ATARI 2600            ODYSSEY 2            INTELLIVISION            COLECOVISION            COMPUTERS

PUBLISHER: Imagic RELEASED: 1983 PROGRAM: David Ross FORMAT: Cartridge

Imagic released game titles on just about every popular game console of the time period, so it's no surprise that the Colecovision saw a handful of releases as well. With its serious graphical capabilities, these Colecovision titles are among the best looking of all the Imagic releases. Dragonfire is one such example. Unfortunately, it seems that most of the developmental effort focused on the visuals and somehow forgot to shore up the play control. The sluggish play control and streaky hit detection make this one of the worst-controlling versions of Dragonfire ever released. The game basically features two scenes. The first scene is the castle drawbridge level, in which you must make your way across the castle's bridge jumping and ducking underneath the many fireballs the dragons toss your way. Once you reach the far side of the bridge, you'll then enter the king's treasure room where you'll have to run around gathering up the many treasures lying around the floor. The dragon at the bottom of the room will continually breathe a barrage of fireballs at you. Once you've gathered all the treasures up, you can then exit the room. You'll be transported back to the drawbridge scene to start the entire process all over again, this time with more fireballs coming your way and at a much faster rate of speed. The Colecovision version of Dragonfire looks almost exactly like the Commodore 64 version in terms of visuals, and the castle looks fantastic and very detailed in its construction. The Colecovision also has the 3-D treasure room found in many of the home computer renditions of the game. The only downside to this is that the dragon doesn't move around at all. Instead, he merely tilts his head slightly to follow your movements. It seems a shame to spoil such a great looking level with a dragon that doesn't even bother to move around.  Dragonfire on the Colecovision proves that flashy visuals don't mean anything if you don't have the play control to back it up.

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