Taito's beloved Darius series took its sweet game to appear in a dedicated compilation. Until now, only 2006's jam-packed Taito Legends 2 package represented the series with the latter titles Darius Gaiden and G-Darius, but with the release of Darius Cozmic Collection, we finally have a near-complete museum of this venerable horizontal shoot-'em-up franchise.
Darius Cozmic Collection Arcade isn't an easy sell for non-fans, but to be perfectly frank it's not the most enticing pick-up for the die-hards, either. £34.99 for a compilation of classic games isn't necessarily ridiculously steep, but Cozmic Collection Arcade – when you get right down to it – is only three really distinct titles.
Now, admittedly, that's a little bit of a controversial statement – for posterity, you've got three versions of the original Darius, three versions of its sequel Darius II (and Sagaia variation) and the excellent Darius Gaiden bringing up the rear. These are good games and well worth playing, but – and hardcore shmup fans will contest this – the variants are not that different.
Starting (sensibly) with Darius, you've got the original three-screen ultra-wide shooter here, the inaugural mission of the Silver Hawk ship in its quest to destroy a captain's table's worth of seafood. The widescreen gimmick is really cool but it ultimately means you've got a lot more to pay attention to, and when even the fodder enemies seem to take multiple hits, you'll have your work cut out. Losing a ship will cause you to drop all your power-ups ala Gradius, so unless you're good you'll be spending a lot of time with a weedy little peashooter. Included Darius variants "New Version" and "Extra Version" mitigate this slightly with rebalancing, but they're still no picnic.
Darius II reduces the number of screens to two, but this helps you focus as a player (as well as appreciate the still-amazing sprite work). As if in response to this concession, the game is far harder – bullets and enemy ships flood the screen within seconds. It's otherwise very similar to the original, and similarly compelling. Included variations of Sagaia adjust both the difficulty and the order you visit the levels, but none of them are huge change-ups.
Finally, the stand-out game of the package is Darius Gaiden; only a single screen here, but it's possibly even harder than its predecessors. The spectacular boss battles and bizarre, haunting soundtrack are extremely memorable and – as with all the games in the package – it's emulated brilliantly.
The oddest thing about Cozmic Collection Arcade is its lack of extras, so to speak; there are training modes for each game that let you play fully-powered and select your stage. This way you can check out those later levels that you may never see in normal gameplay. Besides this and the expected options menus, there's no galleries or anything to put the games into historical context, aside from a short blurb next to each one in the main menu.
Darius Cozmic Collection Arcade is a good compilation and the titles included are of a high quality, but as comprehensive as it is, it's still a little limited for the price. Enthusiasts, however, will be delighted by it.
Comments 10
Darius games are good. More Darius games in one place is better.
Putting pointless variations of Darius games, spread out across two carts and charging almost $100 for them should be considered a war-crime.
Did the guys in their boardroom meeting basically think “yeah, those guys at Konami are tools. They only charged around $20 for their compilations...”
Can't believe how much I still love this whole series. I double dipped and am now waiting for my Western version of the game to arrive. Really happy with the news of both G and Burst Chronicles making the jump to the Switch later this year. I am abit concern if Burst will include all the (truly expensive!) DLC, but that is something to worry about later.
Anyway, have some Zuntata to brighten your day while reading Stuart's review.
Sweet time perhaps?
No mention of the branching paths?
It seems to be a Taito thing. They not only hide some games behind the paywall that represents the collector's edition, but even the standard edition comes with no extras and a price noticeably higher than other classic collections.
And that's true with Darius Cozmic Collection and also with Space Invaders Invincible Collection.
Saying "Included variations of Sagaia adjust both the difficulty and the order you visit the levels, but none of them are huge change-ups." is a bit misleading. Though that is mostly the case for Sagaia ver 1 (though the stages in the final cluster are brand new), all of the levels in Sagaia ver 2. are brand new.
I think I downloaded these old roms about 20 years ago for free. I remember Darius Burst being too expensive to warrant a purchase when it was on psp. Hopefully one day, there will be a way of playing this without the experience being dampened by feeling like a total mug who has just been robbed.
I love that triple screen!!!
@Moistnado
That price definitely justifies emulation.
It's such a wonderful collection, the Space Invaders Invincible Collection is great too, can't wait for Cozmic Revelation with G Darius and Dariusburst!
I was waiting (a long time) for a sale, finally happened yesterday!
Darius gaiden deserves a full review, by itself, and easily justifies the cost of the entire package. this review completely glazes over it, but this is a HUGE game with incredible variety and replayability. branching paths a la starfox (but with more levels) means you could play this game many times and still not see every single level, and the challenge is perfectly balanced, it's not nearly as hard as some hardcore shooters you might've played.
also the bosses are incredible, and if you are a music person these tunes will haunt you (in a good way) forever after.
I had this on Saturn back in the day, and I'm so excited to have it again! 9/10.
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