BY ALPER ÖZKAN (MSN/PhD)
d_ozkan@ug.bilkent.edu.tr
The oceans have always been a source of fascination for us landlubbing apes, and certainly inspired a great number of naturalists, writers, poets and game developers through the ages—and although my very favorite poem is about a sea animal (This is the ship of pearl, which, poets feign/Sails the unshadowed main…), it should go without saying that my interests are aligned largely with that last demographic. Few things make me happier than seeing some underappreciated marine animal in a game, and this week will be about a game series that made me very happy indeed—the “Darius” series of shoot-‘em-ups has featured everything from gulper eels to goblin sharks, all available for your fighter, Silver Hawk (in fact only one of many Silver Hawks; the unit is mass-produced), to shoot down.
So without further ado, here are my five favorite Darius bosses—it took longer to sort them out than to write this column. I should also say that you are encouraged to have Google handy, or, just go ahead and check out the dedicated wiki for the series.
5. Yamato
The Yamato, of course, is the largest battleship ever built (alongside the Musashi, and the Shinano, if you want to count it), holding onto that honor since World War II (mostly because battleships are no longer produced today—World War II was the swan song of the battleship, with the nuclear submarine and the aircraft carrier now occupying its former throne). Its in-game incarnation is one of the select few Darius bosses that live up to the “huge battleship” name (the rest are certainly huge, but only ostensibly ships), but it doesn’t put up much of a fight—it’s only when you defeat the ancient war relic that all hell breaks loose. Now, those familiar with shooting games will know that their bosses come in phases, and Yamato’s second phase involves the ship breaking into three and a hermit crab emerging from one of the sections. This hermit crab then starts dragging around a large chunk of the biggest battleship ever built and gunning for you while you’re all slack-jawed from what just happened. I must also note here that this is not the only hermit crab that lives in a derelict war machine; “Metal Slug 3” features one that commandeers a tank.
4. Titanic Lance
What looks like a gigantic, robotic belemnite is in fact more of a gigantic, robotic orthocone (or so says the web guide I’m using), and one of the more impressive bosses in “Darius Gaiden.” Now, these animals have an interesting way of living: unlike a snail, a nautiloid dwells in only the last chamber of its shell. As it grows, it closes over its previous chamber and moves to the next, filling its previous home with buoyant gas to stay afloat. This bit of information makes the Titanic Lance fight all the sweeter—you’re up against the entire life history of the animal (well, Belserian spaceship), starting at the tip of its shell and destroying your way through the chambers until you reach (and destroy) its head. Each segment has a unique way of shooting you down, from curving lasers and screenwide beams to jellyfish bombs and symbiotic remora. One septum even turns into a nacre-coated iron maiden and tries to crush you, in between salvos of electric mines.
3. Accordion Hazard
The other thing “Darius” is known for is the amazing names some of these bosses have, and Accordion Hazard competes with the likes of Crusty Hammer (mantis shrimp), Fatty Glutton (piranha), Risk Storage (gulper eel) and Curious Chandelier (siphonophore colony, I think). I am rather disappointed that the alien robot Anomalocaris isn’t formed as a combination of robotic sponge, shrimp and jellyfish (if I ever get to design a super robot, it’s definitely going to be that—it reflects how Anomalocaris was discovered, since someone actually put together those three fossils to produce the complete animal), especially since the goblin shark boss, Eternal Triangle, is in fact a combination of three distinct fish, but Accordion Hazard is beautifully rendered and has an arsenal of rather nasty attacks—its eyes emit lasers, its mouth shoots a rainbow-colored, incredibly fast beam in addition to curving lasers, and its claws are the source of its Beta Beam, a large torrent of energy that must be countered in time with your own Alpha Beam.
2. Hysteric Empress
See what I told you about the names? Hysteric Empress is a Japanese spider crab, the largest crustacean alive (it’s rather spindly, but a leg span nearing four meters is nothing to scoff at), and her stint as a final boss is dominated by two quirks: her ridiculous claw dance and the fact that she can leap off the screen, invariably crashing back on top of your Silver Hawk. Her Highness also attacks you by exuding bubbles (this is mainly a feature of fiddlers and other shore-dwelling crabs, but has somehow gotten extended to every crab in existence) and by spawning a series of adorable baby crabs, although the fight soon becomes less than adorable when the crablings also start to foam. Incidentally, the Japanese spider crab does in fact show parental care, although the eggs hatch into the typical crab larvae, the zoeae, instead of tiny versions of the adult. The creature is also much less ornery than its robotic counterpart, relying on its spines and long legs to deter predators while leisurely searching the ocean floor for burrowing animals and edible plant matter.
1. The Embryon
Okay, I’m running out of space, so let’s make this quick. The Embryon is a giant shapeshifting sea angel that has a samurai helmet inside its head (which kind of defeats the point of a helmet, now that I think about it), and a giant eye in its stomach. Sea angels, as you may remember from earlier columns, are as elegant as they are vicious, their claim to fame being the spiny tentacles that can emerge in a flash from their otherwise cute, cat-like heads, and although the Embryon doesn’t produce any buccal appendages, the very fact that a sea angel is the final boss of a shoot-‘em-up game is plenty for me.
Lastly, it is very much recommended that you play the games, should you get your hands on them. The bosses discussed here have been mostly from “Darius Gaiden” and “G-Darius,” the latter of which also boasts a very popular soundtrack.