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System:
GameBoy Advance
Genre:
Shoot 'Em Up
Publisher:
Konami
Developer:
Konami
Players:
-
Release date/year:
11/09/2001
Other systems:
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» FAQ (Boss)
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- Gradius Galaxies
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2001 Konami - Konami - GBA
- Gradius has a long tradition of giving some fast paced shooting frenzy for a long time, and used the side scrolling shooting action, which really isn’t seen anymore. In fact, it’s got two feet in the grave. You really can’t find a good one anymore, if any, if you want some that sells a decent amount of units. Hat is why I decided to pick up Gradius Galaxies for the GBA, and give my old trigger finger a good pushing. If you do not know what Gradius is, it is a side scrolling shooter where you take your little plane and tackle the evil menace running around this planet. You can collect a wide variety of power-ups, like missiles or lasers. However, the real fun to just taking down immensurable odds of baddies and see yourself, in an instant, be vaporized by just one little, easy to kill enemy. Don’t you feel stupid when that happens? I do. Just knowing that you could of easily avoided it. But you keep trying, and soon enough you have the whole AI memorized, and you can beat the whole game in about 1 hour? Does that make up for your little mistakes getting them memorized? It should, thinking about how good this game is, is a diluted market of bad GBA games, such as Britney’s Dance Beat. It brought warmth to my heart to play something like this again. Feel the pulse pounding action when to take hot, molten energy into the enemies one, by one, by one, until you reign supreme!
Gradius Galaxies has a simple story. A planet system has been taken over, and you come along to save it from the scum of the universe, in the fabled ship Gradius. You would have gone out and started shooting even if there was no enemy, were you? If you had some super powerful ship, would you use it to save the world? No, you would the human being thing: loot and plunder. You do loot and plunder, taking away all of the baddies power-ups.
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Graphics: 8
They look very good on the GBA. They look as good, if not better, than the SNES Gradiuses. No problems unless you look really, really close, so they become blurred close, and full of color. The color in this game makes it look open, yet dark and claustrophobic, like the cave will close in on you (and it will sometimes.) The bosses are beautifully done, bringing back real animators from yesteryear to get whole new bosses, new levels, and new weapons. With sprites ranging in sizes, and the only time you see something look actually really bad is when the blow up a sprite, the graphics look pretty good. Not Golden Good, but good. You will need a good light source to play this, because the areas are pretty dark.
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Gameplay: 9
It is exactly what people call “ol’ school.” Taking no names, just beating up some things for the heck of it. BAM BAM. Taking out the enemies one by one. A large amount of levels with an insane amount of new enemies make this the most original Gradius in awhile. Different kinds of ships with upgrades make you a force to be reckoned with, and you should not toy with someone with missiles, 3 options with lasers, and 3 speed-ups. Nothing can beat something that has that much firepower. Being one of the few ones that you can go anywhere with (unless you have a Nomad) you will want a game like this in your GBA inventory.
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Sound: 7
Nice music that fits to the game. Not much else. You also have the mechanical voice that starts you ever time you lose a life. That is just one word: START. Enough to make you turn up the sound? No. Enough to want to you to listen to your CDs? Yes. Unless you like hearing a squeaky little ditty. It would annoy anyone in a 10-foot radius. But it does set the mood for some space shooting.
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Fun Factor: 8
Shooting things can be comical, it could be sad, but it could also be fun. Not in real life though. But in video games shooting can be. If you have played games from the 80s not in an Atari collection, you can shed a tear of old school dodging and missiles. You can almost smell the stale food and body odor of the arcades of yesteryear.
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Buy or Rent?
Even I really love this game, for an average gamer, I would rent it. You can beat this easily, in an hour or two at most.
Graphics: 8
Gameplay: 9
Sound: 7
Fun Factor: 8
Reviewer’s Score: 8/10
//The President
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