Darius II

Darius II (Persian: داريوش دوم‎‎) (Dārayavahuš), was king of the Persian Empire from 423 BC to 405 BC.

Artaxerxes I, who died on December 25, 424 BC, was followed by his son Xerxes II. After a month and a half Xerxes II was murdered by his brother Secydianus or Sogdianus (the form of the name is uncertain). His illegitimate brother, Ochus, satrap of Hyrcania, rebelled against Sogdianus, and after a short fight killed him, and suppressed by treachery the attempt of his own brother Arsites to imitate his example. Ochus adopted the name Darius (Greek sources often call him Darius Nothos, "Bastard"). Neither the names Xerxes II nor Sogdianus occur in the dates of the numerous Babylonian tablets from Nippur; here effectively the reign of Darius II follows immediately after that of Artaxerxes I.

Historians know little about Darius II's reign. A rebellion by the Medes in 409 BC is mentioned by Xenophon. It does seem that Darius II was quite dependent on his wife Parysatis. In excerpts from Ctesias some harem intrigues are recorded, in which he played a disreputable part.

Sega Saturn

The Sega Saturn (セガサターン, Sega Satān) is a 32-bit fifth-generation home video game console that was developed by Sega and released on November 22, 1994 in Japan, May 11, 1995 in North America, and July 8, 1995 in Europe as the successor to the successful Sega Genesis. The Saturn has a dual-CPU architecture and eight processors. Its games are in CD-ROM format, and its game library contains several arcade ports as well as original titles.

Development of the Saturn began in 1992, the same year Sega's groundbreaking 3D Model 1 arcade hardware debuted. Designed around a new CPU from Japanese electronics company Hitachi, another video display processor was incorporated into the system's design in early 1994 to better compete with Sony's forthcoming PlayStation. The Saturn was initially successful in Japan, but failed to sell in large numbers in the United States after its surprise May 1995 launch, four months before its scheduled release date. After the debut of the Nintendo 64 in late 1996, the Saturn rapidly lost market share in the U.S., where it was discontinued in 1998. Having sold 9.26 million units worldwide, the Saturn is considered a commercial failure. The failure of Sega's development teams to release a game in the Sonic the Hedgehog series, known in development as Sonic X-treme, has been considered a factor in the console's poor performance.

After Burner

After Burner (アフターバーナー, Afutā Bānā) is a 1987 combat flight simulator arcade game by Sega AM2. It is one of the first games designed by Yu Suzuki. The player flew an F-14 using a specialized joystick (with moving seat, in some installations), and the game spawned several sequels.

Gameplay

The game allows the player to control a F-14 Tomcat jet, which must destroy a series of enemy jets throughout 18 stages. At the start of the game, the player takes off from an aircraft carrier called the SEGA Enterprise, which shares a similar name to the one used in the 1986 film Top Gun.

In the arcade version, the jet itself employs a machine gun and a limited set of heat-seeking missiles, in the Mastersystem version there is an unlimted amount of missiles. These weapons are replenished by another aircraft after beating a few stages. The aircraft, cannon and missile buttons are all controlled from an integrated flight stick.

The game itself was released in two variations: a standard upright cabinet and a rotating cockpit version. In the cockpit version, the seat rotated horizontally, and the cockpit rotated vertically. The rotating cockpit version also featured two speakers inside the cockpit at head-level, which produced excellent stereo sound that significantly added to the gameplay experience. Both cabinets contained a grey monitor frame with flashing lights at the top that indicated an enemy's "lock" on your craft.

Darius

Darius may refer to:

People

Historical people

Persian kings:

Other kings, princes and politicians:

Surname

Companies

Art, entertainment, and media

Fictional entities

Games

After Burner II

After Burner II is an arcade-style flight game released by Sega in 1987. It is the second game in the After Burner series. In the game, players fly a F-14 Tomcat jet fighter, gunning down enemies while avoiding incoming fire. Like OutRun, another Sega arcade game, After Burner II came in several versions, the most famous being a large, servo actuated, sit-down cabinet which resembled a cockpit and moved according to the motion of the plane onscreen. The cockpit would bank in the same direction the on-screen aircraft was banking. There was also a more basic upright cabinet version.

Translations and ports

After Burner II has been translated and ported to numerous home computers, consoles and mobile phones; including versions for the PC Engine, Sharp X68000, Sega Mega Drive, Famicom, FM Towns Marty, Atari ST, Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64 and Sega Saturn. In Japan, it was released on the PlayStation 2 as part of the Sega Ages classic series. Mega placed the Mega Drive version at #38 in their Top Mega Drive Games of All Time.MegaTech magazine praised the smooth and fast gameplay, as well as the sound.