Gradius

Keeping on the theme of the scrolling shooter space-em-up, I'm taking a pickaxe to the next game and mining my way through the craft of game design. Yep, I'm talking about Gradius (Nemesis in some locations). A game which was splurged out in 1985 and brought to the fore, a series of games that would later become parodies of itself in games like Parodius. Which is basically this game with a cheeky look in its eye.

But before a take enough tangents to the curve to come back around on myself, I'll remain focus upon this game for now. You fly ship, ship shooty things, kill things to get power ups, use power-ups, avoid dying, shooty time for big bosses, beat level and prepare to play it again in a different setting. I'm not exactly selling this thing but then again, there's no real plot to this one. (in the game at least, but who really reads manuals? I stopped bothering around the time of Duke Nukem 3D wherein the plot was "aliens invaded, go kick ass". Kind of pointless and not an acceptable medium of delivering a storyline. Do you go to watch a film but have someone tell you the story just before watching it? If so I feel very sorry for you, incidentally do NOT come to the movies with me you oddball)

But what is it about Gradius that makes it particularly poignant that I would write a review about it? Quite a lot to be honest. The graphics are crisp and colourful without being over the top; the music is optimistically upbeat to the point that if it got any more cheerful people's legs would be falling off. It's cute and lively, largely inoffensive and the difficulty ramps up rather naughtily in the background while you're left to admire the cute game for what it is. A rather challenging little number from Konami that does require your dexterity and reflexes if you want to survive it.

The game play was fairly unique at the time. You've 3 buttons of control here, shooting, power up deployment and bombs (most ports of the game decided to amalgamate the shot and bomb button into one, making for a slightly easier game.) No charging of shots here (See R-Type review), just tap it to shoot and tap it quickly to shoot quickly.

Every time you kill a red-ish enemy, or the whole set of type of enemies, you'll be granted a power-up (if you fly into it) where you'll be able to incrementally move across the power-up list at the bottom of the screen. Once you've got the power-up highlighted that you want, you can active it and hey-presto! You’ve got the power-up. The power-ups come arranged in order of Speed Up (too many and you'll just crash into something because your feeble mind cannot comprehend the pixels and speed) Missiles (runs along the ground fucking shit up) Double Shot (your ability to shoot up and forwards to fuck shit up) Laser (fucks a lot of shit up) Option (give you an orb that does EXACTLY what your ship can do in order to fuck shit up by the multiple) and Shield (Which lets you survive having your shit fucked up).

There are some drawbacks, for a start, each power-up you select, resets your power-up count. So collect 2 and opt for missiles, and you're back to having zero in stock. Lasers and Doubles cannot be used together, one or the other only here. The shield will only take 3 or so hits before it fades and that's assuming you're not hit by something that will completely disregard you have a shield and just blast you into nothingness with a rather disappointing sound effect. This of course means, back to square one with no power-ups and no speed.

The first boss, of the first level (naturally, but bear with me here) is a large spaceship that requires you to shoot out the core to kill it. The second boss is a large spaceship that requires you to shoot out the core to kill it. The third boss is a large spaceship that requires you to shoot out the core to kill it... Noticing a pattern? No, I'm not messing about; the first 5 bosses in the game are the same large spaceship! Now the differences before the battle are the sub-bosses which can be active volcanoes, rushed by hundreds of small enemies, tentacle monsters and such. It's not until you get to level 6 and 7 that the bosses change into something more synonymous with the level itself and of course, the 7th boss is the final boss.

It does make you wonder why they didn't have different bosses? When they manage it on the Gameboy version!

It's worth a play however, if only to see what the game series was spawned from with regards to such mechanics in game play. Aside from that you might fair a lot better if you went with the games ported to other formats and sequels where Konami began to up their game.

Or you could fight the same boss five times.

Hades Nebula

Once again, I take another look back to the older days, the days before Xbox 360s and PS3's (Yeah I know Xbox ONE and PS4 but honestly, not really giving a fuck there about the new stuff until it's made AFFORDABLE, I do not consider consoles costing over several hundred pounds to be worth my money, especially when other consoles still offer great games that are enjoyable, you know what, bollocks, I'm getting the Commodore 64 out again.)

Right, starting over, C64 time and a look at one of the first bullet-hell space shooters that I can remember from my childhood. Hades Nebula, apparently there's some sort of plot but given I only had the cassette (If you have to look up what that is, you're too young for this), and no manual. But that never stopped a kid from enjoying a game... unless it was Elite or Valhalla, then you had a few things to look up.

Oh and don't forget young 'un's, no international computer system was readily available for people to use until 1994, so no way to look up guides unless a) you bought one or b) you read one in a magazine. This game arrived on the gaming scene in 1987 and so you're a long way from home and the internet. Enjoy your cold, disconnected, solo experiences. (Unless of course you like that, in which case, just enjoy!).

Hades Nebula is your vertical scrolling shoot-em-up, featuring a rather plucky little one-hit-wonder spaceship, piloted by captain OnlyShootsForwards (Maiden name...), who of course is the very last defence against the giant ass-hat that is the Hades Emperor. Which always makes me wonder, why didn't they send Captain ShootyShip out first and have him wipe out most of the known enemy, as the player YOU'RE certainly more than capable of doing it.

Armed with a basic laser/bullet, you'll have to contend with veritable armadas of enemies, waves of opponents spawning and shooting at you while others will phase into existence and try to crash into your ship, or at the very least, prevent you from running backwards - which will kill you fairly quickly when you can't move out the way of new enemies coming in from the top of the screen. Before shooting the hell out of the occasional boss and then arriving at the biggest ship with the biggest number of guns and blasters etc, the much sought after, Final Boss.

Game play wise is very simple, the joystick moves the ship while the scrolling maintains a constant speed through levels, and enemies will spawn in at pre-determined places but in random spots. So just after the first level, you WILL fight your first wave of the skull-faced homing enemies but where they turn up on the screen, is randomly allocated within the code. As are all the waves of enemies, so each wave itself is specifically determined as to WHEN it turns up, just not WHERE on the screen. Randomisation does help replay-ability, ask any rogue-like dungeon player.

You do have some hope however, across the 15 levels and bosses, in the guise of power-ups. On the first level you'll just be given speed ups, while later levels will furnish your craft with shields (front and side versions, never both) side wing blasters, dual lasers and tri-lasers. The downside, one hit; one impact; one randomly spawning enemy appearing ATOP you; means death. Death then also means that you have to start over with NO speed, No powers. You're back to basic bog-standard ship and it's time to build it all up again. This in the later levels is a ... nightmare. Actually in the first level it's a fucking nightmare of some degree.

This brings me to the odd system of the game’s powerup supplies. You get to shoot background pods/objects, which will do several things. 1) Blow up with nothing inside, 2) blow up with a bullet fired back AT you or 3) give you a power up. But it's not the pods that have the power-ups and the order/sequence of the powerups depends upon the ones that you SHOOT, so the first level, first speed up power up WILL spawn when you shoot your first pod. No matter WHICH pod. So powerups appear on every Nth pod shot, not pod that exists.

It's an interesting system perhaps implemented for memory reasons, or an oversight on coding and references. Hard to say at this point but I've not really encountered many other games that use similar ones. Imagine Zelda where you got the master sword after the 8th chest you open, irrespective of the actual chest, so you could grab it in the hometown if you opened 7 other chest somewhere else. Not ideal for every game. But it works in this game to a degree.

The majority of enemies within the game will fly in, pattern formation, then disappear off, or fly in, shoot repeatedly and try to ram you at the same time. Fun bunch of bastards. Then there's the odd system of those enemies that turn up and home in on you, but will happily sit right behind you if you're higher than them on the screen, but you can't go backwards, you don't have anything that shoots backwards, so you have to out manoeuvre them, which is almost impossible at the point of having no speed power ups.

The game is heavily punishing for mistakes. BUT, having said that, it is rather generous with the lives, boosting them regularly on the score multiples.

Having said that, I could happily play the game for hours and do NOTHING but listen to the music within the game, be it the introduction or the main music, or even the piece accompanying the name entry sequence for entering in a high-score. The musical score and composition is amazingly well presented and would be worthy of anybody's time to listen to, which most players will do while playing the game anyway. Though the "electric synth" solo does feel a little out of place, but it's the 80s so grind that axe away!

That said, the game isn't R-Type, nor Gradius/Nemesis, it's not complicated enough to be that and not fluid enough to warrant the attention some of the more smooth games can muster, but it has its charm and those looking for challenge on the C64 that isn't about not biting your own arms off in frustration and bashing your genitals with them, could do worse than looking to Hades Nebula.

Or you know, use some poke and peeks and cheat your way through.