Darius Gaiden, part of Taito Corporation's Darius series, was initially an arcade game (1994), then a Sega Saturn title (1996), then ported to Microsoft Windows and PlayStation platforms (1999).

The lush faux 3D backgrounds, frantically gyrating enemies, demented music, fully tripped-out fish-themed enemies and an eye-popping color scheme combine to deliver a wildly screwy Japanese shooter experience. There's a moment on the underwater level (one of the branching paths after the first level) when the operatic Zuntata score coincides with the initial appearance of a writing, multi-jointed starfish creature in a submarine field of missile-firing fauna which beautifully encapsulates this game's seductive, fever-dream appeal: It's very, very weird.

Darius Gaiden suffers from the impossibly-hard-boss syndrome to the point where the main strategy is to hoard as many smart-bombs as possible for the boss encounters. Some of these missile swarms seem absolutely un-dodgeable--at least on the "normal" difficulty setting. A handy device to have is a Pro Action Replay cartridge, which has some Darius G. cheats (like infinite credits) available to less-skilled players.