History YMMV / Gradius

* SoCoolItsAwesome: The entire series, but fans consider ''Gradius Gaiden'' to be the best of the series, or at least one of the best. Also, ''Creator/{{Treasure}}'' was involved in the making of ''Gradius V'', and the game has a little resemblance to ''VideoGame/{{Ikaruga}}''.

** The overseas versions of ''Life Force'' (NES) only has a static shot of the Konami logo against a solid back background while the ending theme plays. It's rather creepy, particularly if you're playing alone at night.

* BestLevelEver - Stage 7 of ''Gaiden'', which stards off as a seemingly-innocent volcano stage...and then ''gets gradually sucked into a black hole.'' [[GameBreakingBug Too bad it slows down to a crawl on a PS2.]]

** ''Gradius III'' is not only [[NintendoHard atrociously difficult]], but it's also full of extremely cheap moments that just make the game not very fun at all. The difficulty had to be toned down very drastically for the SNES port.

** ''Gradius III'' is not only [[NintendoHard atrociously difficult]], but it's also full of extremely cheap moments that just make the game not very fun at all.

* ScrappyLevel - The Fire and Ice zones in ''III Arcade'', the Bubble and Cell stages in ''IV'', and the "green slime factory" stage in ''V''. And the fortress stage in almost every game. ALL of Gradius III arcade.

* {{Sequelitis}} - ''Gradius IV'' is victim to this, due to not adding anything new to the series (the first stage is even a re-hash of the first stage from ''Gradius II'') and for the 3D effects looking rather cheap.

* DegradedBoss: Venom went from [[ThatOneBoss a difficult final boss]] to an regular Gradius AntiClimaxBoss. This also applies to Zelos and Big Core MK 1.

** Venom, from Nemesis 2.
* ZeroEffortBoss: Most of the time, the final bosses don't do anything and when they do something, their attacks can be very weak. You rarely encounter a Gradius final boss that manages to avert being a ZeroEffortBoss.

* PolishedPort: ''Gradius II'' on PCEngine is a very faithful recreation of the arcade version, AND adds a new stage. The Famicom verson, while not one-to-one like the PCE counterpart, stands out on its own with its unique stage design, and is the only ''Gradius'' game on the Famicom/NES to allow '''four options''' on the screen at once thanks to the cartridge's special chip.

* CrowningMomentOfHeartwarming - ''Gradius Collection'' plays this [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CckH73dMek8 melody]] upon completing the first ''Gradius''

* CrowningMomentOfAwesome - "Warning. There is a space-time anomaly forming. Two objects have emerged. Ship identification code cannot be processed for the large craft. The other is [[spoiler: Vic Viper T-301]]"

The following are SubjectiveTropes relating to Gradius.
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* SoCoolItsAwesome: Most of the games, but fans consider ''Gradius Gaiden'' to be the best of the series, or at least one of the best. Also, ''Creator/{{Treasure}}'' was involved in the making of ''Gradius V'', and the game has a little resemblance to ''VideoGame/{{Ikaruga}}''.

* MagnificentBastard: Paula in the Salamander OVAs. She poses as a boat person from the 5th planet and tricks one of the protagonists into destroying a Moai Statue, which allows the Bacterians, who were repelled by the Moai Statue, to come in and mess up the place.

* CompleteMonster - Most of the Bacterians. They take over planets and change the environment to suit the Bacterians, which could potentially kill the other people who can't handle the change environment. In the Salamander OVA series, they indirectly orphaned Stephanie (they kidnapped Stephanie's father, turned him into a cyber brain, and Stephanie had to destroy her father. Stephanie's mother... well the mother died long before the Bacterians' invasion) and were going to make Stephanie a Cyber Brain too. All this with no regret.
** There maybe an exceptional Bacterian named Tita Nium whose one of the heroes of Otomedius. She may be a Bacterian.

** Giga, the FinalBoss of ''Salamander 2''. Yes, he is a FinalBoss. However, it's extremely rare for a ''Gradius'' final boss to be not a ZeroEffortBoss.

** The Falchion Beta is this in Gaiden. The Auto-Aiming at full power covers 180 degrees of the top of your ship, the Gravity Bullet [[BossDissonance speed kills bosses]], and the Rolling Missile both goes in both directions and pierces through weak enemies.

* MoralEventHorizon: In Nemesis 3, Venom attacked planet Gradius and kidnapped a three-year old James Burton to change history in favor of the Bacterians. His attack has indirectly killed many of Venom's ''own'' species due to radiation. {{YMMV}} as it is not clear whether he is aware of this or not.