Gradius - Nemesis

STORY / GAMEPLAY
The game involves a spaceship that bombs enemies on the ground and also features a checkpoint system where the player is sent back to an earlier point of the level. Combined with its relatively slow scrolling and checkpoint based system, these aspects make Gradius: Nemesis very similar to R-Type (released two years later in 1987). As in all Gradius series, the most unique element is the power-up system, which allows you to customize your weaponry. Certain enemies -usually marked with different colors- will drop some small orange orbs. Collecting an orb will activate and increase your power meter. At any point you can select a highlighted item and the power meter will reset. This is very similar to the awesome shooter Project X released for the Amiga early in the 90s. First you have the Speed Up which obviously makes your ship faster. The second is the Missiles, which fires a missile-like projectile -usually upwards or downwards- which can be used to hit enemies that your regular guns can't target. In the arcade games, the missiles are activated by a separate button but in most of the conversions the standard Fire and Missile attacks are assigned to the same button. The Dual Weapon lets you fire in two different directions simultaneously! Although its few technical issues in graphics, the MSX version remains the best in any computer version.

GRAPHICS / SOUND
Although there are plenty of colors, the MSX version suffers from the same issue as most of the other shooters for the system (such as the famous R-Type); the sprites move smoothly but the scrolling is incredibly "jerky", which makes it hard to reckon the speed of enemy projectiles, a fact that turns the game harder than it really is and can potentially become frustrating! It also suffers from the same limitations found on the NES version -miniaturized bosses, limited options and no vertical scrolling in certain stages. The sound is great though, as the standard PSG music is used here and sounds almost the same as in the NES version of the game.