Gradius/Enemies

Hatches
There are three hatches that you will encounter throughout some of the stages. The Dagumu are present in Stage 1 and 4. The Gaomu are is present in Stage 2, and the Kanimu are present in Stage 6. They all behave the same way. They are stationary, and open up from time to time, releasing enemies into the space above them. Once the enemies are released, they follow their own typical behavior. Hatches have a great deal of defense, and it take quite a lot of artillery to destroy them, but it's in your best interests to attack them in order to keep the overall number of enemies that you must face to a minimum. Hatches change color when they are about to be destroyed.

Big Core
The Big Core is the final stage boss for the first five (or six on the PC-Engine version) stages of the game. The strategy to defeat it will always be the same. The Big Core moves up or down, depending on your position after the last time it stood still. It will travel a certain distance before coming to rest again, and fire four beams from its guns. The beams are about the length of the Vic Viper, and spaced apart just enough for the Vic Viper to slip between them, but the margin of error is very small.

The core in the middle of the ship is initially covered and the entire ship in invulnerable. As soon as the core becomes uncovered, the four barriers in front of the core become vulnerable to your attack. You must continuously fire your weapons at the barriers in order to destroy them, one by one, until the blue core is exposed. Then you can fire directly on the core until it take enough damage and the entire craft blows up. However, if you take too long breaking the barriers or destroying the core, the core will turn red, and the ship will become invulnerable again. After the core turns red, the ship will automatically self destruct after a period of time has passed.

(A note for the PC-Engine version of the game: Because of the added length to the laser beam, and the rate of failure with collision detection due to its length, it's actually much better to fire short bursts of laser beams at the core then long beams. The short lasers have a better chance of registering a hit with the barrier and the core.  This is true for most large sized enemies in the game.)

Moai
The Moai of Gradius resemble the Moai of Easter Island a great deal, with one exception: These statues fire at you. The Moai typically populate one particular stage in several of the Gradius games, and in the first game, they populate Stage 3. Moai have their mouths closed most of the time except when you end up in their field of vision. At that time, they open their mouths, and rings of energy come pouring out, flying your general direction. The rings are easy to destroy with a single shot from your weapons, but the number of them that appear can quickly overwhelm you. To destroy the Moai, you must concentrate a heavy amount of fire at the mouth of the statue when it is open and firing rings at you. Lasers give you a better chance for destruction, since the rings will generally stop your regular bullets.

Mother and Child
Mothers appear at the once at the beginning and several times at the end of Stage 3. A Mother is a large circular ship that advances to a point a certain distance away from the Vic Viper before briefly coming to rest. While it holds its position, it opens up and typically releases three Children at you, small indestructible disks that must be dodged. At higher levels, they can release more Children. Unlike the Children, the Mothers can be destroyed if enough fire is concentrated at them. If they are not destroyed after a certain period of time, they begin to advance again, drifting off the screen on their own accord.

Iron Maiden
The Iron Maiden is a swift moving craft with no external offensive ability. Their only method of attack is collision. They appear at the very end of Stage 4, and start out by appearing in the upper right corner of the screen. They follow the terrain in a counter-clockwise direction, sliding down the left side of the screen, back to the right, and up the right side until they get even with your ship, at which point the advance forward at you. They appear one after another, and don't take a lot of firepower to destroy. It is best to attack them up at the very least as they drop down under the first volcano and back up to the land above it. If you're fast or powerful enough, you may be able to destroy it at that point. The very least, you'll weaken it up enough so that when it completes its journey around the screen, it will be much easier to destroy when it make a final advance on you. You must destroy a good number of them before the Big Core shows up. If you take too long to destroy them, they will ultimately surround you in the middle of the screen. Continue to fire at the lead Iron Maiden in an effort to destroy it before it reaches you.

Tentacle
Tentacles are the sole occupant of Stage 5. The slowly float around through space. They consist of a pink fleshy core, surrounded by any number from zero to four tentacles. The tentacles all do their best to point at you and fire small bullets in your direction while the pink cores float aimlessly. Every tentacle has a weak point halfway between the claw and the core, and the entire tentacle can be destroyed by focusing relatively little firepower on the weak point. The core, however, is another matter. Cores are very strong and can withstand a lot of damage. As you attack them, they begin to shrivel, going through three different sizes before ultimately being destroyed. The cores are somewhat mindless, and can usually be avoided with little difficulty, but a core that still has tentacles can be quite a threat. Put the priority on shooting the tentacles, and only focus on the cores when there are no other remaining threats. Be aware that few more tentacles may trickle on to the screen when the Big Core arrives, but they usually usher themselves off quickly.