Dragon's Lair follows Dirk the Daring, your typical do-gooder on a mission to rescue the princess Daphne from the evil dragon Singe. Singe has captured the lady and locked her in a magical prison within the dark wizard Murdoc's castle. The castle is fraught with peril, and Dirk must brave many dangers if he is to be successful in saving the fair maiden!
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| Beware the Peeping-Tomtopus! |
Gameplay in Dragon's Lair is deceptively simple. Dirk moves about the castle in scenes, each of which require him to dodge, slash, jump, and deftly maneuver in order to proceed. Controls in the game consist only of up, down, left, right, and sword. Players must input the correct direction or action at the right time in order to fight Dirk's way through the castle. The game gives small hints as to what direction Dirk needs to go, but they are easy to miss. Making your way to the princess will indefinitely require multiple attempts as you learn what is needed to defeat each trial. At least there are tons of amusing death scenes for when Dirk fails!
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| "Uhh lets see, how did that go...yellow on black?...black on red?..uuuhghghhhh" |
With the Xbox Arcade version comes a move guide that you can turn on which will display the correct actions for each scene. This takes the sometimes frustrating guesswork out of the classic game, but still keeps things challenging as you must react quickly to the prompts or risk falling victim to the heinous traps throughout the castle. Other special features include easy and hard difficulties for the game which change the number of button presses needed in many scenes, and the option to play the arcade or laser-disc version of the game. You're also able to display a slick-looking version of the game with an arcade cabinet border so that you can pretend it's 1983 once more! (why you would want to..I'm not sure)
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| So this is how people dealt with the early 80's economic recession? |
The animation in Dragon's Lair is beautifully done and brings back memories of classic Disney films. I was blown away by the huge number of scenes in the game. There are also unique death scenes for nearly every danger Dirk faces. Scenes flow nearly seamlessly from one to the next depending on a successful or wrong action taken by the player. I almost wish I could have experienced this game back when it first came out, it must have blown minds with its interactivity!
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| Clearly the correct action here is to get the heck out of the room with fire and flying weapons... |
Depending on the skill of the player and if the move guide is turned on, each playthrough of Dragon's Lair lasts around 15-20 minutes. These scenes are randomly selected though, so you never know in what order you'll face the challenges. Clearly, this game is short, so don't go into it expecting it to be something that it is not.
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| How's it feel to be one of the fastest defeated bosses in gaming? |
I thoroughly enjoyed my playthroughs of Dragon's Lair and can see myself tackling the no move indicators mode in the near future. This game doesn't advertise itself as anything more than an updated version of the game game that was released in 1983 and should not be judged as anything more. Lots of reviews have been quite negative due to the gameplay style not aging well, but the way I see it, you knew what you were getting into when you bought the game. Since it is so short, I would recommend waiting until it goes on sale before buying, just to be sure you're happy with your purchase.
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