While my good buddy Keith is laid up for the moment, I thought I’d drop a line about an interesting new iTouch/Phone app.
When I heard a few days ago that iTunes was putting out a “Dragon’s Lair” app, I figured, meh. It’s probably just an adaptation of the original. Cheesy graphics and gameplay, just with the familiar Dragon’s Lair logo.
I couldn’t have been more wrong.
Don Bluth, head animator of the studio that produced the game adapted for the iPhone.
And what you see is an EXACT version of the game.
I distinctly remember when I saw Dragon’s Lair for the first time. It was 1983, and my family was visiting the New York State Fair. My grandmother had just died that spring, and we had met my uncle’s brood there for some extended family bonding.
I was just about to enter 7th grade, and my folks let me explore the fair on my own for a couple of hours.
I had no interest in the prize pig or quilt contests.
I went straight to the arcade. There was a huge group of teens and young adults gathered around a machine. I squeezed my frame into a spot where I could see what all the fuss was about. What I saw there made my eyes bug out.
It was a cartoon. No, it was a movie. NO, it was a VIDEO game. With graphics soooo cool, you played Dirk the Daring, trying to save the DEVASTATINGLY hot Princess Daphne from a dragon inside a castle teeming with danger.
The game was unconventional not only in graphics (total movielike animation) but in gameplay. Basically you were presented with today’s version of Quicktime events, with the ability to tap up, down, left, right, or use your mighty sword.
I waited for a half hour for my turn to play the game. While others had busied themselves with Pac Man, Zaxxon, and Dig Dug, I settled in to try my hand at Dragon’s Lair.
The first thing I noticed was that the game cost 50 cents. 50 CENTS! That was unheard of. But look at this thing. It’s AMAZING.
I dropped in my 2 quarters willingly and got ready for a spine tingling adventure.
Thirty seconds later, I was done, Dirk’s three lives expended. My game was over, the machine greedily digesting my two quarters in its nearly full innards.
You’re thinking, what a ripoff right?
Well, I was thinking, I MUST try again. 2 minutes and $5 later, my entire budget had been spent (and alas there was no budget stimulus for me back in 1983).
How will I EVER get to the climax of the game? To fight the dragon and win the hand of the DEVASTATINGLY hot Princess Dapne????
So, now…(gulp)…flash forward 26 years later. This cutting edge piece of early 80’s technology is completely contained in only several hundred MB’s on my iTouch for only $4.99.
I just played through it in about 1/2 hour, with no mad dash to a change machine for more quarters.
As far as a review, the game is simplistic, trite, the gameplay clunky and overly simplified. Anyone born after 1990 will probably think it’s a waste of time and money.
But none of that matters, I finished the game. I saw the dragon and rescued the DEVASTATINGLY hot Princess Daphne.
And, actually, that doesn’t really matter either. What does is that it took me back. Remembering who I was and what my life was like back then.
In many ways, I’m much happier and doing better than my family was those many years ago.
Then again, to be 12 and so gosh darn carefree. To be on summer vacation, that just seemed to stretch forever. To have your Dad give you a couple of bucks to go to an arcade. Remember GOING to an arcade?!? Aww, it was a sport. An exercise in both mental acuity and anthropologic observation.
I love the Dragon’s Lair app. It’s more than the sum of its parts. It made me nostalgic and remember.
And that is worth $4.99 any day of the week.
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