Overview G Darius is a 2 player 2D side-scrolling shoot-em-up game. You fly around in a futuristic ship, called a Silver Hawk, and shoot hordes of enemies ranging from robot ships to organic creatures such as fish or birds. Many of the enemy ships are modeled to look like fish or birds as well. The emphasis is on lots of firepower and tons of enemies. The graphics feature very detailed backgrounds and environments. The game is divided up into Zones and Areas. You can obtain power ups to your ship and also take control of enemy ships using capture balls.
Game Modes The game features 3 main modes:
Arcade Mode - This mode is taken straight from the arcade version
Beginner Mode - This mode has adjustable difficulty levels and ship customization. It's designed for players who are not ready for Arcade Mode.
Vs. Boss Mode - This mode allows you to fight all the enemy battleships bosses that appear in Arcade Mode.
Zones and Areas Levels are called Zones. Each Zone features many small enemies with a bigger boss battleship at the end. The zone path is traversed in a tree format. After finishing a level you will be able to choose from one of two different zones. The zone you select determines the difficulty level of the next battle. This gives the game some replay value as you cannot experience all the zones in one game.
Movement Most movement is horizontal, with your ship on the left side of the screen, facing the right. Occasionally in boss battles, you will switch to the right and face the left. Some levels also feature a diagonal view with your ship pointed up in a 45 degree angle.
Ship Upgrades You start out with a single horizontal line of missiles. By shooting certain enemies you can obtain power ups that add weapon upgrades to your ship. Weapon upgrades are broken up into different categories and are based on the color of the power up. They include:
Gold - Major Damage (Instant destruction to all enemies on screen)
Capturing Enemy Ships You can use a capture ball to capture and take control of an enemy ship. This gives you added firepower. Capturing mid-size battleships can also allow you to execute more powerful attacks using button combos. Also, when you have captured an enemy ship you can fire your alpha beam which is a powerful attack. Firing your alpha beam or using a bomb will destroy a captured enemy.
Bosses G Darius features a considerable number of different bosses confronted at the end of each level. Most of the boss characters (some of which have 2 different color variations) are presented as gigantic mechanic battleships that resemble various sea creatures such as a jellyfish, sea devil or an oversized shrimp. Every boss battle is precedeed by a short cutscene showing the superior size and power of the enemy.
Eclipse Eye
Eclipse Eye
Tripod Sardine
Queen Fossil
Dual Horn
Dimension Diver
Absolute Defender
Fire Fossil
Death Wings
Eight Feet Umbrella
Boss battles can be really epic. Eternal Triangle
Lightning Coronatus
Heavy Arms Shell
The Embryon
Accordion Hazard
G.T. (Gerat Thing)
Summary G Darius is a graphically appealing 2D shoot-em-up which is very fun an challenging. It's system of power-ups and capturing enemies adds some thought and decision making to the standard shoot-anything-that moves game. The zone selection also adds replay value.
