So, you've finally gotten around to purchasing this game, and you find yourself overwhelmed by a bunch of projectiles all over the screen, all flinging at you. Where do you go from here? You have two options:

One. Spam rapid fire at all the fish and keep credit feeding until you reach the end.

Two. Take the time to absorb everything that comes towards you, learn how to approach every section, and anticipate every move the enemy makes and counter them all with your cunning.

The first method is the easy route, but it is not nourishing. Perhaps it is useful for simply getting a feel of the Silver Hawk's movement, but panicked dodging and firing will not get you far on a single credit. To truly reap the rewards of victory, you must use the second method. But in order to succeed, you must have the proper discipline. When you get hit, this question must come to mind: Why did the fish bite off your arm? You must be able to answer the question... many times.

Now, if you haven't already, you should first play the game as you would to get a grip on the movement and firing controls. Otherwise, you won't understand anything I'm talking about. Those who rise to glory do so by first falling. I will describe the essential mechanics in the immediate next section in case they are not immediately obvious.

Getting to know the Silver Hawk is imperative to your success. As G-Darius is an STG, you should immediately know that it is all about firing straight ahead of your ship. Now, let's take a look at how the Silver Hawk shoots...


The Silver Hawk has three forms of forward fire. The one you start with is the missile. While it starts off narrow, it quickly grows wider as you upgrade it by collecting red powerups, which are contained in red-colored enemies.



Missiles can destroy enemies, obviously, but they are destroyed upon making contact with an enemy, destructible projectile, or terrain. Because only a limited number of your projectiles can exist on the screen at a time, some speedrunners may prefer this weapon to maximize shot output.


Upon collecting seven red powerups, the Silver Hawk is upgraded with the laser weapon. This weapon is capable of piercing through enemies and destructible projectiles, but is destroyed upon colliding with terrain. While very powerful at higher levels, it is always quite narrow, so it is not ideal to get stuck with this weapon for longer than you need to.


The most powerful type of weapon is the wave shot, which can pierce through almost everything, including enemies, destructible projectiles, and terrain. Even at its lowest level, wave shots are pretty wide, and at the highest level, it is extremely effective at clearing out enemies to your side. About the only thing it cannot pierce through is Refnite, a strange, indestructible, rainbow-colored polygon - more on that later.


The bomb is the Silver Hawk's auxiliary, gravity-propelled form of fire, often useful for attacking ground units. You strengthen it by picking up green-colored powerups.


To upgrade the bomb weapon, you only need to collect four green powerups. As with the forward fire, there are three tiers here: the initial single bomb, twin, and multi. Twin bombs is what the name implies; you fire two bombs at once, one down right, and another up right. Multi does this as well as firing two additional bombs behind you, which is really important for attacking enemies behind you.



Now, Arm in this context is not a weapon, but a shield that protects you from enemy fire in all directions. Depending on the tier, it can take a certain number of hits at maximum. This shield is repaired by collecting blue powerups. The amount of hits recovered depends also depends on the tier.

• Normal - 3 hits, 1 repair
  
• Super - 4 hits, 2 repair
  
• Hyper - 5 hits, 3 repair

There are some things to keep in mind here. For one, the arm barrier does not protect against terrain collision to my knowledge, except in the Hyper tier. Also, because collecting a blue powerup in the normal tier only adds one hit to an existing barrier, you should try to get hit once if your shield has only one hit left and then pick up the powerup if at all possible, because picking one up with no shield equipped always gives you three hits right off the bat.

Furthermore, blue powerups are disprportionately scared compared to red and green powerups, hence you cannot entirely rely on the arm barrier to survive. This is where something else comes into play, as described in the next section.

Last but not least, if you lose your ship, each of your levels are reset to zero, but you do keep any higher tier weapons you may have. Recovery is very much doable to some degree, but for best results, you should try to run through the game on a single life as much as you can.

The signature mechanic of G-Darius is the ability to capture almost any enemy in the game, and exploit them to gain additional firepower and/or protection against enemy fire. If, when you see it in action, the first thing that comes to your mind is Pokemon, or, I don't know, Shin Megami Tensei II, you've got the right idea, although this is a much more abusive "use 'em and lose 'em" type of scenario.


As the opening message box reads, "use B button to capture enemies". Pressing the B button (or whatever your capture button is assigned to) fires a capture ball. If it hits an enemy, it's turned to your side. Don't worry if your capture ball misses; the count of capture balls you have only decrements when you capture an enemy.


You start off with three capture balls when you respawn. A purple powerup gives you an additional capture ball, and you can carry up to six at once. Trying to pick up more only awards you 5,000 points, which is measly compared to what you could gain from leveraging additional mechanics stemming from the capture system.

I'm not going to describe how every captured enemy works in this guide works, but as you go along, you'll figure out which ones best suit you. However, there are a few things you should know about them in general.

Many enemies are capable of absorbing projectiles for you, but all can only withstand a finite number of hits, so you should at least treat them with love and care before you coldly sacrifice them. The only exception to this rule is Refnite, the aforementioned rainbow polygon type thing which only appears in the fourth and fifth bosses. It cannot be destroyed, but it can be captured, making it invaluable for more risky tactics.

Some enemies will fire projectiles of their own, which are always colored green. When these projectiles destroy an enemy, you gain double the normal score for it, which is especially valuable when completing formations. Captures that destroy enemies by colliding with them also award double points, but your main firepower still only gives you the baseline score. Of course, this is entirely inconsequential to gameplay, as scoring does not award any extends (extra lives).


Captains, otherwise known as minibosses, require some additional involvement to capture. They're protected by a gold shield that needs to be destroyed with your normal firepower. You have to aim right at that gold piece; firing elsewhere at the body too much will destroy the captain. Once the shield is broken, the captain is ready to be captured.

Captains have even more firepower available in addition to what they fire by default. By performing a quick sequence of movements with the joystick, you can make the captain perform its special attack; the motion should be similar to what you'd find in fighting games, I think. If you are playing G-Darius HD, you can refer to a gadget for the specific movement combination you need for your captain.


When you have a captured enemy on hand, you have two means of disposing it. One is by simply detonating it by pressing the B (capture) button again. This is useful if you are in a pinch and need to discard an enemy right away or create a large barrier around yourself, perhaps to help you capture a captain. For scoring, however, it is objectively bad since it only gives a triple multiplier and does not last all that long.


A much more versatile way to discard an enemy is with the Alpha Beam, an absolutely insane stream of constant fire that obliterates almost everything in its path, including projectiles. At its baseline level, it gives you a quadruple multiplier.


You fire this beam by holding down your shot button (NOT rapid fire) for a brief moment until the enemy's energy is all charged up into some orb as depicted above. Keep it held down until you are ready to release the beam. When you release the beam, normally, it doesn't last very long, but if you rapidly tap the shot button (or hold rapid fire), you can significantly extend the duration of the beam.


This beam becomes even more powerful and awards even more points when you use it to counter a Beta Beam, colored red, which is fired by bosses at certain points. To counter a Beta Beam, you should have your alpha beam ready or active at the right moment. Move it right into the beta beam, and make sure you're holding rapid fire or pressing the fire button frequently. There, you can do some serious damage to the boss; without countering beams, fights can take a very, very long time. Turning a captain into an alpha beam automatically makes it worth a single counter, delivering a higher level of damage and a hextuple score multiplier.


There is one caveat, though. Any such gold pieces flying around, as well as the gold shields endowed by captains, CANNOT be destroyed by alpha beams, only your normal shots. As such, you have to be mindful of when and where you're beaming so as to not leave it to waste too much.

Now that you've read up on the functions of the Silver Hawk, it's time to put them to action!

Alright... now that you've started the game, the very first thing you'll want to do is capture the first enemy that comes up, officially known as "Rei NESIUM". This will split into two which provide some small firepower in the same direction as the Silver Hawk's own fire.


The very first formations will give you one of every powerup, equipping you with the bare minimum essentials you need to get going. If you missed any of them, that is a clear cut indicator that you messed up and need to reset. Missing any powerups can be detrimental to your run, really.

To get double score with Rei NESIUM, taking out most of the smaller enemies is trivial since they're one-hit wonders, but larger ones like the so-called "Rei SOID" take more hits, which the capture's bullets can't land on time. In the best case scenario, you'd use your main firepower to quickly weaken the enemy, then destroy it with the capture's bullets.


Pretty soon, you'll come across a divergence. The Darius series has been well noted for its branched zone structure, but G-Darius takes this a step further as it splits zones into different areas at the midpoint. To select an area, you move the Silver Hawk into one half of the screen and hold that position until the timer expires; the on-screen indicators make that self-explanatory.

There's also the first occurrence of an enemy barricaded by those gold pieces I was talking about earlier. As I said, you need to use your normal firepower to destroy them. This may look like the miniboss, but it's not.

Deciding which area to stick to doesn't simply add visual variety; it also affects which kinds of enemies you'll be up against, the terrain you may have to traverse, what powerups will be available, and what attacks the zone's boss will have. If you were to select Area B, you'd dive through an underwater cavern, acquire twin bombs, and get an extra unit for your arm barrier. However, this area has no captain and it doesn't have as many red powerups.

In general, I'd favor going to Area A, which is what this route will be using. From here, it'll seem like there's so many things flying at you all at once, but it's really not so bad. Enemies often fire in the direction which you're standing at, so a common STG technique known as tap-dodging, where you just move in a direction a little bit at a time, comes into play. Say you have space to move up to the top of the screen; if you were to scurry there right away, you might get cornered. But, if you quickly tap upwards for a split second, wait, and then tap up again, it should give you more room to evade the overall wave of attacks headed towards you.

But what's more important than that is memorizing where all the enemy formations will appear from. This may be difficult to do when you're first encountering them, so it helps a lot to record your gameplay. G-Darius HD has a built-in replay system, so if you don't have powerful enough recording equipment, you can use that function.


Assuming you haven't somehow wasted your initial capture already, here is a good place to charge your alpha beam: right after clearing the one formation coming from the top right and downward as you're about to rise above the arch. As you move up to the top left of the screen, hold down the regular shot button until you see a blue flash coming from the front of the Silver Hawk, then immedediately release and rapid fire to ensure your beam lasts long enough to clear out the following formations.


The end of this beam should line up perfectly with the entry of the first captain. When you move to the center, it will try to dodge you either up or down depending on where you're positioned. You can simply point blank its helmet until it breaks, and then capture it, as the homing missiles it fires can be destroyed by your normal fire.



Normally, this captain will shoot out homing missiles towards your enemies, but by performing a quick movement (down, down+right, right) followed by pressing the shot button, it will lock in place and fire a powerful wave laser. Basically, you'd have to make a quick, quarter-circular, counter-clockwise motion with some directional controls; an arcade stick is definitely the easiest to work with as the game was initially designed around that. Also be mindful to not let the captain get hit too much here.


This thing is easy. You could get away with just rapid firing at it or immediately beaming your captain for a quick kill, but it's not as rewarding. Remember, we love to do things the hard way.

Don't hold rapid fire here. Start off by slowly tapping the normal shot button just to destroy the little rockets that spew out of Eclipse Eye's jaws. You'll notice that one press of the shot button fires several bullets.


Once that pattern's finished, don't shoot. The boss will fire six times in three directions, aiming at where you were last standing. Move out of the way up or down a bit and stand there. Eclipse Eye will do this again two more times, adjusting its aim to your new location; again, dodge. It's good to try to help your captain avoid these shots as well, but it should be okay if it takes some hits from this as well. If, however, your captain is destroyed by this pattern, you may have caused it to ram into too many enemies earlier, or the other way around.


This next pattern is also straightforward. These wide, spinning projectiles can be destroyed by your shots, so slowly tap the shot button some more.


If you're really crafty, you can try to break off one of the eyes here as Eclipse Eye is about to turn around, either by tapping the shot button faster or using the First Captain's wave laser. It's not required, but it does give you some extra points.


This next pattern can be really dangerous for your captain, as these larger missiles will rapidly drain its energy if it is in contact with them. For this reason, I just try to create a few homing missiles, and right before the enemy's missiles enter the same layer as the Silver Hawk, I charge the alpha beam and keep it held down. From there, it's just a matter of evading the other missiles. They'll slowly move around trying to get into position, then rapidly charge at you in a fixed direction.


Do you see those red light rays closing in on Eclipse Eye? That means it's getting ready to fire a beta beam. You'll hear a distinct noise indicating this as well. It may take some time to get used to the timing, and you don't have to time your beam exactly with the start of its own, but when it fires, you'll want to release your beam, hold rapid fire, and get into the position of its beam. There, you've got yourself a double counter and secured victory!


From here, you can select the next zone. I've seen many players suggest the Lambda route (all top zones), but here I'll go on the Nu route, taking inspiration from Smraedis. Besides, Tripod Sardine is a very nice guy, and we wouldn't want his head to be blown off, would we???

I find it better to destroy the first two formations and then capture one from the third, comprised of another enemy "RYUKIN". This one is very similar to the first capture, but its bullets aim at an angle away from Silver Hawk's main fire, making shots more spread out. This is useful here since a lot of the formations here tend to show up from the very top and bottom sides of the screen.


Eventually, you'll start flying upwards at a 45 degree angle, and so your shots will be aiming in that direction. It's kind of awkward to get a grip on, but it's very brief.

You'll soon encounter this zone's captain, Queen's Child. When you're first fighting this, you may prefer to detonate your existing capture to get an opportunity to quickly break its shield. The explosion you create will protect you from its projectiles. They're mainly comprised of long lasers and large bullets spreading out, which should get easier to evade the more you learn how to move around them. It's the kind of stuff a written guide can't exactly teach you how to conquer.

When you're confident in your ability to outmaneuver its attacks, you can start using the alpha beam around here for higher scoring potential. When exactly to do so is something you'll have to decide for yourself. In my run, I fired around the time both of those spiky things showed up, but you may prefer to do it a little bit before the angle changes instead.


When captured, Queen's Child usually just fires dual lasers, but with a different movement combination (left, left+down, down, down+right, right), it can fire out a serious barrage of projectiles that will be of great help in the near upcoming boss fight. To put it simply, you perform a quick half-circular motion with the directional stick.


They're not joking when they say this is huge; it's practically an entire stage in its own right! An entire squadron of your comrades was obliterated, but don't be intimidated. You are positioned as the Doomguy equivalent of STG pilots, the only one who survives the literal hellfire. Rip and tear... and make it well done.


Select Area E. Not only is it easier to run through, it's also host to something really badass that you've just gotta see. Queen Fossil will start off firing with the turret in its tail; the lasers here are slow-moving, and it's easy to fit in between them. Destroy it quickly to get a red powerup. Using the captain's special attack will help.


These next three turrets can be speedkilled if you prefer to do that so as to immediately move to the next phase, but you'll be missing out on a green powerup that's found in a formation which would appear if the turrets are active and firing. Missing it is not terribly consequential since there's plenty more to pick up later on, but getting this one could leave you better off in the long run.

Therefore, I advise destroying only one or two turrets as soon as possible (using the normal shot button), then leaving the third intact until the green powerup arrives. Leaving all three turrets intact will leave you with a lot more projectiles to put up with, thereby putting your captain in bad shape by the end of the attack.

You REALLY have to be mindful of where you position your captain, though. If it is moved into Queen Fossil's body, its energy will drain rapidly, and it will very likely die before you have a chance to use it in a beam.


Next, Queen Fossil will start to throw fin blades at you. If you missed some of the turrets, this is a good opportunity to finish them before your ship turns around to the left. The first blade contains another green powerup. Since I have encountered an issue where the powerup won't appear if the blade is destroyed too soon, you should hold your fire. Wait for the first blade to come in at you from the left, and then shoot it. This should ensure that the powerup appears.


Following that, more missiles will be fired at you. Nothing crazy to it, just try to make your captain perform its special attack at the right time to destroy the lot of them.


The laser cannons at the top right are possibly the most menacing, as they don't give you too much legroom. You may want to try to destroy those first. The machine gun in the middle is also pretty nasty, but if you destroy it, it'll give you a blue powerup. Be careful about destroying the three turrets on the bottom. Destroying them obviously means less projectiles will clutter the screen, but the top right cannons will start shooting lasers that bend towards you are 90 degree angles. To avoid them, you'll have to move around in a circle until they exit the screen.


Another set of fin blades will be hurled. The third one contains a red powerup. In anticipation for the upcoming second Queen's Child, you have a number of options: one, you can detonate your capture as soon as the fresh new captain is ready to fight and break its shield behind your explosion, which is easier.


Or, you can do what I did here, charge a beam and release it immediately as the first blade closes in at the Silver Hawk, then move right up to a particular spot where some more bad guys are being dispensed. When your beam dissipates (this should be right as the red and purple powerups become available), immediately move down and out of the way. The second Queen's Child is here to replace your old and beaten up one. It has the same attack patterns from before. Break its shield and capture it. Use tap movements to align yourself neatly with it.


After your ship is turned to the left, four gold rockets will be fired from the bottom left. Use your captain's special attack to aid in destroying them. Then, Queen Fossil will fire more of those spread out lasers. Just position yourself in between them with tap movements, and keep firing. Or, you can charge your beam now. Whichever the case may be, it will follow that attack with shedding off some of its scales which are thrown at you. Pay attention to how they move; the ones that bounce back are the ones about to move towards you in a straight line.


And now, the moment you've been waiting for... as soon as those cannons open up, release your alpha beam! Keep positioning it towards each succeeding beta beam, making sure to hold that rapid fire, and you will achieve a fourfold counter that is so giant it takes up the entire screen!!

If that didn't work out, well... you're gonna be face with plenty more, much harder patterns... those will not be discussed here, but if you're trying to reach for a world record, learning them may be really helpful.

The third stage has a lot of asteroids that cannot be captured. Trying to do so would be like trying to raise a pet rock. Some real enemies do show up soon for you to grab, but I didn't bother capturing any here.


It should be noted that the second formation moving downward from the top has a blue powerup at the end, but this formation goes by quickly. There is a chance you could miss it. Having the laser weapon really helps.


The zone's captain, Reverse Direction, appears early on. Its attacks may seem too large to get up close and personal with it, but those are cluster rockets it's firing. They move out a bit, and then they expand into a lineup of bullets. Try to stay right next to, but undernearth this captain where the shield is. You'll likely have to move up as it moves itself down trying to evade your attacks. Break the shield! Get the captain!

Reverse Direction doesn't have as charismatic of an attack as the previous two captains, mainly just fires out one of its fins like a boomerang. The movement combination for this is right, down, down+right - as in, you move the directional stick right, put it to neutral, then down, and down right. It's not as easy to pull off as the fractionally circular motions from before, but every little bit of extra firepower helps.

Some of the asteroids have these spikes protruding from them. These take more hits to destroy, and because of this, they are exceptionally threatening to your captain. You really want to remove them as soon as possible, because if your captain is making contact with them, it will take heavy damage, and probably die before reaching a good position to be used for a beam.

Immediately following this, there will be some satellite lasers shooting up to the left. Removing them will give you more space, but be wary of the ground below. There is a chance you could crash into it and immediately die, without regard to how many hits your arm barrier has left.


At the midpoint, I'll select Area I. Be mindful of the area selection timer. When it expires, a red asteroid will come down towards the bottom, which is easy to miss. You definitely want to destroy it so you can grab the powerup.


After reaching the station, there are a number of goodies to be on the lookout for. Two additional powerups, colored gold and silver, respectively, can destroy/damage all enemies on the screen or give you a point bonus. From what I recall, the amount of points awarded by a silver powerup depends on the direction in which you approach it, but don't quote me on that.

The gold powerup shown above is hidden in that corner. When you shoot it, it flashes briefly to reveal its position. Keep shooting there, and it will be released. I would wait a while before picking it up until those rockets waiting underneath show up. You can use that powerup to destroy them easily. Keep Reverse Direction away from the terrain.


If you don't have the multi bombs at this point, you're going to have a bad time. Two spiky asteroids will emerge from the left side and try to close in on your captain. Aiming the rear bombs towards them is the fastest way to remove them.


As you begin moving underneath the ceiling, you have to decide when you think you should convert your captain into an alpha beam. Without gadgets, you don't really have much of a way of knowing if it's safe to beam later unless you've been paying close attention to where the captain's been moving. It might be best to just shoot an early beam, and get underneath that modestly sized fish and move up to destroy it. The rest should be cannon fodder.


If you haven't destroyed those long spinning bars (Rei TANOUL), they could be useful for destroying the next wave of asteroids from the left. One of them shoots backwards. Of course, the most reliable means of shooting backwards is always having those multi bombs equipped.


This one... is horrible. It has a variety of different patterns, which almost seem to be selected at random. The first few are consistent, starting with a wave of erratic French fry lasers...


...followed by this fire coming out of its trident tail. I don't even bother firing here, just trying to keep myself focused on positioning myself somewhere good in the hopes of leaving the tail aiming upward.


Dimension Diver will then move in from the left, and drop three rows of mines that move down in a chaotic wave pattern. There are openings that could allow you to evade them all without taking a single hit, but you should definitely have two hits available in you arm barrier (it should not look small), at a bare minimum. You'll have to figure out the movement yourself, but as best as I can describe it, I enter up into a gap, quickly move right, and up again, sort of in a zigzag pattern.


Now you're thinking with portals! Oh wait, so did Aperture steal Thiima technology, also? Anyway, this is where the random patterns come up. Thankfully, it is possible to anticipate at least some of them judging by the position and angle of Diver's head. One has homing rockets that suddenly appear from the top and bottom. These can be destroyed. Also be mindful of this large bullet from underneath that can explode into smaller bullets.


For this popcorn machine, I prefer to move to the top right where there seems to be a lot more open space. As always, having a capture handy helps a lot in preventing your barrier from being wasted.


Alongside the exploding bullet packs, you may also get homing lasers, which are easy enough to avoid if you're in the right position. If you don't get the lasers, this one's a pipsqueak; just stay low and fire, adjusting yourself as needed.


These next few are from my failed runs. This one is really nasty. A bunch of wave projectiles will spread out and fill the screen. I find it best to get high, and hold your fire so the bullet packs don't shoot with unpredictable timing.


If it's spitting out anchors, just shoot 'em. No catch... I think.


A few rockets could suddenly appear from the top and bottom. These ones are longer, and only move straight. Also mind the bullet packs.


Now this one is straight up EVIL! Plenty of spinning lasers steer towards you, on top of there being bullet packs. It seems this only appears when the boss is seriously damaged.


If you survived three patterns, you're given an opportunity to capture if you don't have one already. Charge, and release immediately when Diver returns. It will then fire its beams. DO NOT COUNTER BOTH IMMEDIATELY, or it will move out of the way. Only counter the bottom one first. When Diver turns more pink, quickly move up to counter the other, and you're done.

The start of this zone is pretty chaotic. Enemies come in from many directions, and you're often not given a whole lot of legroom to move around thanks to those floaty things in the middle (Rei SETORE) that are hard to break and always firing straight. However, by now you should have a surplus of capture balls, and you can only carry six at once, remember? Maybe now's a good opportunity to consume some of them ahead of time...

At the very least, the ground here seems to be out of your way enough that it won't make your ship crash.


VERY IMPORTANT - the only extra life available is found right next to the pillar closest to you, in front of the pyramid. Other fourth zones have an extra life hidden elsewhere, but otherwise, this is the only way to get one. Like the gold and silver powerups discussed in the last zone, this is buried underneath terrain, and needs to be hit a few times to be released. Even if you are going for a no miss clear, the remaining lives you have count towards your end game bonus.

It is especially important that you uncover this one as soon as that pillar appears, because when it crosses halfway across the screen, you'll rise up and won't be able to uncover it.


Here, I ended up doing yet more beaming. There will be several waves of those gold things that will block such beams. They shouldn't be too much of a problem, but watch for formations that may show up from behind. Even though your alpha beam can destroy most everything else, your arm barrier can still be damaged from behind.


At the midpoint, these large gold rockets will fire northwest. If you're beaming, just keep yourself in between a couple of them, and be mindful that firing a beam will slowly push you backwards. Either tap your movement to the right, or, preferably, use the leftmost gap where you can sit comfortably at the left side of the screen. Select Area O, because Area P is terrible for survival due to its total absence of blue powerups to repair your barrier.


When you enter the pyramid, things are a bit more modest, and you shouldn't need to beam your way through it unless you're in a ditch. Your wave shot, assuming you have it, should be a lot more powerful, and a lot wider as well to dispose of what you may have been having trouble with earlier. Save your balls for the captain!


After descending to a lower floor, you'll find three large gold rockets headed towards you. Destroy them with your normal fire. Then, the captain Gray Stripe will appear. It fires waves at angles depending on where you're located. I'm sure you could've used a beam somewhere, but I just detonated instead, because, for one, my shield was depleted, and two, I haven't figured out a good time on where to beam. As always, destroy its shield, try to stay clear of the waves, and capture when it breaks.


Gray Stripe is excellent with both its normal and special attacks. Normally, it fires two rows of waves parallel with your own shots, but with the movement combination right, left, left+down, down, down+right, right, it can fire four rows of waves that spread out - VERY helpful for clearing out all sides of the screen when you're stuck.

Soon, you'll exit the pyramid, and the last enemies you'll encounter are some of those jet bomber-looking things from behind. If you have multi bombs, you can shoot those yourself easily. Should be a good opportunity to cool off before things really get intense.


After destroying the short wave of anchors, you have to think about how well you've treated Gray Stripe. If you think it's healthy enough, you could hide inside it and have it tank the slightly bland stream of bullets Death Wings will fire. Once those bullets stop, though, it'll fire lasers that bend towards you. That's when you should charge, and immediately release your beam. Use it to destroy the lasers. With the captain's strength, you'll shave off more than half of Death Wings' hit points, provided you're holding rapid fire or tapping shot fast enough.


This is the part where you REALLY have to pay attention to where your ship turns. The first time that Death Wings flies to the top, you'll turn left. So, you'd want to move to the right and aim for the captures available on the left. There's a lot going on here; not only is Death Wings firing wave lasers at your standing point, it's also surrounding the area with those gold pieces. I didn't know where I was even heading when I first dealt with this, but that's where recording/replays come into play. They give you the time to deconstruct what you're facing, and plan out your tactics for next time!


Those gold pieces will be sucked in, and there will be an opening to move out of that in the corners. Following this, it'll turn on the vacuum, trying to slowly drag you towards it. Hold down and right, and adjust yourself as needed to avoid the bullets coming towards you. It's somewhat easier if you have a new capture on hand, as you can just ram forward into the bullets with the front shield things (IFATHER PLUS). Even without a capture, I've found it's still very much doable; you might have to perform "jumping" motions to dodge the bullets.


The easier way to destroy Death Wings is by firing a beam some time after it moves to the left (not too early), countering its own beam to extend the length of yours, and moving just slightly underneath so the beam still hits as the boss moves right. That should be enough to clear this zone.


Otherwise, you can go for its juicier double beam later. Fire at the destructible bullets, then when you're next to Death Wings' tail, avoid the next wave of bullets while destroying the anchors. Always know when that's going to stop, because immediately following that, the wings (really just ray fins) will start firing out their jet flames.


You have only a very narrow safe spot to move to, right underneath the tail, close to the torso. When you're in position, stand still! As soon as Death Wings moves away, move to the right side of the screen.


After firing a few homing missiles, Death Wings will do this thing again with moving up, firing the lasers, and boxing you in with gold pieces, and this time your ship will turn right. Move to the left, and don't miss the capture on the right this time. When the gold rolls inward, get out through the corner like before. At least it's a lot shorter this time around.


When Death Wings moves to the right, charge your beam, and fire it when the next homing missiles are launched. Here, two beams will be fired. More beams, more damage, more score. Position yourself in line with the beams as you're firing yours, and finish off Death Wings with a double counter. If you've made it this far, you can definitely win!

This is it. You're at the home stretch, about to decide the fate of humanity. Here in this zone, you'll be treated to a trippy background and some of OGR's very best work - no, the very best track ever created for a video game. (This is not disputable)


But I'm getting ahead of myself. The first part of this zone is quite easygoing, surprisingly. The only real threats here are some enemies emerging from multiple sides of the screen, particularly behind you - and not having the protection to compensate for that, hence you should stay somewhere in the center of the screen whenever possible. Those enemies seen above (YATTAH) can be captured, and you should grab one immediately.

If you're not trying to attain a high technical rank, just keep firing. Having full upgrades at this point will make this a lot easier, but this zone has enough powerups that you can recover pretty quickly should you have lost a ship.


The first enemies you really need to watch out for are the large, gold-plated ones (gold = no capture). They take some hits to destroy, and they move fast, so they can really screw you over if you don't anticipate where they're going to move.


At the midpoint, one of the gelatinous things down at the bottom center splits into two when it is shot. This yields TWO blue powerups, meaning instant full restoration of a hyper arm barrier, which takes five hits. Believe me, having hyper arm at this point can make all the difference for a no miss clear. Select Area Y at this midpoint.


Watch out! This powerup may look real. It may appear as an extend, a tricolor powerup, or something else, but...


...it's a fake! When you run into it, another enemy appears and immediately shoots fire in your direction. When you do move out, it's pretty easy to destroy. But then you have to watch out for all the gold rockets firing quickly at you in all sorts of directions.


Here comes the last captain, Dream Tender. It'll ascend from the bottom left, so stay clear of that space. When it's moved up, you can detonate your existing capture to protect yourself against the waves aiming towards you, or you could have beamed somewhere. Capture this after breaking its shield. While it can take a lot of hits, you really have to take great care of it, because it could possibly collide into a plentiful of things that could eat away at its energy - and fast!


Like these polygons with gold spheres in them. They move in quickly, and take a lot of hits to destroy. In order for your captain to survive, you have to pay attention to the background for whatever's coming up next and drag it out of the way.


Two more blue powerups should become available near the end of the zone. Leave them floating around for a while just in case you do get hit, but when you get really close to the end where this barrage of gold rockets is firing, you've really gotta pick them up, or they will disappear when the warning comes up. Then, stay to the left of the screen for the final wave of gold rockets, and...


Position yourself in line with the heart and move behind your captain. If you think your captain got hit too much, just charge it and release an alpha beam immediately. The single counter strength it provides is enough to finish The Embryon's first phase.


Otherwise, you can wait through the first two bullet attacks, and when the boss moves to the left side, charge, and release when those rings of bullets start firing out (for safety purposes, you could also start it later if you can dodge them). It will fire out a few fish heads that can give you some extra points. Just aim for the head to break it, and then at the heart until the boss fades out.


After destroying some more gold missiles and evading another string of bullets, move to the left side of the screen. You'll get trapped in a pyramid-shaped polygon and dragged towards The Embryon. Pull left more, and fire constantly to destroy the polygon while evading homing lasers.


Grab a capture, and hide either above or below The Embryon to avoid its laser spanning across the screen. Only the head and heart cause damage upon collision. After that, move out, and evade more bullets and homing lasers.


If you have mutli bombs, this might be a safe corner, although I cannot provide any warranty on that. While the bullets will be well out of your way, the anchors can still move towards you, which can be destroyed by said bombs (all while applying more damage to the head). If you'd rather not do that, just be prepared to charge after one or two bullet waves.

If you're sitting in the corner, charge after the head begins to ready its own beam (making sure there are no anchors headed towards you, then immediately release and pull out. While you can still take damage from behind, you do get a brief period of invulnerability when you first release the beam, about a second. (Other events may trigger invulnerability as well; see the last section for details).


When firing the beam, STAND CLEAR of the head until it fires its beam. or it will be destroyed and its beam will be cancelled. You want to counter it. When it fires, move in, and the chest will fire shortly thereafter. The beam coming from there is a double beam, being twice as thick, so when you counter both beams, it's a triple counter. Aim at the heart and the second phase is finished.


Keep firing. The first column of gold rockets only has a narrow passage, so if you're turned left too soon before some of them are destroyed, align yourself in between that gap, then destroy the other rockets.


As The Embryon reforms, immediately move back to the upper left corner. This time it's definitely a safe spot, and can conserve valuable hits for the next pattern, which is painful.


More rings of bullets will be fired, AND you will be trapped in another polygon. Pull left until that breaks. You can use tap dodging to avoid the bullets.


Grab another capture, and move above or under the head and heart to avoid the laser. Charge, and release on the head when it fires its beam, making sure to avoid the swarms of enemies that will emerge (or destroying them with that beam). But this is just a single counter, which is not as valuable, so try not to kill it right at this moment. You should also try to stick to one side, as there will come another set of captures you can take right as the beam ends.


The Embryon will fire another beam that you can make a triple counter out of. That will be your surefire winning move.

Read on for more advice!

If you're still struggling to pull through, there are a number of things that could help you...

Yes, really. It's dirty, and it will illegitimatize your run, but at the same time, it is an invaluable tool for practicing. Sometimes you have to make the game easier before you can play it exactly how it was meant to be in its arcade cabinet. Here are some things you can try:

Changing the game settings: Start off with more lives than normal, perhaps the maximum allowed. Reduce the difficulty, and max out the capture balls as well. You'll still qualify for the online leaderboards, but will be restricted to the "All Mix" section. Those of honor will use the default arcade settings!

Using save states: I had brushed it off at first, but this is actually a great way to learn boss patterns a lot more quickly than you would otherwise. G-Darius HD has this functionality built in, thereby acknowledging its importance. This will disqualify you from all online leaderboards, and you cannot pass your run off as a real no miss clear, but it will help you get there when you're ready for the real deal.

Training Mode: G-Darius HD has a training mode that lets you test the waters with any zone, and you can equip whatever powerups you please, sort of like the beginner mode on the PlayStation port. So, if you'd rather just coast along with full power, you can do that. You won't earn achievements in training mode, though.

Other Videos: If recording your own gameplay isn't enough, watching other gameplay footage may help. I've uploaded my own run to my site if you want to use that for reference, and there are plenty of other good recordings on the internet you could refer to as well, from players like Smraedis, HARUKA, and others. Just watch out for the credit feeding playthroughs, as those will not help you.

In G-Darius, the floating powerups can block projectiles, which is an incentive to not pick them up right away in tight situations. Also, when picking up a powerup, you gain about half a second of invulnerability.

Some other events appear to trigger a brief period of invulnerability as well, including capturing an enemy successfully and firing an alpha beam. Due to their short duration, these aren't completely reliable, but every little bit helps.

If you find this is still too extreme for you but you're trying to get into STG in general, there are many other options available which you can try as an entry point, before you take this on. XOP Ultra is my personal recommendation. It's free to download, and has a very sensible difficulty level. But make sure to specify "game" in your search, as it appears a set of climbing sticks is trying to override its existence...

Good luck on your journey. You'll need it!