Dragon's Lair (1983 video game)
| Dragon's Lair | |
|---|---|
Dragon's Lair promotional poster
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| Developer(s) | Advanced Microcomputer Systems |
| Publisher(s) | Cinematronics |
| Director(s) | Don Bluth |
| Designer(s) |
Don Bluth Rick Dyer |
| Composer(s) | Chris Stone |
| Series | Dragon's Lair |
| Platform(s) | Arcade, various |
| Release date(s) |
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| Genre(s) | Interactive movie |
| Mode(s) | Up to 2 players (alternating turns) |
| Cabinet | Upright |
| Arcade system | Z-80 processor on a proprietary motherboard |
| Display | Horizontal orientation, raster, standard resolution |
Dragon's Lair is a laserdisc video game published by Cinematronics in 1983 as the first game in the Dragon's Lair series. In the game, the protagonist Dirk the Daring is a knight attempting to rescue Princess Daphne from the evil dragon Singe who has locked the princess in the foul wizard Mordroc's castle. It featured animation by ex-Disney animator Don Bluth.
Most other games of the era represented the character as a sprite, which consisted of a series of pixels displayed in succession. Due to hardware limitations of the era, artists were greatly restricted in the detail they could achieve using that technique; the resolution, framerate and number of frames were severely constrained. Dragon's Lair overcame those limitations by tapping into the vast storage potential of the LaserDisc, but imposed other limitations on the actual gameplay.
The success of the game sparked numerous home ports, sequels and related games. In the 21st century it has been repackaged in a number of formats (such as for the iPhone) as a "retro" or historic game.
The game displays animated cutscenes, and the player executes an action by selecting a direction or pressing the sword button with correct timing in order to clear each quick time event (QTE). The comedy aspects of the game stemmed not only from the bizarre-looking creatures and humorous death scenes, but also the fact that the player character was somewhat clumsy in his efforts, as well as being a reluctant hero, prone to shrieking and reacting in horror to the various dangers he encounters. Instead of controlling the character's actions directly, players control his reflexes, with different full motion video (FMV) segments playing for correct or incorrect choices. While there are a limited number of scenes, other than the first and last, these are played in a random order. Some scenes are played more than once before reaching the end and additionally some scenes are flipped or mirrored such that the opposite actions (e.g. left instead of right) are required.
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