Only the other day I was trying
to work out how many shoot-'em-ups featuring dragons I've
seen and I came up with three -
Thalmus (ancient),
St Dragon
and
Dragon Breed. A few days
later, yesterday in fact, whilst on
the toilet I wondered "what
made them so good?" Whilst on
the loo later that day I realised
that it was because you actually
used parts of the dragon to help
you - its firey breath
to flame baddies, its
tail to curl around
you and protect you
or to whip nasties
with.
So imagine my surprise when
Dragon Spirit popped through
my door for reviewing. I
immediately loaded it up, had a
few goes, sat on the lav for
inspiration, and came up with
this analysis.
Dragon Spirit isn't as
successful as all the other
games with dragons in cos the
dragon has nothing to do with
the game. You simply scroll
vertically up the screen,
shooting other dragon-related
things whilst flying over the sort
of scenery you'd imagine
dragons to fly over. In the
arcade, the graphics would
probably make the game look
quite innovative, but here it
looks identical to about fifty
other shoot-'em-ups including
Flying Shark and
Gemini Wing,
the only major difference is the
redefined graphics. Fans of this
sort of thing can't go wrong cos
the game's got some neat
touches and
plenty of
power-ups.
But all in all
Dragon Breed
gets neatly
filed away in
the box at the
corner of the shed
marked 'vertically scrolling
shoot-'em-ups that are all the
same', where one suspect's it
will stay for some time. Hardly
the thinking man's shoot-'em-up.
| Arcade version screenshot... |
|
| Click here to view all 3 pics |
| Ratings given by other magazines |
| |
7/10
|
|
8/10
| |
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| Info supplied by the SPOT*ON database |
