Darius II is a 1989 arcade video game developed by Taito. It is the direct sequel to the 1987 Darius. It was later released as Sagaia in Japan in 1991 for the Game Boy as well as non-Japanese ports. A remake was released for the PC Engine Super CD-ROM as Super Darius II in 1993. A Mega Drive conversion was released in Japan in 1990; it was later released for the Genesis in the United States and Brazil in 1991, where it was renamed Sagaia. Changes include a boss rush mode (via a code) and various modifications to levels and mechanics, such as the boss Steel Spine being moved to another level and the boss Killer Higia being replaced with a similar creation called Nehonojia. This conversion does not support two players, so the ability to choose between Proco Jr. and Tiat Young was added; Proco plays like normal, while Tiat starts every life off with one power level to every weapon. A Master System conversion, developed by Natsume, was released in Europe and Brazil in 1992, also titled Sagaia. It is somewhat based on the Mega Drive port, and while Tiat Young and her abilities are still present (though even more limited), many zones (and thus bosses) have been completely removed. The Super CD-ROM version features an entirely new set of bosses, major changes to levels, and a fully arranged soundtrack including new songs.
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Unfortunately the downsides are the aforementioned momentum based gameplay, enemies and projectiles appearing suddenly with no reasonable way to react to them without knowing they're there beforehand (as most enemies shooting don't make sounds here), and the frame rate dropping frequently. Extra shoutouts to Grand Octopus, who makes you play in single digit frames per second until you take out two of its tentacles. And this somehow made it to release.
I'm sure the arcade version is superior but I rank what I played, and what I played wasn't terrible, and likely tried its best to capture the feeling of its arcade counterpart.
Played A-C-D-F-G-I-L
Fun but somehow feels even more brutal than its predecessor at times with how quarter-munchy it is. As much as I like that the death penalty is less harsh for an already difficult game, it still seems unnecessarily heavy for how well-statted both bosses and midgame to lategame enemies are.
It looks and sounds quite a lot better, but a few of the gripes I had with how the first game felt to play do remain here. The movement is a bit too slow and the weapon upgrades sometimes threw me off by messing with my muscle memory, though they didn't feel quite as inconsistent as in the first game.
This game, while a solid upgrade, still doesn't quiiiite feel like the series has come into its own yet. In particular it feels as if the bosses and minibosses are somewhat inconsistent in difficulty once again while the levels are getting pretty close to feeling properly balanced, so I'm hoping the next entry will finally get to a point where they either nail both or come close to doing so.