You're right about Gradius being a weaker port (whereas Contra, Rush'n'Attack, and many others came out better) but you have the origins of the Konami Code wrong.
He created the code because the game was too difficult for him to complete during the coding and testing phases, and he needed a debug code to make the game more manageable for his skill level.
Oddly enough, I personally learned the Konami code from an arcade machine.
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Re: Is this true emulation or an issue?
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