Introduction
An odd creation, the original Dragon's lair was essentially one big quick time event using full motion antimated video, while most people seem to hate games that overuse quick time events (I'm looking at you, Resident Evil 6), nonetheless, the 8 bit NES obviously couldn't render these types of graphics, so it got its own side-scroller based on the original, afterall that's' what the NES was made for, right? Well, not exactly
Gameplay
You start off on one end of a drawbridge into a castle, seems simple, right? That is until you find out parts
of the drawbridge crumbles and a fire breathing dragon pops its head up and kills you if you haven't fallen through the crumbling drawbridge
, unfortunately, another door closes down on the entrance of the castle, forcing you to kill said dragon with the pathetically weak throwing knives you are given as your weapons in order to proceed
, the only way to achieve this is by standing at the far left end (You can duck down to avoid the flames but the dragon will also duch inder the drawbridge) and throw the knives at the dragon
and keep ducking when the dragon shoots flames at you, this whole process would be easier if the character didn't walk like he was guarding Buckingham Palace and jump like he had a vitamin D deficiency whilst on the moon,
and yes we're back to one hit kills again.
Gameplay Continued...
The worst aspect of this game is the elevator at the end of every section, you have to jump off at the right stop or be forced to do a dungeon level, then do the elevator again or be forced to do the section you just completed again (How was a kid in 1990 supposed to work this stuff out with no internet?)
Verdict
A bad attempt at recreating the trial and error nature of the original game, the game overall is just frustrating, sluggish and not fun to play.