feeling listless

Games I never could follow 'Dragon's Lair'. Don Blum's fantasy action coin-ops were a nice idea on the drawing board, but faled misery in playability ... based around (I think) a laser disc, the player was presented with a series of tasks for Dirk the knight to master. But instead of being able to actually control the character within the environment, all that was required of the player was the nudge of the joystick in a seemingly random direction in the hope that he didn't die. In other words, it looked great, but Pac-man was more interactive. Somehow it limped through a sequel and sci-fi spin-off 'Space Ace'.

But the idea was still there. For years there were adaptations on everything from the ZX Spectrum to the Commodore Amiga, and recently remastered versions turned up on DVD for playing on you own TV set. With the new wave of games machines, Bloom (via Ubi-soft) is relaunching the title on multiple formats and in three dimensions.

Judging by the screenshots, it seems that the gameplay has been extended to become a third-person adventure in the style of Tomb Raider, but with cell-animation style visuals. Like the first version it may have missed the boat, or they may be over-estimating people's interest in the franchise but we'll see. [via Animation Magazine]