Syvalion (SNES)

Arena
Checkpoints OFF
4 Difficulty levels
5 Stages
Ship speed fixed
- - - - - - -
Developed by Taito
Published by Toshiba EMI in 1992

On the subject of strange video games – shmups or not – here's a serious contender for the most eccentric one: Syvalion. A rather faithful port of an awkward trackball arcade title, it was released for the Super Famicom in Japan and the Super Nintendo in Europe. As a result, it remained relatively obscure outside those regions, known mostly to die-hard Taito fans or those with a deep interest in Darius lore. For Syvalion is a part of the Darius universe. The connection is unorthodox and somewhat obscure, but it unquestionably exists.

Well, unorthodox is actually the best word to describe this game. The first impression can be, quite frankly, a real disaster. From disheartening to downright unplayable, at first glance Syvalion seems to be impossible. Besides controlling a humongous dragon within a tight maze, you're often victim of enemies spawning right below the poor creature to drain its health to oblivion in seconds. Certainly aware of the awful nature of the gameplay, devs were smart enough to provide unlimited continues with no checkpoints at all, so people will at least inevitably reach the end no matter how many times that golden dragon explodes.

Your only way of attack is to breath fire by pressing buttons A or B (R and L make it spin its head only). While it's possible to deflect all bullets with the fire breath (not stationary lasers), aiming is a chore and there is absolutely no other way to inflict damage against waves of sneaky enemies and a series of huge bosses. Not only that, the reach of the dragon's breath diminishes the longer you keep firing, and the only way to recover is to refrain from doing it (moving the dragon helps recuperate faster). Lost health, indicated by the dragon's golden color turning red, might be replenished if you're lucky enough to see enemies release small triangles instead of DNA molecules whose only purpose is to give you points. Health is not recovered between levels, and no panic resource exists to help you out.

In the search for Gigat and Armax

The story of Syvalion is that an alien race is invading Earth and capturing people to turn them into robotic slaves. Then the game unfolds in two different ways: a fixed adventure that works as a training/tutorial mode featuring fixed stages/bosses (basic series) and the main game mode, which contains procedurally generated levels, random bosses and ever-changing story developments that lead to more than 100 different endings (real combat series). The Super Nintendo version also features a time attack mode where the player must get as many points as possible before the timer runs out over the course of a single stage.

I played the Japanese version, so I couldn't understand anything about the story. For those who also do not understand Japanese, the only thing we need to know is that the first option in the selection screen is the basic series, the second one is the real combat series and the third one is time attack. And then, no matter which one you choose, suffering starts. Syvalion will teach players the meaning of claustrophobic navigation and playing under pressure. After all, the game is timed. If you take too long to follow the arrows and beat the level you'll die. If you procrastinate and stay put deadly skulls will start crossing the screen to bring you inescapable suffering and defeat.

But there is hope. Beating the game in a single credit is actually possible. The natural approach here is to play the basic series first, getting used to stage layouts and enemy behavior. After a while the challenge almost feels fair because it's possible to memorize where hazards are located and spawned. When you move on to the real combat mode suffering starts anew, heightened by a vicious AI that cramps all sorts of things in tight passages that require pixel perfect navigation to avoid damage. Bosses are chosen randomly from a gallery that includes three extra enemies: a giant snail, a dinosaur and a couple of variants of Syvalion itself.

Real combat series also includes a feature that's not present in the basic/tutorial mode: random upgrades applied (or not) to the dragon for each level. These upgrades include extra shots provided by trailing options (single shots, several variations of spread shots, exploding orbs, homing shots), unlimited flames or the best enhancement of all: invincibility. Being invincible allows you to cruise the whole level and still pummel the boss without taking any damage. As for the other upgrades, unfortunately you lose them if you die. Watch out for a variation of the auxiliary option in the form of the Silver Hawk, the trademark spaceship from the Darius series.

Look, ma, how tiny my hands and feet are!
(courtesy of YouTube user Now Loading Please Wait)

So the catch to see the ending of Syvalion's real combat mode in a single credit is a mix of two factors: lucky upgrades and swift performance. Swift because the game encourages you to keep moving even at the cost of some health. Enemies with a blue aura are unique in that they're invincible, so the only way to get through them is by navigating carefully. All dragon segments follow the movement of the head, but if you don't move or move too slowly they might drift a few pixels and get you in harm's way. I might be wrong here, but I don't recall this happening in the arcade version. Unfair cramping of narrow passages is another trait that seems exclusive to the SNES port, so there you have a strong hint of which version should be considered the hardest.

Another thing that doesn't seem to be in line with the original arcade game, aside from the different soundtrack, is rank. Sometimes the port just throws very difficult mazes in the second stage already for no reason at all. And the different boss attacks vary wildly. There are three of them: small blue shots, large blue shots and two forms of homing blue shots. Depending on the boss, if you get the homing shots you can kiss the credit goodbye because it's just really hard to deplete them in time. When luck plays such an important part of the challenge it's hard to state that the experience was actually fun, but Syvalion at least succeeds in teasing the player into trying again and again. The game is very short, graphics are crisp and colorful and the occasional slowdown will certainly be welcomed during the most crowded parts of the maze.

In the high score screen the right table refers to the basic series, and the left table shows the best results for the real combat series. Scores for real combat series tend to be higher because the bonuses when completing levels are cut in half in the basic series. That's why it's also harder to get the single extend in the basic series when you score 1,5 million points, an award that's valid for all game modes. Here are my best 1CC results for the main game modes in the default difficulty (Normal):

Hidden options allow you to change the difficulty and practice the game with stage selection. At the title screen press A, B, X, Y, START. For a debug mode with more options go for A, B, ↑, ↓, ←, →, START. These codes are only valid for the Japanese port.