Extended review: Gradius Origins

 This is an extended, expanded, and less cut-down version of the review I posted on Steam. I had to cut some material from that review because I hit the character limit. None of the material was filler, mind you, there's just a lot to talk about with this collection.

Foreword: I paid ~$37 for this, and value commentary will reflect that price.

Gradius Origins is finally here, and there's a lot of game in this package; enough that talking about what's actually in the package alone will be a substantial discussion by itself. I'm going to do more than that, though, and talk about what I've experienced.

Let's start by going through what's in this collection, piece by piece!

For Gradius 1, you have the following versions:

• Japanese ROM version -- the version available on most other releases of Gradius 1, e.g. PSX, Saturn, PSP
• Japanese Bubble version -- Using unreliable bubble memory, this version is the first release of Gradius 1. This has somewhat more slowdown than the later ROM version.
• North American version -- the version available in the US, Canada, etc. Higher difficulty curve, allows continues, a group of enemies drop powerups after respawning from death.
• North American Prototype version -- The hardest version of all, with death bullets from the first loop. This version has never been released in any collection before now.
• VS System version -- the arcade version of the NES version of Gradius, which was only released outside of Japan. This version of the game is unlocked by a secret code.

For Salamander, you have:

• Japanese version -- uses discrete power-ups instead of the power-up capsules.
• North American version (Life Force) -- Uses the same discrete power-ups from Salamander, but has graphical differences, some stage and music changes. It also has a completely changed story. This is categorized as Salamander because it's far closer to Japanese Salamander than it is Japanese Life Force.
• Salamander Power-Up Capsule version -- This secret, unlockable, brand new version is a hybrid of the other arcade games to create a version of Japanese Salamander that has Gradius power-up capsules. This version of the game is unlocked by a secret code.

For Life Force (yes, there's a separate Life Force for good reason) you have:

• Japanese version -- This is a even more heavily modified version of the US Life Force with all mechanical enemies changed to biological ones. It also uses the Gradius power-up capsules, and has further stage changes compared to either of the Salamander versions.

As a side note, the version of Life Force most people know best, the NES/Famicom one, is closest to a hybrid of all three arcade (obviously not the Salamander Power-Up Capsule version as that's completely new) Salamander/Life Forces with the Gradius power-up capsules and with some further stage changes to fit the FC/NES hardware. It is NOT in this collection, but likely will pop-up in a future collection.

For Gradius 2, you have:

• Japanese Early version -- The first version that came out.
• Japanese Mid version -- A version with some scoring changes that came out later on.
• Japanese Late version -- Final version of the game, with large adjustments to prevent milking for score and extra lives.
• Vulcan Venture North American version -- The version released in the US and Canada under the "Vulcan Venture" name, Based on the Japanese Mid version with the ability to continue added.

For Gradius 3, you have:

• Japanese Old version -- First version that came out. Brutally hard.
• Japanese New version -- Second version, with fixes to prevent milking and remove invincibility glitches.
• Asian version -- Released outside Japan, doesn't have the course selection version from the Japanese versions. Includes a few difficulty tweaks that make recovery easier.
• Japanese AM Show version -- The legendary version shown at the Japanese Amusement Machine Show in 1989. This version was incomplete and due to complaints from veteran players that it was too easy, Konami overcompensated, rapidly redesigned the game, and put out a radically different version for the arcade. Long thought to be lost forever, M2 and Konami managed to find the ROM data in Konami's archives and reconstuct as much of it as they could. This is not a finished version of the game, but it is interesting in that it has weapons and stage designs that are very different from any other version of the game.

For Salamander 2:

• You get the Japanese version of the game.
• There is a option in the game's options settings to convert it to the never-released Taiwan version of Life Force 2 with massively increased difficulty.
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You also get Salamander 3:

• Salamander 3 is a completely new game designed to look like what Konami and M2 would have put out in 1998 in arcades in the last period before 3D accelerators would become the future of arcades. This game has a feel that's somewhere in-between Salamander 1 and 2 with a lot of Gradius mixed in. While the game has a fair bit of the biological stage design that Salamander is known for, there are several stages that feel more like a Gradius stage in overall design and feel. The new Burst mode allows you to temporarily (yet massively) power-up your weapons for a short time, at the cost of losing access to those weapons-- you go back to the default impulse railgun-- for a bit while they cool back down.
• The difficulty curve for Salamander 3 starts off lighter than most of the other games. M2 has said in a recent Japanese interview that they want the first stage to be completable by even newcomers, but to ramp up towards a more normal difficulty.
• There are multiple loops in Salamander 3, with some stage design changes and considerably increased difficulty. M2 had hoped to introduce more changes in the stages across the loops, but didn't have time to do nearly as much as they'd have liked.

Many of the versions of the games include features like widgets that allow you to monitor internal state like Rank (the variable difficulty level of the game based on your actions), the state of your shield, what weapons you have, the state of the Option Hunter in games that have that annoying pain, and so forth. The games that have widgets also get optional subtitles for voiceovers.

For difficulty, there are two lowered-difficulty options, allowing you to play in Easy (with smaller hitbox) or Invincible mode (the game counts the number of times you get hit but doesn't kill you). There is also a Training mode for some of the games, allowing you to practice various parts of the game with the power-ups of your choice. In short, there are a lot of different ways to train yourself to get better at the parts of the games that you struggle at. There is also a rewind option that allows you to retry sections as desired.

Unfortunately, these additional difficulty options and training modes do not exist in Salamander 3. Nor do you get widgets or subtitles. This is one place M2 did drop the ball pretty hard in my estimation, and it's my hope they'll fix this.

There's several databases of game information included in the package, including official artwork, design documents, and even a music player with the full OSTs of the games AND several old CDs of remixed materials included as well. Unfortunately, again, none of this exists for Salamander 3. It's another place where the overall package is hurt a bit-- you'd really expect the premiere game in the package to get at LEAST the same treatment as the emulated games. It's my belief that the soundtrack is missing primarily because it's included on CD with the console-exclusive limited edition package.

The quality of the emulation is on-par with what you'd expect from M2. There are no visible hitches beyond what you'd have seen with the original arcade hardware for the games that were in the arcade. M2 goes an entire step beyond this, however, by offering what they call Hardcore options. These hardcore options allow you to adjust certain behaviors of the original games, such as to deal with bugs with hitboxes or graphic glitches in the original game.

As for PC-specific notes:

• I've heard that some AMD GPU users are having problems with the game and inconsistent framerate. As I'm using an Nvidia card with G-Sync capability, I haven't experienced any of this at all nor would I be able to assist in troubleshooting.
• Some have reported some issues with 8bitdo controllers. Others have said they've had no problems with them. I suspect it depends on whether you're using the controller in DirectInput or XInput mode, but I can't confirm that.
• There is remappable keyboard support, but it maps the keyboard to an Xbox gamepad. Instead of mapping Z to shoot and X to missile, it defaults to Z being the A button on the Xbox controller, X being the B button, A being the X button, S being the Y button, and Q/W for the bumpers, 1/2 for the triggers. This isn't unworkable, but it's not optimal either.
  
  
  
• There is a problem with the volume control in the game as of 1.01.00 on PC that doesn't show up in the console versions. The volume is entirely too low and cannot be raised any further. Hopefully this will be fixed in a hurry. This problem is very annoying on my PC, but on my Steam Deck I'm using a gain-control plugin to compensate for the low volume levels. You also cannot individually map volume for the sound effects, music, and voice-- while this is understandable for the arcade games, I'd say Salamander 3 desperately needs the ability to adjust the individual levels.

While the collection is certainly not perfect, it's THE best way to play the 21 included versions of games in the collection. There's tons of value here when you look at how many different versions were included, and how there are four never-seen-before games between the North American prototype of Gradius, Salamander 3, Gradius 3 AM Version, and Salamander Power-Up Capsule version.

Do I recommend this? 

If you have interest in the Gradius series but have never played it before, definitely. It's a great starting place with a lot of training options to help you learn the games. If you're an existing fan, I'd suggest it because there's some brand new materials in here too.

As for Gradius 4 and Solar Assault, those were cut for lack of time and may come in a later collection. M2 has expressed interest in bringing out the home games too. I would honestly expect a second collection in a year or two just judging by how quickly Konami greenlit the Castlevania collections so far.

I know of at least 20 additional games that could be added to future collections without including things like the licensed Commodore 64 or Spectrum home ports, either.

1. Gradius for NES/Famicom. Yes, the unlockable VS System version of Gradius is the same game, but you can't do a home collection without including the most well-known version of Gradius for the home machines.
2. Nemesis for Gameboy, which is a remixed version of Gradius with considerable new content.
3. Gradius: Interstellar Assault for Gameboy, which is a completely new and different game.
4. Gradius for MSX, which includes a completely new stage.
5. M2 released an updated, somewhat more arcade-accurate version of Gradius on the PCE Mini console.
6. Salamander for Famicom, Life Force for NES (there's a difference between them; the Japanese version uses a more advanced mapper chip that allows for a third Option compared to the two the US version gets, along with a better power-up meter at the bottom of the screen)
7. Salamander for PC Engine.
8. M2 released an updated, somewhat more arcade-accurate version of Salamander on the PCE Mini console.
9. Gradius 2 for Famicom, which is a considerably different game than the arcade original due to hardware limitations.
10. Gradius 2 for PC Engine CD, which includes a brand new stage and boss not in the arcade original.
11. Gradius 2 for MSX, which is an entirely different game from any other version of Gradius 2.
12. Nemesis '90 Kai on the X68000 is a remake of the MSX Gradius 2 with enhanced graphics and sound.
13. Gradius 3 for Super Famicom/SNES, which is a massively rebalanced and redesigned version of the arcade game.
14. Gradius 3 for MSX, which is also an entirely different game from the arcade and SNES games.
15. Gradius Gaiden, which I'd consider one of the two best games in the entire series.
16. Gradius 4, which only has home versions on the PS2 (in painfully interlaced 640x480) or PSP.
17. Solar Assault Gradius and Solar Assault Revised, which have never had a home version.
18. Gradius 5, which desperately needs a rerelease with higher resolution special effects than the PS2 could handle.
19. Gradius Galaxies/Gradius Generation on Gameboy Advance, which could certainly use a rerelease with a soundtack revamp
20. Gradius Rebirth, which was created by M2 and released on the Wii.