Recently, a friend invited me over to play a freshly purchased copy of Gradius III (SNES version).  I'd never played the game before, but who could blame me?  It came out just five months after I was born and it was never a part of my childhood SNES collection.  At first, I didn't take much liking to the game.  The ship was slow, the power-up system was a mystery (we were both new to the game, so there was a learning curve) and Game Over was becoming common vernacular.  At some point, we became sidetracked with one thing or another and set the game down and to be honest... I didn't give the game much thought after that.
     Weeks later, I found myself playing Gradius III on the PSP (On the, uh, Gradius Collection of course.  :P) and loved it.  I guess the pacing of the action just sort of clicked, finally.  Without reserve, I nabbed the game off Wii Shop around 3AM this morning and played a good four hours before logging onto GiantBomb.com to update the neglected Gradius III article.
     I guess my point is... Gradius III is fucking awesome!  How did I spend the last two decades without it?