PixlBit

G Darius

Released: 1997

Pitch: Capture your enemy and blow-up the big battleship in this 3D shooting epic!

G Darius is an impressive game. Going fully polygonal in 1997 was usually a recipe for a crappy-looking game but since G Darius is all ships and robotic space fish (other than those two pilots in the intro), it still looks pretty good, if a tad pointy. As with the other Darius games I've played, I love the zany sense of creativity that permeates the game. Robotic space fish! And this game, again, allows you to choose between two levels after each boss, creating a sideways pyramid of possibilities. Some of the levels I saw were really cool. Then there's this game's particular gimmick: Capturing enemies to help you! Darious Gaiden allowed you to capture the midboss (though I couldn't get it to work very well for me), but G Darius allows you to capture nearly any enemy. One of my complaints about the game is that the later levels were reeeeeeaaallllly hard but I think they are designed with the capturing mechanic in mind. You need to know what to capture to best help you get through. Some enemies give you more straighforward shots or ones that go up and down or the enemy itself boomerangs out and back. I captured one during the final boss that just sat in front of me, soaking up bullets (very useful!). But still, those levels were HARD. The game makes good use of 3D with enemies and objects coming in and out of the background and foreground but that can be confusing at times. The camera also stays at a fixed distance from the action, a la traditional pixel-based 2D shooters, but with full 3D there is no reason to keep it that way all the time. Some of those later hard levels would have felt more manageable with a little more screen real estate to work with. (Raiden V does a great job matching the size of the screen to the action.) While I'm complaining let me mention the lack of screen-clearing bombs. Whyyyyy?? You do have shields by default, so one shot doesn't kill you, which is nice. One more thing, though, is that each boss shoots out a giant beta laser sometime during their fight. You are supposed to hold your shot button down to counter with an alpha laser and do big damage but I never got it to work, even once. I'm probably missing some mechanic to charge it or something but it was frustrating.

Anyway, I know I focused a lot on negatives but G Darius is a very good game. Definitely one aimed more at serious shmup fans but with infinite continues, anyone (i.e., me) can enjoy it.

This video is actually from the PS2 collection I'm playing. Also, this guy went a totally different route from me, so it was cool to scrub through this and see some of the other levels and bosses.