Gradius Galaxies

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Gradius Galaxies
North American cover art
Developer(s)	Mobile21
Publisher(s)	Konami
Designer(s)	Hideaki Fukutome
Release date(s)	^EU November 9, 2001 ^NA November 12, 2001 ^JPN January 17, 2002
Genre(s)	Horizontal scrolling shooter
Mode(s)	Single player
Rating(s)	ESRB: Everyone CERO: All Ages ELSPA: 11+
Platform(s)	Game Boy Advance
Media	Cartridge

Gradius Galaxies is a horizontally-scrolling shooter handheld video game published by Konami in 2001. The game, released for the Game Boy Advance, is the first and thus far only Gradius title to be available for the system.

The game was renamed Gradius Generation in Japan and Gradius Advance in Europe.

1 Gameplay
2 Regional variations
3 Trivia
4 External links

[edit] Gameplay

Gradius Galaxies plays almost identically to other titles in the series. The player takes control of the Vic Viper spacecraft attacking onslaughts of enemies. All the traditions of Gradius are present: moai, an undefended final boss, and the power meter. The weapons system remains mostly unchanged as the configurations available are identical to Gradius III, with the exception that the edit mode is missing. There are four different types of weapons configurations: balanced (traditional Gradius), wide area (Salamander), power, and air-to-ground. Each configuration has the Vic Viper in a different color. Unlike Gradius III, there are only two shield options: shield and force field. In addition, the S.Option ("snake option") is also not present in this version. The player can however choose to have the computer assign weapon powerups automatically or leave it manual.

[edit] Regional variations

Two challenge modes (A and B) appears in the Japanese version after the player completes the game. These modes challenges the player to complete segments of the game with few or no power-ups.

[edit] Trivia

As in all Gradius games, the famous "Konami code" (Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A) can be entered to fully power up the player. However, if the player uses left and right on the control pad to enter the code, the Vic Viper will self-destruct. Instead, the player has to use the L and R pads for the proper effect. This alternate code was originally used in Gradius III.

Also, contrary to popular belief, there is a remix of a song from the original Gradius. It plays on most of the pre-stage flights, and is a remix of Stage 2's music from the first Gradius.

In this game, a scene featuring screenshots of several games in the Gradius series appeared. The first one was the game Scramble, which was retroactively added in the Gradius continuity.