Darius II

Darius II is a 1989 arcade video game by Taito. It is the direct sequel to Darius, first released in arcades in 1989. The arcade version kept the same three-screen format as the first game. The power-up system changed slightly: to obtain power-ups, the player had to destroy complete waves of a particular enemy.

Story
Darius II Takes place sometime after the first Darius game; the colonized planet Darius is recuperating from its invasion from the alien Belser Army thanks to that game's heroes Proco and Tiat. The Darius inhabitants have since situated themselves on the planet Olga while Darius' societies, architecture and attacked areas were being repaired. The space flight Headquarters established on Olga picks up an SOS signal coming from the Earth where the first colonists of Darius originated before colonizing Darius; the signal included the description of alien ships similar to that of the Belser Army. Suspecting that these might be their remaining Earthling ancestors, the people of Darius sends both Proco Jr. and Tiat Young to help them.

Description
This game contains the red, green and blue items, as in almost all Darius series and they do the same functions (the red powers up the shots, the green powers up the bombs and the blue regenerates and powers up the arm shield).

This game has the following 2 weaknesses in comparison with the rest of the Darius games: The first one is that there are no power up bars from first game. This implies that if you died, you'll lose all power ups and you'll return to lowest missile, lowest bomb and no laser. The second one is that the shots don't pierce through the enemies, which implies that the player cannot destroy an enemy unless they first destroys the enemies in front of it.

Two new power-ups were added: a golden item containing a new weapon power-up which gives the player green, vertical lasers that do pierce through enemies, and a rainbow-colored item that upgrades all the players weapons. The game is set in the inner half of the Solar system, and has the same branching level structure as Darius.

Another great difference between the power ups on Darius II and the rest of the Darius series (except Super Darius II and Darius Twin) is that on Darius II, the player must destroy a complete formation of 8 certain unarmed ship types in order to get a power up.

Another new feature in Darius II is the appearance of minibosses named captains- large enemies that appear near the middle of a level, with similar abilities to the game's normal bosses (such as extravagant weapons, or the inability to be damaged without first exposing a vulnerable area). The captains in Darius II are in fact smaller versions of the bosses from Darius.

Stages, Captains and Bosses
The original Darius II has the following captains and bosses.

Stage 1: Sun. Captain: King Fossil (coelecanth). Boss: Hyper Sting (lionfish)

Stage 2: Mercury. Captain: Green Coronatus (sea horse). Bosses: Both of Mercury's zones have two bosses in succession. The first boss for both is Alloy Lantern (anglerfish). After Alloy Lantern is defeated, the player(s) will enter its interior to fight Steel Spine (porcupine fish) in B, or Killer Hijia (mackerel) in C.

Stage 3: Venus. Captain: Fatty Glutton (piranha) Boss: Drio Sawm (moray eel)

Stage 4: Moon. Captain: Cuttlefish. Boss: Red Crab (fiddler crab).

Stage 5: Earth. Captain: Strong Shell (sea turtle). Boss: Yamato (an hermit crab taking over the actual Japanese battleship with the same name) in K, M, and O, Leadain (sea urchin) in L and N.

Stage 6: Mars. Captain: Octopus. Boss: Grand Octopus

Stage 7: Jupiter. Captains: Green Coronatus and Fatty Glutton in V and Z', King Fossil and Strong Shell in the rest of the areas. Boss: There are three possible bosses. In Z', X, and V', the boss is Bio Strong (a foetus of an undetermined species). In V and Z, Mother Hawk (a gigantic Belser replica of the Silver Hawk). In W and Y, Little Stripes (angelfish).

The TurboGrafx CD version of the game, Super Darius II, included enough new battleships, many of them adapted from Darius and Super Darius, to give each zone its own captain.


 * Stage Sun: Captain: King Fossil. Boss: Golden Eyes (Bigeye snapper)


 * Stage Mercury:


 * Zone B: Captain: Guard Sauvage (Tiger shark). Boss: B-Guadian (Garden eel)


 * Zone C: Captain: Hyper Sting. Boss: Killer Hijia.


 * Stage Venus: Bosses: Revenge Shark (Whale shark) in D and E, Deep Dragon (Weedy sea dragon) in F.


 * Zone D: Captain. Big Rajarnn (stingray).


 * Zone E: Captain: Little Stripes.


 * Zone F: Captain: Fatty Glutton.:


 * Stage Moon: Bosses: Crab Armer (Horseshoe crab) in G and I, Bald Crab (Arrow crab) in H and J


 * Zone G: Captain: Steel Spine.


 * Zone H: Captain: Drio Sawm.


 * Zone I: Captain: Burst Out (Puffer fish).


 * Zone J: Captain: Red Crab.


 * Stage Earth: The bosses in this stage are the same as the original Darius II (see above).


 * Zone K: Captain: A nameless sea moth.


 * Zone L: Captain: Strong Shell.


 * Zone M: Captain: Cuttlefish.


 * Zone N: Captain: a nameless Sawfish


 * Zone O:Captain: Keen Bayonet (swordfish)


 * Stage Mars: Boss: Dark Modon (Black swallower)


 * Zone P: Captain: A nameless Sea serpent.


 * Zone Q: Captain: Mystic Power (Chambered nautilus).


 * Zone R: Captain: Fire Star (starfish).


 * Zone S: Captain: Iron Hammer (Hammerhead shark).


 * Zone T: Captain: Buddy Blazer (Dragonfish)


 * Zone U: Captain: My Home Daddy (another hermit crab).


 * Stage Jupiter: Bosses: Heat Arrow (Ocean sunfish) in Z' and Z, Moderato (Oarfish) in X and V', Mechanical Bio Strong in the remaining zones.


 * Zone Z': Captains: Dual Shears (Lobster) and a nameless Flying fish.


 * Zone V: Captains: Great Thing (Sperm whale) and a nameless flounder.


 * Zone W: Captains: a nameless White Shark and a nameless Suckerfish.


 * Zone X: Captain: Green Coronatus. (this is the only area of the Jupiter stage that has only one captain)


 * Zone Y: Captains: Alloy Lantern and Hard Mollusc (portuguese man-o'-war).


 * Zone Z: Captains: Octopus and another nameless flounder.


 * Zone V': Captains: Electric Fan (Sea anemone) and Tough Spring (shrimp)

Ports
Darius II was ported to the Mega Drive/Genesis, Sega Master System in 1990, and was renamed Sagaia. It was later ported to the Sega Saturn in 1996. The main difference between this port and the original Darius II is a boss named Nehonojia (a mackerel skeleton) which exists only in Sagaia, on the X area.