G Darius

"The Milky Way: Reinterpreted with Fish"

G-Darius is yet another game in the Darius series of high octane shooters. Sadly I know jack diddly about the other Dariuses. But I know about this one!

Story: To tell you truth I don't have a clue. I know there was a war going on till the war awoken some super powerful armored fish that evolve. *shrug* If you really want to know the story read the manual or find a scan online. Like most shooters the story isn't that important. This game is all about making big with explosions and such.

Graphics: From a texture and polygonal stand point this game looks terrific. The zones (levels) are well detailed and filled with action. Weapon effects are a little on the boring side except for the Alpha Beam and explosion technique. Bosses are huge and well detailed with nice animations and attack patterns to boot. The downside to these mostly good graphics is the slow down. Its rare to see this game run at full speed but that is not such a bad thing considering the amount of yellow dots that will be flying at you at any given moment.

Sound: The sound effects are pretty standard. Shoot pea shooter, hit enemy, boom. The music is pretty good. It fits the weird and hectic atmosphere of the game. There are a few stand out tracks and if you really want to groove to the music go to the options menu and turn down the sfx and turn up the jamz!

Game play: The meat and potatoes! In the genre of shooters (no not first person or third person shooters) one must find a way to stand out amongst the others. In G-Darius you have your main gun which gets upgraded as you find red energy balls. You have your bombs that are weak but fire at a rapid succession at an angle and can be upgraded with green energy balls. Then there is your shield which is powered up and upgraded with blue energy balls. Now we have all seen shooters with this sort of set up (i haven't seen shield done like this though). What makes G-Darius stand apart is the capture balls. You fire out a purple ball that captures an enemy and turns it into your slave basically. Some ships fire bullets ahead like you and others rush out and smack your enemies. Then you have your mid bosses which can be captured. They are the only ones that can pull off dangerously powerful techniques. And while you have an enemy under your control you can do one of two things with them. Press X to explode them like a super bomb in most shooters or use it as an alpha beam. The Alpha and Beta beams are the highlight of this game. When a boss begins to charge up its Beta beam you can counter it with your Alpha beam. And when those two collide you must keep it going and eventually you will over power the boss's beam and if the boss has more beams your beam can absorb those beams too. And once your beam takes up half the screen you'll be saying Oh holy (fill in it with whatever here)! while ripping apart the boss.

The downfall in the game play is its repetitiveness. I know its a shooter. But even with the ability to pick paths within a zone (which is handled nicely) and pick your next zone after you beat the one you were on the zone designs are pretty much the same. You will find that there are only like 7 different main designs even though there are 14 zones in the game. The lack of variety can be said about normal enemy designs as well. There is a 2 player mode, a boss rush mode which you can customize the boss order, and a beginner mode which lets you play the whole game minus the endings and ranking at the end.

Final Word: If you love shooters buy it. I love shooters and I bought it. If you don't love shooters rent it. I doubt you will find it in a video store though. I advise buying the best PS One shooter Einhander first. That lasts longer and is more fun to play.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 05/25/03, Updated 05/25/03