Taito is one of the greats when it comes to arcade games. While the company still exists, it's debatable whether it still exists as it was. Above all, it was extremely important and prolific in quantity and quality, all the way from the original Space Invaders originators to the 1980s popular classics like Darius, Bubble Bobble, Elevator Action and Arkanoid, to the 1990s which, for me, was even their best period, if not the most popular, with dark horses like Space Invaders '90, Darius Gaiden and G-Darius, RayForce and Elevator Action Returns.
I'd like to go deeper into Darius in this post, leaning on the computer releases of Darius Cozmic Collection, as well G-Darius. The original Darius is an ominous beast. The beautiful effects on the backgrounds as well as the huge length of the monitor (originally a 3 screen wide monitor) gave it a momentous depth. Everything is slow and builds tension as you can see what's coming a mile away. To overset that, the Silver Hawk is quite slow and the firing rate slow. Upgrades are somewhat easy to get, but also easy to miss. Right from the start there's great use of the horizontal setting, giving or taking away height as well as hiding many surprise attacks in its walls. Bosses are gigantic but otherwise have fairly repetitive and simple patterns. In short, it's a very attractive game that plays like nothing else because of its length but, ultimately, is not sufficiently endearing mechanically.
Darius Gaiden is all-action. It loses the brooding feel of the original and loads up the Silver Hawk with lots of powerups - there are main shot upgrades, but also missiles and shield. Upgrades come think and fast and death does not send you back to checkpoint like before. This contributes to the hectic feel as not only can you take quite a few shots before dying (due to the shield) but even when you die you get resurrected right away and usually with a load of powerups available to get you up to full strength quickly.
The game is visually fantastic, making great use of Taito's celebrated F-3 arcade system (Elevator Action Returns, RayForce), which has a great use of colour and effects, including 3D effects. The backgrounds are mesmerizing and the bombs generate a similar effect to the screen shattering altered state effect in Metal Black. Surprisingly for a horizontal shooter, the environmental hazards only pop up about halfway through your journey, in the later stages - depending on the stage of course. This takes us to a common complaint of the series but that is a series characteristic and if it was any different it wouldn't be Darius - there are too many stages and a playthrough takes too long. The fact that there are too many is closely related to the feeling that, to a certain degree, they might be too similar. Bosses, as well, while visually striking, are usually quite boring being hard to kill because they can take a lot of damage but while usually having well telegraphed, simple, attacks.
Apart from the hypnotic, fever-dream feel of the game, the best and most unexpected aspects happen to be the enemies during the main levels, which have a great variety with many different attack patterns that always keep you on your toes, as well as the midlevel bosses (more like a harder enemy), which are usually unique and offer something different and challenging. As it is, this game is probably the most frenetic horizontal shooter I've played, that arms the player well and makes death comes thick and fast and thrives on chaos. There is nothing necessarily unique about the gameplay if not the eagerness to equip you quickly and fuel a triggerhappy state. In short, a visually enticing ride and a thrilling game.
G-Darius is a crazy bastard. While technically not as hectic as Gaiden, it is in fact insanely hard and you'll be facing death often. As always, it's a statement piece, this time fully polygonal, perhaps the finest of the early horizontal polygonal shooters. This is a colourful and attractive game. The models are huge so space is particularly tight. The biggest change to gameplay is the capture system which is a brilliant thing, allowing you to recruit (almost) any enemy to fight alongside you to even the odds. The difficulty comes from the combination of relentless assault, slightly slower speed compared to Gaiden, as well as a big target. Due to the unshapely polygon designs and colourful backgrounds, it does also suffer from the cardinal sin of shmups: hard to see bullets.
As a break from the usual in the series, the bosses here are not only impressive but now have very ingenious attacks and have finally grown to be the highlight of the game, not only visually, but mechanically as well. If anything, now the game has no downtime: from the first part of the stage when it's aggressive cannon fodder and environmental hazards, to the relentless midstage bosses that like to blast you two inches from the tip of the Silver Hawk's nose, to the end-stage bosses, it's nonstop action. As I said before, not as hectice as Gaiden because the speed is slower but with a lot more going on, and a lot more complex too.
Even if it is so punishing, it's still a load of fun, taking you back to another age and full of arcade spirit. Darius's finest hour. The computer edition is a luxury, with several versions including the HD remaster, but also the original and console versions as well as all alternate versions, a bonus boss rush mode with reimagined graphics in a dual screen as well as bonus features and all the QoL features imaginable. Just great. If you have any interest in arcade games this is as good as it gets in terms of arcade recreations on computer.
Metal Black is a visually impressive game particularly for its visual effects. Its gameplay is slightly unique in that it depends on constantly powering up the main laser via abundant powerups. It develops into a game of crowd control, learning when to deploy the laser at full power to keep the number of enemies in check and not be overwhelmed. The S-Tribute version suffers from the lack of analog control that makes it practically unplayable, even with extra help. A shame. In the end the game might be more interesting for its concept and set pieces (particularly the very memorable first level) than anything else. Perhaps one day a reissue of the arcade original will happen.
RayForce, RayStorm, RayCrisis are also visually impressive if for different reasons. The gimmick here is multilevel gameplay be it 2D or 3D. In particular the later 3D games go heavy on scripted setpieces, very similar to what Panzer Dragoon would be if it was a vertical shooter. The problem is judging distances and not to be overwhelmed by bullets and enemies coming at you from different dimensions. Thus they come off as somewhat dated but still good, solid arcade fun.
