Very, very gimmicky, but Darius had good music and a decent attract mode. the game wasn't too forgiving, but one could make it to the first stage without too much grief, except over the too-long-to-power up weapons systems. If you survived (and the game was quite unforgiving) the first zone, there was always the giant coelacanth at the end of the first stage heralded by a 'WARNING' and thingies to make you feel worse; the giant screen did sort of help since it gave you more dodging room. But, hang around too long and little red orbs in wireframe cubes would harass you (but not very seriously). They would later resurface as givers of powerups in Darius Twin on the SNES. And so on. The branching stages added variety (but not much), since there was only one boss per tier, except for the last one. There were, too, Taito's terrible crappy sound effects (except for the bosses'dying roar), a recurring motif in a lot of their shoot'em ups.
All of the bosses in Darius, like the actors or characters in the first of a movie series, have reappeared in one form or the other; sometimes in greater roles, otherwise in mere rehashings or bit parts. Here they are:
| Level(s) |
Boss |
| A |
King Fossil |
| B,C |
Electric Fan |
| D,E,F |
Dual Shears |
| G,H,I,J |
Fatty Glutton |
| K,L,M,N,O |
Keen Bayonet |
| P,Q,R,S,T,U |
Iron Hammer |
| V |
Strong Shell |
| W |
Green Coronatus |
| X |
Octopus |
| Y |
Cuttle Fish |
| Z |
Great Thing |
Arcade PCB pix: 1,2
OST (as Taito Game Music Vol.2):1, 2
Strategy Book?:1 (big thanx to jason Brookes for this one!
Misc: 1,2,3 (some game music collection including Legendary Wings...go figure.)
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