Retro Tavern

Dragon's Lair

was one of the first laserdisc video games,
released in June 1983 by Cinematronics.

I always sucked at this game - I remember it cost more to play
and it would last about 5 seconds...!
But..It did look pretty cool for the time

"It featured animation created by former Disney animator Don Bluth.
Most other games of the era represented the character as a sprite, which
consisted of a series of bitmaps animated by playing them in succession.
However due to hardware limitations of the era, artists were greatly restricted
in the detail they could achieve using that technique; the resolution, framerate
and number of frames were severely constrained. Dragon's Lair overcame those
limitations by tapping into the vast storage potential of laserdisc, but imposed
other limitations on the actual gameplay. The game's enormous contrast with
other arcade games of the time created a sensation when it appeared, and was
played so heavily that many machines often broke due to the strain of overuse.
It was also arguably the most successful game on this medium and is aggressively
sought after by collectors."

"Dragon's Lair features the hero, "Dirk the Daring", attempting to rescue
"Princess Daphne" from the evildragon Singe holed up in a wizard's castle.
The screen shows animated scenes, and the player executes an action by selecting
a direction or pressing the sword button with correct timing. The comedy of the
game stemmed from not only the bizarre looking creatures and death scenes, but
the fact that while Dirk was skilled knight, he was somewhat clumsy in his efforts
and was a reluctant hero, prone to shrieking and reacting in horror
to the various dangers he encounters."
- From Wikipedia