Darius Gaiden

Darius Gaiden is a two-dimensional shoot'em up. The player controls a spaceship called Silver Hawk and must steer it through scrolling levels, destroying enemies and avoiding obstacles. The ship is armed with forward-firing missiles, aerial bombs and a protective force field, all of which can be upgraded by various power-ups dropped by specially colored enemies when destroyed by the player. New to the Silver Hawk's arsenal in Darius Gaiden is the "Black Hole Bomb." When fired, it creates a large vortex in the center of the screen that sucks in enemies and projectiles for a brief moment until it explodes in a powerful lightning ball that deals massive damage to all enemies on the screen. Another feature that Darius Gaiden has introduced is the possibility of catching minibosses that appear in each stage. On top of each miniboss is a small, circular ball that detaches when the miniboss has taken enough damage and floats away. When the player collects the orb, the miniboss follows and helps the player. After a short period of time, or if the player loses a life, the miniboss explodes. A few months after the release, an update was released for the arcade version called "Darius Gaiden Extra Edition". This version of the arcade game includes redesigned levels, as well as automatically activated auto fire, two additional weapon powers (a larger wave shot and a larger red wave shot), and an all-stage mode that can be accessed by starting the game on the 2P side.