機動装甲ダイオン aka Kidou Soukou Daion aka Dion aka Imperium

Mobile Armor Dion -- most emphatically NOT a Gundam -- launches into battle!

Released at the end of 1992 for the SFC and SNES, Mobile Armor Dion (機動装甲ダイオン, or simply Imperium in North America) is notable for its wide variety of weapons and power-ups, the clever way it makes itself both accessible and impenetrable at the same time, and most interesting to me, the way it incorporates a couple of RPG elements into its already unique vertical-scrolling shoot 'em up (shmup) formula  And of course, I can't ignore the excellent use of pseudo-animation in the game's opening sequence, as seen in the GIF at the top of this article.

Beginning with the weapon load-out, Dion launches with a basic machine gun that is quickly expanded to include an energy blast that tracks enemies, a powerful laser, and a beam weapon that fires in the opposite direction to where Dion is moving (and can be locked in place by holding down the R button). Each has its own strengths and weaknesses that can exploit the strengths and weaknesses of the various enemy types that appear in each level. Learning which weapon to use when is a key part of making progress through the game, though there are usually several ways to approach any given situation.

Enemy-seeking energy blasts end multitudes of fast, weak enemies before they can even get a shot off

Part of the reason for this stems from the way Dion gains -- and loses -- weapon power ups. Rather than powering up by collecting items dropped by enemies, Dion uses what would normally be a score count to function very much like EXP in an RPG. The upper left corner of the screen shows two numbers: EXP and N.EXP, which together indicate how much EXP has been gained, and how much is needed to reach the next "level". Note that these aren't necessarily levels in the typical RPG sense, rather, each weapon has its own level, and they take turns leveling up whenever N.EXP reaches zero. In doing so, a machine gun that originally fired two shots at a time will begin firing four in a wider pattern, the single laser becomes a twin laser, and so on, greatly increasing in power as more and more robot enemies fall to them.

Keeping this power in check is the penalty incurred whenever Dion is hit by enemy fire. Any time this happens, Dion loses one HP (displayed as the five red bars on the top right side of the screen), and the weapon currently equipped goes down one level (to a minimum of Level 1). As a result, there will be times when the best weapon for a given situation is underpowered relative to the others, adding some complication to the moment-to-moment decision of which equipment to use. Even worse, leveled down weapons slow progress towards getting the strongest weapons. It's possible to level up the weapons again, but it becomes much harder to do so while relying weaker weapons to defeat the stronger enemies that appear as the game progresses.

The Level 3 laser edges closer to the border of ostentatious

The dim ray of mercy this game shines on the player comes in the form of the previously mentioned HP gauge. Dion can take five hits in a row before it's game over; a welcome improvement over the much more typical one-shot-and-you're-dead mechanic common to shmups. Making this approach even friendlier is the fact that each time a weapon levels up, one HP is recovered. Clearly, it's best to not take any hits, but I appreciate the way this game gives the player a way to recover, so long as they've got the skills necessary to do so.

For me, this is especially useful in the early stages of the game, where typically frustrating errors are rendered virtually consequence-free. In most shmups, being hit during the first stage probably means a quick restart, given that it it will be hard to make up for whatever power ups were lost at a point where death should be easily avoided. In Dion, getting hit early in the game won't level down any weapons, since they are already at level 1 and can't downgrade further. The only real impact is that one HP is lost, though it can quickly be recovered.  Make no mistake, Dion is still a difficult game that rewards excellent reflexes and pattern memorization; it just doesn't penalize the player for mistakes as severely as others in the genre.

The beautiful city backdrop seen here in the JP version is replaced in the NA release by a digitized trash heap

As of this writing, both the NA and JP versions of the game can be had for a reasonable price from your online seller of choice. I'd consider the JP version to be the definitive one, as some background effects were stripped down and/or outright changed in the NA release to its remarkable detriment. The enemey-seeking weapon was also replaced with wave beam that, while neat-looking, strikes me as a fix to a problem that didn't exist. Aside from the instruction manual, no Japanese language proficiency is needed, so it's a pretty safe and highly recommended import.