Thursday 24 January, 2008

SUMMARY:

Gradius III is a shoot ‘em up game for the Super Nintendo. Essentially, this means that you are flying a spaceship that must fight through gallons and gallons of enemy ships and creatures in space.

GAMEPLAY:

I wasn’t expecting much from an old-style shoot ‘em up (also known as the shortened “schmup”). And I was right, for the most part. The first thing that hit me about this game was the lack of a story, or if there was one, I simply could not find it. I like at least a bit of a story to compel me to play further, even if it doesn’t have too much importance. The game essentially throws you in the mist of combat at the very beginning.

After choosing my selection of what kind of power-ups I would like, it began with my ship flying in space. And I quickly found out that this game is a lesson in frustration. You are given three lives and several continues, but every time you die, you have to start over at a checkpoint. Now this wouldn’t be so bad, if it wasn’t for the fact that you die in one hit. Make a mistake and you are sent back to the start of the checkpoint without any power-ups except for one measly given power-up to somehow get you by.

I am, by no means, an expert or hardcore player of shoot ‘em ups. I would even say that I am just a casual player, but this is utterly ridiculous for difficulty. While I was able to get further and further each time I died, the fact that dead is inescapable even on easy except for hardcore shoot ‘em up fans makes me want to throw my controller in frustration. What’s even worse is the fact that you are given a limited number of lives and continues. It wouldn’t be so bad if you could try again and again; and get further each time, but with a limited amount, once I lost it all, it’s back to square one.

GAMEPLAY:

After spending more time with this game, I am starting to loathe it even more. You are practically required to take at least one power-up of speed-up, otherwise your ship is way too slow to efficient dodge enemy fire. I have tried numerous times to forgo this, but it is such a necessity that it shouldn’t have been a power-up. It should have been an integral part of your ship from the very beginning.

I managed to get farther into the game, but the game itself keeps bombarding me with its ridiculous difficulty. A part that came to my mind is when I had to battle giant bubbles that bombard your screen with their slow movements, but splatters into several smaller bubbles when destroyed. In that scene, enemy ships spawn from behind, with the only intent to slam into your ship in a kamikaze style. Really, what is with this shoot ‘em up? I know that you have enemies, but they could at least stop trying to commit suicide on your ship.

Overall, this game has been a horrible experience. I would highly recommend one of the Japanese’s more modern shoot ‘em ups than this classic frustration.

DESIGN:

One of the innovative features is the ability to choose what kind of power-ups that you want to have at the beginning of each “life”. During the battles, you can pick up the power-ups and eventually be able to get to which power-up skill you want and use it. But it also presents another problem. For one of the higher skills, it takes several power-ups to reach that level, power-ups that would be better applied if you just stick to the skills that only require a few power-ups to achieve. While it makes the game more strategic in deciding what skill you want to have, it also makes it harder to achieve the desired skill.

The AI is a point of interest in this game. Quite frankly, it reeks of mindless intelligence. Each enemy’s main goal, like in any shoot ‘em up, is to shoot you, but like other lesser games, it also wants to kill you by any means, including kamikaze style killings and using the environment to its advantage. The enemies simply aim at you while on their regular flight path, with the only real exceptions are the equally dumb ground troops that walks back and forth as well as the kamikaze ships that tries to hit you in its turns (though they don’t seem to try that hard). The bosses are one of the big dumb points that I have encountered so far. Examples would be the first two bosses that have only one repetitive attack each. Once you know the attack, it is surprisingly easy to beat the boss. The only chance that they could kill you is if by surprise, which it quickly loses.

The environment, a landscape that is somehow in space in which, if you touch it, you can be destroyed. The bottom of the screen is a prime example, as you will be instantly destroyed upon even trying to feel the ground landscaping, but if you were to touch the exact same graphics on the top of the screen, it will have no effect unless it is one of those large hills or mountains. The landscape is constantly against you, as there are spots where it has some kind of weird maze in the middle of the screen that you must transverse. Your shots will not penetrate through the environment, but your enemies’ shots will.

This game was made in an arcade style only suited to a small audience. Thank goodness that people have improved a lot on shoot ‘em ups since then.