has always had this cool little power up system, and it’s evolved and changed a lot over the years. You can opt for different configurations and weapons, and even replace that force field with other things, like shrinking or a bomb. Powering up is a series of choices. Now, there are some issues with this design. When you eventually die (which will almost certainly happen), you lose all your power ups (though here you can recollect your allied options) and start at square one. This can lead to a pretty immediate spiral of repeated deaths, and can be really frustrating. But even if it didn’t it would still commit the cardinal action game sin of punishing players with a bad time. You move so slow at the start and it really just feels bad until you get a few speed upgrades. Those choices can feel less like exciting crossroads and more like burdensome obligations. This also has the issue of severely punishing players who are struggling, resulting in a feedback loop of demises. And with a game as difficult as this, that’s going to push people away.
Gradius as a series has also always had this strange penchant for unpredictable and chaotic level design, as well as claustrophobic spaces, and this is definitely the case with Gradius V. This is not really in vogue for modern shmup design. I think modern shmups tend to lean towards a ballet of evasion. Gradius has a bit of that, but it also has these wacky maze elements of navigating corridors. It feels very old school, but I don’t think this is a bad thing. In fact, there are a few moments here where I think it works beautifully. (There’s this weird walker boss near the end of the game that I think is genuinely sublime.) The options function as a way of extending your attack range without endangering your ship, and their different configurations provide different ways doing so with very different advantages. Something is working here. At the same time, there are some moments in Gradius V where I felt like the game expected me to be psychic. While these obstacles can require snappy responses, some obstacles are just too unpredictable to feel fair. Weirder still, the game often feels like it expects you to memorize its levels due to obstacles that are unavoidable if you don’t know when and where they’re going to appear. It’s a weird combo that doesn’t always work. But sometimes it works. Sometimes scraping through its challenges is as thrilling as it is frantic. And that power up system, and the 7 hit points, enable these levels to feel like gauntlets. I just wish there were less moments where failure felt inevitable.
I’ve always liked Gradius and Parodius, but I’ve never really been sure why. I could never beat the first level of the first game (those volcanoes suck!) and the theming is generally pretty dull (well, not Parodius). It might just be a nostalgia for having played some of them in junior high. Who could say? But now, coming back to them and addressing them critically, there is a unique approach to shmupcraft here. When these games work, they can be exciting and tense, not in spite of their corridors and chaotic obstacles, but because of them, as they work in tandem with the upgrade system that defined Gradius from the get-go. If only it were easier to slip into those moments.
Gradius has always had this cool little power up system, and it’s evolved and changed a lot over the years. You can opt for different configurations and weapons, and even replace that force field with other things, like shrinking or a bomb. Powering up is a series of choices. Now, there are some issues with this design. When you eventually die (which will almost certainly happen), you lose all your power ups (though here you can recollect your allied options) and start at square one. This can lead to a pretty immediate spiral of repeated deaths, and can be really frustrating. But even if it didn’t it would still commit the cardinal action game sin of punishing players with a bad time. You move so slow at the start and it really just feels bad until you get a few speed upgrades. Those choices can feel less like exciting crossroads and more like burdensome obligations. This also has the issue of severely punishing players who are struggling, resulting in a feedback loop of demises. And with a game as difficult as this, that’s going to push people away.
Gradius as a series has also always had this strange penchant for unpredictable and chaotic level design, as well as claustrophobic spaces, and this is definitely the case with Gradius V. This is not really in vogue for modern shmup design. I think modern shmups tend to lean towards a ballet of evasion. Gradius has a bit of that, but it also has these wacky maze elements of navigating corridors. It feels very old school, but I don’t think this is a bad thing. In fact, there are a few moments here where I think it works beautifully. (There’s this weird walker boss near the end of the game that I think is genuinely sublime.) The options function as a way of extending your attack range without endangering your ship, and their different configurations provide different ways doing so with very different advantages. Something is working here. At the same time, there are some moments in Gradius V where I felt like the game expected me to be psychic. While these obstacles can require snappy responses, some obstacles are just too unpredictable to feel fair. Weirder still, the game often feels like it expects you to memorize its levels due to obstacles that are unavoidable if you don’t know when and where they’re going to appear. It’s a weird combo that doesn’t always work. But sometimes it works. Sometimes scraping through its challenges is as thrilling as it is frantic. And that power up system, and the 7 hit points, enable these levels to feel like gauntlets. I just wish there were less moments where failure felt inevitable.
I’ve always liked Gradius and Parodius, but I’ve never really been sure why. I could never beat the first level of the first game (those volcanoes suck!) and the theming is generally pretty dull (well, not Parodius). It might just be a nostalgia for having played some of them in junior high. Who could say? But now, coming back to them and addressing them critically, there is a unique approach to shmupcraft here. When these games work, they can be exciting and tense, not in spite of their corridors and chaotic obstacles, but because of them, as they work in tandem with the upgrade system that defined Gradius from the get-go. If only it were easier to slip into those moments.