Ladies and gentlemen once again I bring you to another Capcom classic. This game is called The King of Dragons, and it was released in 1991 for the arcade and then later ported to the SNES in 1994. Why am I taking the time to review another game from this company that is about fantasies involving knights, dragons, cyclopsis, and other crazy ass beings? This game is better than Knights of the Round and Quiz and Dragons combined, that’s why.
This is a promo flyer that they used to get people to want to play/buy the game and there is no way in hell that this game fails at doing either.
This game takes place in a fictional land named Malus that is being completely run into the ground by a big dragon named Gildess. Gildess has dispatched all his army of random beasts and men, to destroy the entire countryside. Once he had succeeded it was up to our fair heroes of this story to try to make a big bit of difference and take him down once and for all. Just like Knights of the Round, this is a side scrolling beat em’ up that has RPG elements, only this time they are much more noticeable. After every two stages or so your character will pick up a new weapon that will increase his attack strength, and if your lucky you will be able to pick up a shield that will increase defense as well. The weapon, and shield will be labeled with a certain level, but you can be any level when you get them, so you can be a level 3 and get a level 6 shield and vice versa. You can level up at any time during a level if you do good enough or collect enough jewels while fighting. Honestly if you can time it right the easy way to gain exp is by attacking the arrows that get shot at you by certain enemies, because when you do it counts as double the exp compared to just blocking them.
You are able to pick from one of 5 different masters of their own craft to get the countryside back in the right hands, so here is the rundown or the choices you will have.
1: Elf – The elf, is the fastest character and has the farthest range of any of the men you can choose from but the problem is he has no defense, and dies very easily. He is the only character that cannot increase his defense throughout the game, and he cannot even equip a shield like all the others can, he is the worst character in my opinion but an experienced player can actually do quite well with him if you can counter constantly.
2: Wizard- Ok this wizard is not the same as the one in quiz and dragons who kicked way too much ass for his own good. This wizard has low defense and low speed, but has the second biggest range and has the best magic….which should be pretty obvious. His defense is upgradable, although the speed of his attacks are not. To begin the game he honestly sucks, with no strength but eventually becomes what might be the strongest in the game, he also gains the ability to do multi-hit attacks, so that helps out a lot.
3: Fighter- The fighter is a big, brute of a man. He has decent speed and defense which can be very helpful if you can use them effectively. His magic is by far the worst but he makes up for it by regaining his health the fastest out of all the characters. He can also wield a shield that can be used to deflect certain attacks from enemies such as bows, and sword attacks.
4: Cleric-By the grace of God this man has the best defense and actually is a very easy character to use even for a beginner. His biggest drawback is the fact that he has no speed or agility, but to counteract that his magic and strength is pretty high up there. He also gets a shield to defend himself with, and he seems to level faster than the other characters for some reason.
5: Dwarf- This man has balls of steel, and can swing an axe like no ones business. He has what I would say is the second slowest attack speed, but is actually quite fast with decent defense, and has crazy agility for such a little man beast. He also has the worst range, and really weak magic which should be no suprise.He like the fighter and cleric carries a shield that is very effective if used right.
To be completely honest if I had to choose between them, I normally pick the fighter or the cleric. To me they are the most balanced and are very good for people that have never played and they are even good for the most experienced veterans as well.
These are the men you will get to choose from and to be honest, they all look like they are ready to kill everything in their paths.
As soon as you pick your character you are thrust into the action and have to traverse through 16 different levels on your quest. You will travel across the countryside, go into caves, go on a viking ship and a lot of other locations as well. The controls for this game are broken down to two buttons, one to attack and the other to jump. If you push the two together you will use your magical ability the only downside to this is the fact that when used you will actually lose health, and if you are a character like the fighter who’s magic is not up to snuff then there really is no point in even using it. If you have a character that has a shield you can hit back on the joystick at the perfect time to deflect certain attacks and that is very important unless you want to keep pumping quarters into the machine, or having to reset your SNES cartridge. The game-play is classic in the sense that you can tell the game is from the early 90′s but in no way am I knocking it for that reason. It is actually alot of fun and quite addicting from the first time you slash, shoot an arrow, or whatever your character does to destroy your enemies. I will be honest a lot of the stages are short, but the ones that are not can actually be quite brutal on the ass kicking. Mind you, in this game you will go up against, minotaurs, werewolves, mummies, wraiths, dragons, wizards, lizard-men, giant spiders, and a lot more in the game. Each of the bosses are hard with the exception of the wraith who can be very easy if you get the timing down just right. If you have the manhood to make it all the way to the final boss you will be in one hell of a fight for your life. You have to fight Gildess and I shit you not he takes up about 75% of the screen when he is on it. His attacks are that he can grab you, spit fireballs, and just engulf you in flame. The biggest challenge is that he is so damn big it is so easy to think your about to ruin his world only to have him turn you into a human bonfire.
This is one of the bosses, and yes hes a gray dragon mixed with a knight which is one of the most bad-ass things ever invented. Sadly I cannot find a picture of the final boss Gildess, which is why I have found a video to show him instead.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EaiSekPniRs&feature=PlayList&p=E814C727A6FAFBDD&index=15
The music to this game is very important because I really think that Capcom nailed it perfectly. They took older sound effects, and mixed them with different music and made it unbelievable. The one piece of music that sticks out is when you get to fight the final boss Gildess, it honestly is one of the most epic pieces of music I have ever heard when it comes to fighting a boss.
Is there any reason that Capcom threw mummies into this game? Probably for the same reason there is a ninja in Quiz and Dragons.
To this day I will play this game and be remembered about the first time I showed a good friend of mine how awesome it is as we were drinking Kettle One Vodka. Each time that we get the opportunity to, we will still play this game to this day because it truly is one of the best games that Capcom has ever made, its just a shame that a lot of the good things they have made always get slept on. I can compare them to the music industry actually, most of what is awesome is overshadowed by all the things that people remember them being famous for. If you ever get the chance to play this on MAME or SNES you really need to do it, this game has a high ranking on the Martyr seal of approval. The only problem is that the SNES is inferior to the MAME by far in my opinion, hell you can’t even play with three people on the SNES like you could in the arcade which to me is a huge damn shame. I really wish that more games like this existed, but Capcom did make two Dungeon and Dragons arcade games which from what I have seen are kinda similar so eventually I will get to them but until them please find a way to play this game, and if you don’t like it you can send your mail to me and I will refuse to read it due to an invalid argument on your behalf.
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