Huge Heart

Huge Heart
Huge Heart as it appears in Gradius V
Japanese name	ヒュージハート Hyūji Hāto
Type	Organic boss
Abilities	Shoots bone pillars that fire lightning bolts from the sides Huge tusks that emerge from openings on the surfaces Releases a flaming snake-like creature Shoots large lasers from several eyes Creates small volcano-like openings that spew green mucus Protected by a force field
Location(s)	Bacterian Cell Center
Appearances	Gradius V
Theme	"Stage Boss"

“	Destroy the cell!	„
	~ Announcer in Gradius V

The Huge Heart (ヒュージハート) is the boss of Stage 4 in Gradius V.

Description

It is the only organic boss in the game. The Huge Heart itself does not attack; the body around it uses defense mechanisms.

Attack patterns

Note: *All attack names except Beam Shot are purely conjectural.*

The tubes on the top and bottom of the Huge Heart are the source of its attacks.

• "Bone Bolt" - The Huge Heart can attack by releasing rotating bone pillars that fire lightning bolts from the sides.
• "Sharp Cross" - The Huge Heart releases huge tusks at the player's ship in an attempt to pierce it (like the Sharp Cross "teeth" from the first stage of Salamander)
• "Acid Reflux" - The Huge Heart uses its tubes to spew green mucus in a volcano-like fashion.
• "Prominence" - The Huge Heart releases a flaming snake-like creature with the front firing fireballs aimed from its line of sight while the back is firing fireballs in a sunburst.
• "Eye Beams" - The Huge Heart uses 3 of the 4 eyes to shoot continuous laser beams to limit player movement while 1 of the 4 eyes fires numerous eye beams while sweeping around.

The Huge Heart is protected by a force field with a weak spot that circles around it that must be destroyed in order for the Vic Viper to shoot the heart itself. The force field regenerates after several seconds.

Gallery

Huge Heart exploding

Trivia

• The Huge Heart has probably the most gruesome death sequence of all the bosses in Gradius so far. It begins pulsating rapidly while streams of green blood gush out of it in five sections. It then proceeds to explode violently.
• The Huge Heart shares some similarities to Gomeramos King, a recurrent boss from the Contra series, also by Konami. Both are gigantic hearts that presumably feed the organic environment where they're encountered in, and both don't attack directly, but instead rely on organic peripherals to attack the player and defend themselves. Ironically, the tube itself also shares some similarities to the Eggron that kept on spawning aliens to defend its heart until it was destroyed.