Dragon's Lair

Dragon's Lair is a 1990 NES action-platformer starring Dirk the Daring on his quest to rescue Princess Daphne from the dragon Singe. It was developed by MotiveTime and released in North America by CSG Imagesoft in December 1990; Elite Systems later published the European version.

Despite sharing its story and characters with the celebrated 1983 arcade game, this is not a LaserDisc interactive movie. The arcade original played Don Bluth animation in preset scenes and asked for precisely timed directional or action inputs. Limited to a cartridge, the NES release rebuilds the premise as a scrolling, sprite-based adventure rather than attempting to reproduce that full-motion-video format.

Dirk travels through a series of dangerous castle and cave stages, walking, crouching, and jumping over gaps, spikes, collapsing structures, and other traps. Enemies include bats, snakes, dragons, and the Lizard King. A stage is cleared by reaching its end alive, but many hazards are instantly fatal even though the game also displays a life meter.

The controls give the quest a slightly unusual NES layout: B makes Dirk jump and A attacks. Dirk can find and throw weapons such as knives, axes, and fireballs, while the directional pad handles movement and ducking. The game’s deliberate character animation makes timing jumps and attacks an important part of surviving its obstacle-filled rooms.

Start activates Dirk's candle, spending from a candle meter to illuminate dark areas and reveal hidden items. Select pauses the game. These functions are the reverse of the more common NES convention, making the manual's control explanation particularly useful before setting out.

Some stage endings lead to an elevator that pauses beside different platforms. Choosing when to jump creates a branching route: a poor choice can send Dirk back to an earlier stage, while another route reaches the Lizard King's throne room, a bonus area where stolen gold can be recovered.

The NES game supports one player or two players taking turns. Its Japanese and PAL releases were revised from the North American version; the PAL edition runs faster and adds elements including level-introduction screens, extra enemies and bosses, and additional death animation.