I thoroughly enjoy playing old-school arcade shooters. I am awful at them but I love trying to conquer them! One series that has caught my eye recently with the release of the Sega Genesis Mini was Taito’s Darius. I vaguely remember playing through one of the Super Nintendo entries back in the day but that was about as far as my experience with it went. With the Genesis port of the first game being this new thing, I was curious to give it a try and sure enough, I sucked at it! Even still, I found it to be a fun game and I was eager to explore more of the franchise. Luckily for me, the Darius Cozmic Collection is a thing and is an easy way to experience most of the classic entries of the franchise!

Story

The Darius System is under attack from vicious invaders. With nearly all their forces defeated, the people of Darius only have one hope remaining. That hope rests on the shoulders of 2 brave pilots who must overcome insurmountable odds to defend their home!

Gameplay

The Darius Cozmic Collection compiles a number of early Darius titles together across 2 volumes, with one being focused on arcade entries and the other, home console. Each part of the compilation features a number of Darius games and a number of their versions and regional variants. On the Arcade side there is Darius (Darius Old Version, Darius New Version, and Darius Extra Version), Darius II and it’s altered international release Sagaia (Darius II Dual Screen Version, Sagaia V1, and Sagaia V2), and finally Darius Gaiden, giving us a total of 7 variations across 3 games. For the console compilation the games included are Darius II (Darius II Mega Drive, Sagaia Sega Genesis, and Sagaia Sega Master System), Darius Force (Darius Force Super Famicom, and Supernova Super Nintendo), Darius Twin (Darius Twin Super Famicom, Darius Twin Super Nintendo), Darius Alpha (PC Engine), and Darius Plus (PC Engine), resulting in 9 revisions for 5 games.

The gameplay remains fairly similar across each of the included titles. As the player, it is your job to blast your way through swarms of enemies and defeat a powerful boss at the end. Along the way, you can earn power-ups that will increase your ship’s weaponry and provide defensive shields. In some of the titles, dying resets these upgrades while in others it doesn’t. Regardless, the key to victory is staying alive and so far I have only managed to do that in a few of the arcade versions, since the coin counter gives you unlimited lives! Each game included in the collections have played absolutely beautifully with the experts at M2 handling the conversions. I might even say they have outdone themselves when it comes to the multiscreen arcade conversions!

The original Darius release spanned three screens in its massive arcade cabinet. This 3 screen presentation is completely retained in the Cozmic Collection! The game does feature borders along the top and bottom due to the resolution but don’t think that space is wasted; quite the contrary! In this bordered area are a number of optional displays that can be brought up, like score, upgrade levels, and a boss HP counter! It is a cool use for what would be unused space otherwise and I like it a lot. Like I said a second ago though, if you don’t want these displays they can all be disabled at any time in the options menu.

Speaking of options, the usual settings you have come to know and love as part of these retro compilations are all present in the Darius Cozmic Collection. Save states are supported, along with a number of video options I will talk more about in the visuals section of the review. What I have had a blast messing with is the slew of options for the arcade releases. Arcade games back in the day would utilize a series of dip switches to adjust things like difficulty and lives. In the Darius Cozmic Collection Arcade compilation, these options are free to mess with and can dramatically alter the experience to make it easier or harder! Controller and audio settings can also be changed to suit player preference.

I want to highlight one cool feature M2 has brought to the arcade releases of Darius and Darius II I want to highlight. In the original arcade machines, special subwoofers were installed into the bench where players would sit. As the player would fly around or get hit the subwoofer would be activated giving the player vibration to increase immersion. What M2 has done for these new console conversions is transfer these subwoofer signals into the controller’s rumble motors! The effect is an awesome one and I am happy such a little detail was given the attention to be included in the release.

Visuals

Each game in the Darius Cozmic Collection across both Arcade and Console compilations look true to their original presentations. The pixels are sharp and beautiful but a number of optional settings can be applied to smooth out the image or have scanlines added in. You can change the method of screen scaling with 1:1 pixels, fit to screen, and full screen being available. If you have a 21:9 monitor hooked up to your PS4/Switch, you can set the 3 screen Darius to fullscreen to stretch the image into 16:9, then use the display to stretch it again into 21:9, giving you an almost perfect way to play it! It isn’t quite right but a neat option to have regardless. Limitations of the hardware the games originally ran on are also emulated, resulting in sprite flickering and slowdowns during heavy scenes. It is something I like to see in compilations personally but it is likely to have a few detractors.

The main menu for both collections are very minimal and honestly wouldn’t be worth noting if it wasn’t for the description section for each title. These little blocks of text provide info about each of the games, including differences provided between the versions. For example, the Japanese release of Darius Twin only featured mono sound whereas the North American release was able to use a larger cart to get proper stereo sound. Fascinating stuff and something I love to learn about!

Audio

I love listening to the games in the Darius Cozmic Collection! Each music track, bullet, bomb, and explosion warp me back to the arcades of yesteryear where such noises were commonplace! Oddly though I found myself really loving the way the Sega Master System version of Sagaia sounded with its 8-bit sounds. It has no right to sound as good as it does to me, but here we are! Of course, the arcade releases sound the fullest and includes a great selection of music tracks to listen to as you blast through enemies.

Replayability

With so many versions of Darius to play through, the Cozmic Collection can keep players occupied for a number of hours. If you need more of a challenge, you can try to claim the number one spots in the online leaderboards!

What It Could Have Done Better

As much fun as I have had with the Darius Cozmic Collection, it is a fairly bare-bones release as far as bonus content is concerned. There aren’t any behind the scenes or museum type galleries discussing the games that have been featured in a number of recent retro compilations from other franchises. The short descriptions for each game in the main menu is all we get and it just makes me long for more. Maybe with the announced Darius Cozmic Collection 2 we can get this type of feature! I also hope that we might see the Genesis Mini port of Darius be freed from the mini hardware as it deserves a wider release. 

Players with a more passing interest in the titles might also be turned off by the price. Since the Darius Cozmic Collection is split into 2 parts (with the Arcade side costing $44.99 and the Console side costing $59.99) the combined total to get both comes out to over $100. Considering the number of entries in the series you are getting and factoring in the individual costs of the console versions alone, it isn’t a bad deal, let alone the cost of finding the original arcade versions. For reference, Darius Alpha, which is included as part of the Console compilation, is selling for around $2000 for an original PC Engine copy!

Verdict

I have been loving having the chance to finally get familiar with the Darius franchise. With the Darius Cozmic Collection you get easy, and relatively affordable, access to so many different versions of the games with each having their own unique qualities. With the conversions handled by M2, every detail of the originals is brought over intact and complete with even the smallest features many wouldn’t have noticed. There is a sad lack of bonus content for my tastes but it isn’t a deal-breaker. If you are a diehard fan of the franchise these compilations are a no-brainer to add to your Switch or PS4 library! Looking past the seemingly high price reveals real value and a new way to experience some truly great shooters.