Castle of Dragon

NES

Seta U.S.A. Inc. - 1989

So. I bet you’re wondering about a couple of things right off the bat- first- Castle of Dragon? Isn’t that horrifyingly grammatically incorrect? Yes. Yes it is. Second- Who the hell is Seta U.S.A. anyway? Would you like to know why you’ve never heard of Seta and never will again? Because Castle of Dragon is an AWFUL game. Really, it makes me want to tape my lips to an exhaust pipe. In a good way.

Have you ever wondered what would happen if Zelda II and Castlevania were glued together and beaten with a metal bat a few times? Well, this isn’t quite as good as that, but it is quite similar.

Plot. Right. So At the beginning of the game, a little red blob flies into a castle and carries a little white blob away. What just happened? I hope, one day, to know. Perhaps blob warfare, perhaps plot. Now you are in the WENLARY CASTLE. I guess it’s your castle, but who really knows? It’s hard to tell. If it IS indeed your castle, then, buddy, you’ve got a skeleton/zombie/bat/fireball infestation problem that you should probably take care of. Once you clear the area, it’s on the the HERESY FOREST! Who comes up with these names? Well, you beat up the same crappy enemies for a while and make your way to the DARKLARZA CASTLE!!! I wish I was making this up. You fart around for a while and try to beat up random monsters, gathering strength for the all but unbeatable dragon lodged in the middle of the castle.

The gameplay ususally consists of fight an enemy, Walk, Kill bats/fireballs for no apparent reason(or don’t, it really doesn’t seem to matter), fight another enemy, Repeat. More often than not, the only way to dispatch the enemy is to beat the tar out of them before they beat the tar out of you, so you run up to them and beat them with whatever’s handy, and hope that your life doesn’t run out before theirs. This is true of almost all enemies except for a very few. Even then it’s hard to do because the game slows down a lot and the controls are lacking.

One of the biggest problems in Castle of Dragon is the fact that you have only one life. If you die, you have to start over FROM THE BEGINNING. Playing through the first few stages over and over again is like powersanding your toes. To be fair, the game does console you in the fact that your life gauge gets bigger the more enemies you beat the tar out of. However, the jumping is kind of quirky, and you can easily fall down a hole. Then it’s back to toe powersanding.

What liked: It may be retarded like a monkey on pills, but it’s got a certain simplistic charm about it.

What disliked: Controls, enemies, repetitiveness, unoriginality, grammar, zombies, armadillos, enemies that spit.

What to expect: An unenthusiastic rip-off. Tar-out-of beating.

What not to expect: Non-blob plot

What's so different from this and other games of it's genre: sprites are larger than usual, game is eventually non-linear

Ratings on:

Control: 5 (nothing unexpected, when it works, that is)

Graphics: 3(repetitive, bad, garish, orange)

Sound: 6 (not totally obnoxious. Very intersting at times.)

Style: 2 (Darklarza! It kinda makes me giggle when I say it.)

1st hour: 4 (Ok, this is kinda weird, but I’ll give it some time.)

5th hour: 2 (This game is turning on a sitcom and always seeing the same episode.)

1st week: (Casle of Dragon = coaster)

#1 reason why I hate this game: I beat the (insert enemy here) and fell down a goddam hole and now my toes are completely sanded off.

by Free”if you ever put tofu in pumpkin pie again, I’ll kill you” Ohio