Gradius

Gradius is a 1985 horizontally scrolling shoot 'em up video game developed and published by Konami, originally released as a coin-operated arcade game in 1985. It was the first game in the Gradius series of shoot 'em ups. In Gradius, the player maneuvers a spacecraft known as the Vic Viper that must defend itself from the various alien enemies. The game features a power-up system in which a weapon selection meter called the "power meter", based upon collecting capsules to 'purchase' additional weapons. The arcade version of Gradius was released internationally outside Japan under the title of Nemesis, although later releases kept the original title. Home versions were released for various platforms, such as the Famicom/NES, the MSX home computer, and the PC Engine, among other formats. The original arcade game and some of the home versions has also been included in various compilation releases and are available for download in services such as the Virtual Console and PlayStation Network.