Rise of the Dragon | |
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Cover art
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Developer(s) |
Dynamix Game Arts (Sega CD) |
Publisher(s) | Sierra On-Line |
Distributor(s) |
Activision (DOS, Macintosh, Sega CD and Amiga) (2014–present) |
Director(s) |
Jeff Tunnell Alan McKean |
Designer(s) | Jeff Tunnell |
Programmer(s) | Dariusz Lukaszuk Richard Rayl Kevin Ryan |
Artist(s) | Randy Dersham (art director) Robert Caracol (concept art) |
Writer(s) | Jerry Luttrell David Selle |
Composer(s) |
Don Latarski (original score) Christopher Stevens (music) Noriyuki Iwadare (Sega CD) |
Platform(s) | Amiga, DOS, Macintosh, Sega CD |
Release | 1990 (DOS/Mac) 1991 (Amiga) 1992 (Sega CD) (JP) 1993 (Sega CD) (US) |
Genre(s) | Graphic adventure, action-adventure |
Mode(s) | Single-player |
Rise of the Dragon is a graphic adventure game released in 1990 for DOS and Macintosh, and later remade for the Sega CD (1993) as well as the Amiga. It was one of the few adventure game titles developed by Dynamix, a company that was better known as an action and flight simulator game developer.
Gameplay in Rise of the Dragon is similar to that of Dynamix's other 1990s adventure games, The Adventures of Willy Beamish and Heart of China. The screen shows the current room roughly from the protagonist Blade's perspective. Movement occurs with the cursor, which becomes an arrow to proceed to another room or a magnifying glass to get closer to a part of the current scene.
The game has a time meter that reflects the passage of time in the game. Each of Blade's actions takes up a certain amount of time. Some game events will only occur at particular times. The player must find a way to delay the plans of the game's villains, or the game will end after only three days and Blade will not have time to save the day. Travelling between locations can take up a lot of in-game time, so players must plan their moves strategically.
Several puzzles in Rise of the Dragon have multiple possible solutions Blade's activities can influence the plot of the game later on. Game characters remember his earlier behavior, and if he says the wrong thing to key characters they will refuse to help him with his work, which can render the game unwinnable.
Rise of the Dragon features two action scenes and an aim-and-shoot scene. It is possible to beat the game without playing through all of these scenes. If the player tries and fails to complete the action scenes several times, the game will offer the chance to automatically win the sequence and move on to the next scene.
The game is set in a dark cyberpunk version of Los Angeles in 2053. Rise of the Dragon's seedy vision of the future is inspired by the film Blade Runner. The main character is named William 'Blade' Hunter, an apparent tribute to the film. His clothing also resembles that worn by Harrison Ford as Rick Deckard in Blade Runner.