Remember Gradius? Remember Gradius.

Gradius was the cartridge I repeatedly rented and never bought, to the point where that value proposition lost all meaning. Well apparently that was about 30 years ago, and while my young mind clued into the quality of the game, my substantially older mind had no idea about the legacy it left. Luckily Kurt Kalata over at Gamasutra has my back and has published a pretty great (and concise) retrospective on Gradius for its 30th birthday, effectively adding yet another NES cartridge to my "get" list.

The history of Gradius: A look back at 30 years of Konami shooting | Gamasutra