Game:

Gradius III (1989)

Category:

Walkthrough

Duration: 31:33

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Gradius III (Japanese: グラディウスIII: 伝説から神話へ, Hepburn: Guradiusu III: Densetsu Kara Shinwa e, lit. "Gradius III: From Legend to Myth") is a scrolling shooter arcade game developed and published by Konami in 1989 for video arcades. It was made available on December 24, 2020 on PlayStation 4 and Nintendo Switch as part of the Arcade Archives.
The player returns in the role of the pilot of the Vic Viper starfighter to battle the onslaughts of the Bacterian Empire.

In the darkest reaches of infinite space, pure evil lies in wait... The Dark Forces led by the god of destruction, Bacterian, prepare to launch a massive onslaught against the planet Gradius. Possessing unstoppable power, the Dark Forces threaten to plunge the Universe into total war and complete annihilation.
Their invasion force smashes the Gradius defenses, and the surrounding planets soon fall like dominoes. Now Bacterian's evil grasp reaches for the heart of the resistance... planet Gradius itself... To counter the oncoming threat the United Gradius World Forces gather all their fighter craft. Half of them form a defensive net - the other half a strike team. But they are badly outnumbered and the Dark Forces easily tear through their thin front line. No fighters survive the slaughter...
In a last gasp move, the United Gradius World Forces send out two fighters, previously considered too dangerous for combat missions: The InterDimensional VIC VIPER fighters. The Fighters take off for the heart of darkness to join the fray that will decide the fate of the Universe...

A port of Gradius III was released for the Super Famicom in December 1990 and the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in 1991, with the option of reduced difficulty and additional armaments for the Vic Viper. It replicates the slowdown of its arcade counterpart and discards the pseudo-3D and Crystal levels. The Cell Level is also swapped to being the final stage instead of the sixth stage like in the arcade version; it is also given a new layout and soundtrack. It also introduces a boss called Beacon which awaits the player at the end of the new high-speed stage, which is a counterpart of the high-speed stage in Gradius II. Unlike any other version, the Super NES port is the only one that allow players to continue when they lost all their lives. Also, there are bonus areas that can be accessed by finding an entry point and fulfilling certain conditions. A harder difficulty called "Arcade" can be unlocked by inputting a code on the options screen; however, it is simply the same SNES game at a harder difficulty and not an accurate port of the arcade version.

The changes from the arcade version include:

Stage 5 becomes Stage 4.
Stage 6 becomes Stage 10 (the Final Stage).
Stage 7 becomes Stage 5.
Stage 8 becomes Stage 6.
3D and Cube Rush stages removed. In their place is the high speed stage, Crystal Maze.
The final stage is split: the Boss Rush is at Stage 8, the Fortress Base is at Stage 9, the Cell Stage is the Final Stage (or known as Stage 10).
Some bosses were removed: Gregol, Dogas and Vaif, Wyvern, Zub Rush Mk. II, Lizard Core, Tetran and Shadow Gear.
They were replaced with the ff. bosses: Beacon, Zub Rush and Shadow Gear MK II.
New bonus stages.
The orders of the bosses in the Boss Rush were reorganised (with the removal of Tetran), as well as new addition of BGM tracks for them.

The Super NES version of the game suffered from severe slowdown. In 2019 Brazilian computer engineer Vitor Vilela created a romhack version of the game that uses the SA-1 enhancement chip that completely eliminates slowdown in the game.

Download links:

GitHub: https://github.com/VitorVilela7/SA1-Root/releases (made by VitorVilela7)
Zeldix: https://www.zeldix.net/t1522-gradius-iii
Arcade Arrangement: Coming Soon

The arrangement credit:

https://www.youtube.com/user/mistcatsalfa (れもそ) - for making Unpleasant Cell (Arcade Arrangement)
https://www.youtube.com/user/fsolisiii (ThirdySolisTV) - for making the Arcade Arrangements of Catapult, Smash, Crystal Core (Version 2), Big Core MK II, Covered Core Themes & Last Struggle
https://www.youtube.com/user/scph35001 () - for making Sharp Shoot/Snipe Shoot (Arcade Arrangement)

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