As we all know, there are a lot of different versions of Space Invaders. More than you can count on one hand. Or two hands. Or even two hands and two feet if you take your socks off. Anyway, the one we're looking at today is Space Invaders DX, released in 1994 in the arcades, rather obviously, by Taito. It's a 'collection' of sorts, bringing together the four different arcade versions of the original Space Invaders (that's the upright cabinet with the moon background, and three different cocktail versions- the one with cellophane, the one without, and the one with colour! Exciting!) It also adds in two extra things- a bizarre 2-Player 'Vs.' mode, and the focus of our attention now, the Parody Mode.
Parody Mode is simply Space Invaders with a new lick of paint- that is, a new Taito lick of paint. Every round is based on a classic (and sometimes not-so-classic) Taito game. Of course, this is all well and good, but unless you're a Space Invaders expert, you aren't going to be seeing all of them. I don't know about you, but I'm pretty useless at Space Invaders, I can usually get to the third round before choking and losing all my lives. But what if you're a die-hard Don Doko Don fan, and simply cannot live without seeing every single cameo appearance Bob and Jim have made over the years? If you are, then we've got you covered. Here's all the Parody Mode stages from Space Invaders DX.
Round 1 - The New Zealand Story
Round 4 - Rainbow Islands
Round 7 - Kiki Kaikai
Round 2 - The Fairyland Story
Round 5 - Liquid Kids
Round 8 - Darius
Round 3 - Bubble Bobble
Round 6 - Arkanoid
Round 9 - Don Doko Don
There we are, then. Aside from the new graphics, Parody Mode is basically the same Space Invaders you've been playing since 1978 and, once you beat the Don Doko Don round, the game loops back to The Fairyland Story and continues from there until you either switch off the cheats (how the hell do you think I got these screenshots?!) or give up. To be brutal, though, the graphics are hideous! I mean, look at Zen-Chan on the Bubble Bobble stage (bottom row of Invaders). He appears to have gone under some horrific mutation. Well, regardless of the graphics, it's still a nice novelty, I guess.
If you want to play this for yourself, and prove you're totally hardcore by looping the Parody levels about 50 times and therefore put me to shame, then you really ought to pick up Taito Legends 2 for the PS2, Xbox or PC- all three versions have Space Invaders DX (presumably to make sure that you've got some form of the original Space Invaders, especially if you missed the first collection).
Incidentally, except for Arkanoid and Darius, every single game that makes a cameo here would later be represented in Taito's Pop n' Pop.
Goodness. This certainly isn't a half-arsed rehash from my last terrible website just to bump the numbers up. No sir. Not a jot.
