Random: Someone's Working To Fix SNES Shooter Gradius III's Slowdown Issues

The slowdown is the only reason I ever could make it anywhere in that game.

@Expa0 You and everyone else. x)

AMAZING!!! This game is ugly when it sloooooooows.,

I love this. This guy is good.

I always thought it was a brilliant little confluence of tech limitations and player accessibility for older console shmups to slow down when the screen was filled with bullets so that you could actually dodge the things.

This is a nice technical acheivement, but honestly, i think i'd stick with the slowdown because it makes the game easier.

Gradius III is my least favourite Gradius anyway.

@RupeeClock It is quite trial and error so far, but the worst part is already conquered.

My favourite Gradius title, despite the missing levels and the slowdown. The soundtrack is arguably better than the arcade version which also suffers from loads of slowdown too.

Just watched the new footage and it looks impressive.........only thing they didn’t show was full options plus laser.....that really slows the game down to a few FPS

Good now fix the NeoGeo slowdown on Metal Slug too.

@retro_player_22 ...that is a bit out of reach for the SA1. :x

I'm not the most knowledgeable on the SNES/Super Famicom, but I recall reading that another issue it had was ROM speed. Specifically, slower ROMs would require the CPU to run in a slower mode. I don't know if that was the case here and how the SA-1 deals with that. I'm fascinated by the SA-1 and the possibilities for it had it seen more widespread use. In theory, it could have solved the bigger issues I had with the system as I always preferred fast, action-oriented games. Having played a lot of PC Engine, I could see Nintendo using similar methods had Nintendo actually released a CD add on. Much like the NEC System 3 and Arcade cards, Nintendo could have released CD-system carts with more memory and, possibly, an SA-1 inside. That would mean, for CD games, players would only have to buy the SA-1 once and Nintendo wouldn't have to include one with every single game cart that needed one. But that was a dream I had.

Next, fix Mega Man 3's...everything. Maybe even MMX entire Armored Armadillo Stage?

Why break what's already fixed?

I love Gradius III, but without that slowdown, I probably couldn't beat it.

I never used to mind the slow down. As others have already said, seemed like my good ol chum Mr SNES was giving a helping hand when the action hotted up

What slowdown? Must be subtle

It’s cool to know this is possible. It’s long been my goal to try and improve Final Fight using the SA-1 to allow more than three enemies on screen at once, but I’ve never had the time to dig into it.

Incidentally there’s a ROM hack for Super Ghouls ‘n’ Ghosts that removes most of the slow down (although it doesn’t use the SA-1 for it).

The slowdown may not have been intentional, but it's as much a part of the nostalgia as anything else. If anything, it made the game feel more dramatic.

Exquisite. I simply need this.

Very impressive! That SA1 chip really helps the game out, especially in the bubble stage!

I just wish I like Gradius 3. Sure, I respect the game, but Gradius 1, 2 and 5 are better Gradius games than 3 IMO. But it's very nice to see the game get a much needed upgrade to make it much smoother!

@Mr_Pepperami The video is me playing the 'fixed' version. Here is the game running in its original state.

@Shiryu I was joking😂. It’s notorious bad. I had it on the SNES and it slows to a crawl. Sarcasm doesn’t work in text sometimes. Video looks great 👍🏻

@Shiryu if I remember rightly it’s especially bad if you get the laser.

@Mr_Pepperami Sorry , it does not translate in text indeed. Yep, the ripple laser was a massive lag-exploitable weapon to ensure you actually had a fighting chance in the later levels.

@Shiryu yeah that’s the one. As soon as you shoot it the screen goes into slow motion it’s unbelievable. I actually don’t think I’ve ever played this game without any slowdown. Would be great to get a full gradius collection with all that fixed.

@Mr_Pepperami I was sad to see Konami skipping on bundling all the *Gradius*es as a collection instead of putting just a few on their Anniversary Collection. I do believe the PSP has a great compilation of the whole series except V.

@Shiryu that is a bizarre collection. Why haunted castle is on what is basically a shooters collection is just baffling. Also the region changes to each title are so significant in some cases that there should be an option to switch between the two. I hope we get additional collections from Konami as such a small numbers of titles doesn’t really show the scope of konami’s fantastic back catalogue.

@Shiryu gradius V is phenomenal. Such a great title

@Mr_Pepperami Indeed, if only they got a hold of Treasure and just remastered it to fit in 16:9 aspect... one can dream.

The newer versions of SNES9x include an option to remove slowdown in games. You can even load it onto the SNES/NES classic edition via Retroarch as an alternative to the built-in emulator.

It causes problems with certain titles but I tried it with Castlevania IV and the difference is...jarring. Fighting the twin headed dragon was suddenly difficult.

If this can be done successfully then I'd basically want them to do it for all SNES games that suffer from slowdown (and hopefully we can apply this to the ROM versions so I can update all the games on my SNES Classic to remove the slowdown). Because let's be honest, this was basically the only area where the SNES lacked compared to the Mega Drive.

Kinda wish Nintendo had gone the extra mile and added this kind of thing as an option on the SNES Classic so you could turn it on/off for each game and totally remove the slowdown if you wanted or keep it if you preferred it the original way. I mean it's obvious the developers never really wanted the slowdown as a feature so allowing us to turn it off in 20XX would still be totally in-keeping with the original vision but just tweak it a little and fix these unnecessary issues for play in modern times. That would have been sooo cool.

Right on. I think almost any SNES game could use this.

Love Gradius 3 have the original game on SNES, and arcade version. Personally prefer the SNES version. With regards to slow down, the SNES is so good it doesn’t matter the sheer quality outweighs that. Play Rendering rangers, super Aleste no slow Down at all. I think a lot of it boiled down to lazy optimisation. But I must say Thunder spirits compared to Thunder force 3 is terrible, again bad programming.