Gradius/Stage 6

• • Stage 6 features a rather biological look and feel to it, perhaps one the indirectly inspired the Gradius off-shoot series, Life Force. It is in this stage that you will be introduced to the Amoebas, which are the primary enemy in the stage. More importantly, you will discover a type of webbing that you can fire through to create your own tunnels and pathways through the level.

• • Additionally, there is a new type of hatch that appears in this stage, but the difference in merely cosmetic. They still release many Ruguls into the space around you, which pour out and try to collide with the Vic Viper in order prevent your attack from proceeding. Do your best to remove the hatches as early as possible, without putting yourself in any jeopardy in the process.

• The Amoebas come in two colors; purple and red. The red ones provide power-up capsules, and are found with greater frequency towards the end of the stage. Amoebas are tough creatures, and they can even withstand an attack from the blue Crash capsule. They hover from one location to another, pausing in between to stop and evaluate your current position before proceeding to get closer to you. They would love nothing more than to collide with you and take out you of the game.

• Naturally, the only way to get rid of the Amoebas is to concentrate a lot of firepower on them. They can take quite a bit of damage before ultimately blowing up. They also tend to huddle together, which can make it tough to fight against more than one unless you're using lasers. Considering how well lasers work against the webbing as well, you would be well advised to utilize them in this stage.

• • Safely blasting your way through the webbing is another important step in this stage. It's not difficult to do, but you should choose a pathway that can offer you a good degree of safety. Once you are committed to a certain route, you won't be able to move up or down beyond any room that you happen to have given yourself until you are all the way through. It's a good idea to hang back as far to the left as you can, destroying as many Amoebas as you can, before committing to a particular path, and dashing through it as quickly as you can destroy the webbing.

• • There are other threats to worry about as well, such as the Dee-01 cannons that are placed intermittently throughout the stage. Missiles only work well if the terrain ahead of the target is level or downhill. Sometimes it can be more efficient to line yourself up with the tanks and simply blasting them off the screen before they have a chance to fire at you. Some will even leave power-up capsules behind, but as always, be careful not to fly too close to the terrain to pick them up and risk a collision.

• Just before you reach the end of the stage, there will be two platforms with webbing above and below them, and clear sailing between them except for all of the Dee-01 tanks situated inside. Clearing the tanks shouldn't pose much of a problem, but the invading Amoebas may get in the way of your shots. Do you best to take out all of them, as well as the few remaining Rugul ships that will make a fly by before you reach the end of the stage.

• There is no Big Core on this stage, so the structure that you see in front of you at the end of the stage is in fact the stage boss. While it looks fairly menacing, it's actually quite a breeze as long as you have lasers. The weak point is the large object in the very center, but the two tubes positioned around it provide the threat. Bullets pour out of the tubes in your general direction, flying at a variety of angles. However, the good news is that these bullets can be shot and destroyed, long before they ever reach you. So if you fire you lasers continuously, there's a good chance that you may never have to move while you focus all of your fire on the object in the middle and destroy it. When you do, you'll proceed immediately to the next and final stage.