Gradius IV: Fukkatsu

Gradius IV: Fukkatsu is notable for being the first main installment in the series to use 3D models.

Debug Menu#

This needs some investigation. Discuss ideas and findings on the talk page. Specifically: Document these properly now that the immediate exit problem has been diagnosed. Find a more reliable way to enter the sub-menus, or provide cheat(s) to prevent them from being exited immediately. Does the debug menu function any differently on the other versions listed in MAME?

Enabling the following MAME cheat replaces the operator menu with a series of debugging functions. Annoyingly, the 1P Start button is used both for entering and exiting the sub-menus (sans one exception) with zero distinguishing between when the button was pressed, resulting in most of the options exiting immediately unless you use frame advance to make sure 1P Start was only pressed for one frame.

<cheat desc="Debug Menu">
    <script state="run">
        <action>maincpu.pd@803c8da0=803b4700</action>
    </script>
    <script state="off">
        <action>maincpu.pd@803c8da0=803b4288</action>
    </script>
</cheat>

The functions that can be found are as follows:

Unused Graphic#

Found alongside the power-up name graphics in the K037122 chip are tiles referring to the ! power-down items from Gradius III, which do not appear here.

Tiles	Assembled

Unused Sounds#

The announcer has several unused voice clips; most of them are for explaining how powerups work, all of them in factǃ They would have most likely of been used in the Attract Screen like Gradius Gaiden but wasn't. There are also two other unused voicelines, one of them being a "hint" for defeating an enemy or a boss, and the other referring to a scrapped mode selection.

It is worth to mention that some of these audio samples do not correlate with their appropriate function. There is also an additional voice clip for Multiples, which was what the Options was called in the non-Japanese versions of Gradius and Gradius II and in all versions of Salamander and Gradius III. Although non-Japanese versions of the game were found (see below), they still use the Option name.

Version Differences#

While it is not known if the arcade version of Gradius IV was ever released officially outside of Japan, American (UAx) and Asian (AAx) sets have since been added to MAME. Two revisions for each set are also known to exist, ending with A and C.

Title Screen#

Ver. JAA/JAC	Ver. UAA/UAC/AAC	Ver. AAA

The JAA and JAC sets contain Gradius IV: Fukkatsu in small font above the title as well as 復活 ("Resurrection") underneath. The UAA, UAC, and AAC sets remove those and shift "Gradius" and "IV" to better align them. In addition, the AAA set also removes the trademark symbol.

Continue#

In the Japanese sets (JAA and JAC), the continue feature is disabled by default. In the other sets, it is enabled.

This is a typical behavior taken on how continues worked in the first two games of the series.

References#