I Always Wanted A Thing Called Darius II Commentary

[@TaraRaeDev]

I love your channel so much!! Great run! STG Never Die!

[@hazylevels]

Yay! Thanks! Shooting game neva die!

[@TheCrewExpendable]

RTX raytracing: pff whatever Darius 12:3 aspect ratio: This is so technically impressive! The future of gaming!

[@hazylevels]

No joke the first two Darius game still look weird and futuristic to me 🔮✨

[@aubanurmi]

new hazy dropped❤

[@hazylevels]

🐠💛

[@whatamalike]

Woo! I also tried to get into darius 2 but struggled so far for the reasons you're outlining. Stay cute ❤

[@hazylevels]

Definitely try easy mode! Cute mode also helps, at least in keeping morale up.

[@jermanator181]

You have reached my “insta clear” tier of KZbinrs. Your commentary is perfect brain fuzz. Thank you for this one!

[@hazylevels]

Aww, thanks so much!

[@thefractalcactus]

Nice clear. You really locked in there at the end. I'm looking forward to the Batrider video.

[@hazylevels]

Thanks!

[@Misanola]

Darius is my favorite shmup series but I'm not masochistic enough to attempt a 1cc on the first two titles. Awesome work and great commentary, btw.

[@hazylevels]

Thanks! Darius 1 is pretty accessible if you do the trick of not upgrading past missiles, but I can understand leaving the early stuff be.

[@Misanola]

@@hazylevels I've spent a lot of time with the early ones but by the time I learned of the tricks I was pretty burned out. I'll go back eventually. I also wanted to try a 1cc of the 3 screen variant but it's by Hamster so it doesn't have a quick-save/load feature.

[@M_Knight_Jul]

Congrats on the clear! And glad to know the STG Weekly episode helped you get back into it Accidentally going into Zone X and clearing regardless is crazy haha, nicely done. And your assessment on Leadain VS Yamato (raw difficulty VS randomness) is spot-on Oh yeah for the recovery rainbow powerup, it appears in later stages if you have 1 or 0 lives remaining and destroy a powerup formation. It's possible to get it consistently if you can fulfill the conditions. Prickly Angler uses it in his routes for Very hard difficulty for example.

[@hazylevels]

Yes, I'm not sure I would have picked up the game again without the STG weekly video, so huge thanks for that! I learned a lot listening to you talk and in general started to appreciate Darius II more. And that's really good to know about the rainbow power up, as it can provide that last bit of oomph when trying to limp to the finish 😅🏁

[@M_Knight_Jul]

@@hazylevels As you explained, Darius 2 is an acquired taste so it makes sense it had to take some time, effort, and outside influence to pick it up again!

[@TheHiddenFortress81]

I’ve been off the grid pretty much cause I just moved out of Los Angeles across the country. And my game stuff is finally starting to get plugged in. Been craving some schmuping badly! Can’t wait to watch your videos that I missed! :)

[@hazylevels]

Wow, that sounds like quite the undertaking! Take your time, shmups aren't going anywhere.

[@js200gb]

Great commentary, as always! I didn’t know about the difficulty setting. So that’s why the game kicked my butt so bad by stage 4 or so. I will try again on the other setting and turn those 🐟 into 🍣! As for Darius 1, I still have trouble with some of the later bosses. I’m doing something wrong. I even choose the easiest routes. I’d like to see your play through. BTW, nice shirt. Reminds me bit of the XBox 360 game Sakura Flamingo Archives cover art. Looking forward to Batrider!

[@hazylevels]

Thanks for the nice comment as always! Yes, with Darius II you can blame the game and not yourself 🤠 definitely try the easier setting and see how it feels. As for Darius 1, there's some jank to it too, where you actually don't want to upgrade your weapons past a certain point or the game will get way harder... Check out my Darius 1 video if you're interested in the details.

[@VinuShmup]

Hi Hazy, amazing clear and comments as always! It's interesting you explain why you played on Easy and your autofire setup. About the difficulty I think it was the era of R-Type 2, Gradius III, Darius 2 etc. Super hard games because Japanese STG players were so damn good lol. The game is gorgeous even if I prefer the music of Darius Gaiden.

[@hazylevels]

Hi Vinu, thanks for watching! That's a good point about that era of games, some really scary titles in there :) even the Shmuplations interview mentions that players were getting too good. And yes, the music in Darius Gaiden is exquisite! I enjoy this one, but aesthetically Gaiden is on another level.

[@Sorrowful000]

If you ever feel in the mood for more Darius II I highly recommend giving the second version of Sagaia (which is included in the Arcade Cozmic Collection) a try. While the first version of Sagaia is just a condensed version of Darius II the second version is actually really interesting, it has its own levels with new layouts and scenery, modified bosses and lots of visual variety. It's also even harder than Darius II, I laughed when I saw how fast and vicious Red Crab is in that game.

[@hazylevels]

That's so weird how many different versions they made, and even with new content it seems! I'll keep it in mind if I get the old school Darius urge again, thanks. Though I think I'll be playing G-Darius next.

[@thiagoaraujos]

I love your videos, thanks! Just OOC, what controls do you prefer, d-pad, arcade stick, or analog stick?

[@hazylevels]

Thanks for watching! As for your question, you may want to have a look at my previous video :)

[@thiagoaraujos]

@@hazylevels Oh, I can't believe I missed that one! Thanks

[@morsalty]

Hell yeah! Congrats 🎉 I'm sure you can get a B rank clear after this if you wanted

[@hazylevels]

Ty! I might come back to the B Rank at some point, but right now the unknown waters of G-Darius call to me more 🐙

[@morsalty]

@@hazylevels oooo Going for G is certainly the better call, I think it's the best in the series

[@xhblue]

I wish I could like this video more than once! I need to try more of these horizontal classics. Side note, have you seen that Yuzo Koshiro is currently developing a shmup for the Sega Genesis? It gives me those classic shmup vibes. It's called Earthion.

[@hazylevels]

I appreciate the sentiment

[@xhblue]

@@hazylevels Yes! I'm excited to hear the soundtrack when it releases

[@TheHiddenFortress81]

I have this one sitting on my shelf for Switch. Not sure why i picked up the Switch version….anyway, now I cant wait to jump into Darius 2. That game looks nasty. But so cool looking and sounding. I would definitely try out easy mode with the pcb rapid fire…i should probably give myself more of a break from Ketsui hah. Haha that boss fight in zone S with no power-ups was pretty dope. Also i think you referred to yourself as an average player, humble and commendable, but in my opinion you are easily above average. :)

[@hazylevels]

It's definitely a game with an attitude, you need to be in the mood for some old school nastiness 😅 and yes, get ready for that zone S octopus... But it's a pretty cool experience too. Have you tried Darius Gaiden yet (assuming you have the Cozmic Collection)?

[@TheHiddenFortress81]

@@hazylevels Okay so, often I will buy a game that I don’t get to play for a while because I’m always kinda worried it will go out of print because I’m old and that used to happen (i still love physical media). I have not really played the Cozmic Collection yet BUT! I do have Darius Gaiden for the Saturn, and I have played it on that console. I haven’t played it though in years. As far as the old school stuff goes, i really like many of them. Raiden is still one of my favorites and it is a vicious game as I’m sure you know. Like, your gameplay of Darius 2 was full of bullets that exist on screen for really just a few frames before they would hit you. That dodging was pretty insane. Once your guns are gone…that’s just gnarly haha. Also, one of the things i personally think make a good gaming channel good, is when i watch a video and it makes we want to play that game. Your channel has that strength.

[@TheHiddenFortress81]

So anyway, i started getting down on Ketsui again. Question. Sorry off topic. Are there 2 extends you can get in stage5? Im not playing for score but i feel like i got an extra life for points (besides the one i get in stage 3 for points) and the extra life for destroying the two ships without bombing….are there 2 extends in stage5? If so…i MIGHT be starting to get close to a 1cc if i can learn stage 5. I havent really started practicing stage 5 yet. But i can get there with two lives sometimes, plus if there are 2 extends i might be close.

[@hazylevels]

@@TheHiddenFortress81 Yeah, no need to hurry about playing these games, they're not going anywhere. I haven't played a huge amount of older shmups, but I do know Raiden by reputation 😅 something about the Darius series drew me in despite the punishing quirks of the gameplay. In Ketsui, you get two score-based and two hidden extends. The hidden ones are in stage 3 (the battleship) and 5 (the two helicopters before the midboss). So no, you only get one hidden 1-up in St5... But if you've already managed to get there with a couple of lives to spare, things are looking good for you! The final stage is by far the toughest, but that tiny hitbox is really helpful in getting some lucky dodges in, even when you're sure you're toast :) Happy to hear that my channel makes you want to play these games, cause that's why I started it in the first place!

[@KingFossilFER]

sorry if this was already mentioned on the darius gaiden video, but you can manually shoot faster by tapping, so you can for a moment tap really fast to get a better ROF. Also you should check DGaiden runs of MathUDX since I think he has the only 1CC runs on youtube beating the game witht he default autofire. Also check out Super Darius 1&2 for PCengine. They are pretty cool ports of the first two games with a bunch of new bosses.

[@hazylevels]

Hey there, thanks for the recommendations! Yeah I know about rapid tapping, but it's not something I ever do because it's just not good for your hands... Also, I don't think there is an issue with Gaiden's default autofire per se, it's just pretty bad for late game recovery. That's why default autofire Gaiden clears seem to often be no miss runs, which is a little limiting imo. Thankfully there's different options to experiment with for all of these games!

[@KingFossilFER]

@@hazylevels yeah its hard on the hands for sure. Even then, I think it wouldnt even be needed as you find out safe spot and how to dodge other things.

[@hazylevels]

Yes, safe spots are definitely a big part of these slightly older shmups! And admittedly I'm sometimes lazy about learning them :)

[@KewieCRC420]

Zuntana ftw.

[@hazylevels]

Yup, the music rules!