''Dragon View'' is a

side-scrolling A side-scrolling video game (alternatively side-scroller) is a video game viewed from a side-view camera angle where the screen follows the player as they move left or right. The jump from single-screen or flip-screen graphics to scrolling grap ...

role-playing Role-playing or roleplaying is the changing of one's behaviour to assume a role, either unconsciously to fill a social role, or consciously to act out an adopted role. While the ''Oxford English Dictionary'' offers a definition of role-playing ...

beat 'em up A beat 'em up (also known as brawler and, in some markets, beat 'em all) is a video game genre featuring hand-to-hand combat against a large number of opponents. Traditional beat 'em ups take place in Side-scrolling video game, scrolling, 2D c ...

for the

Super Nintendo Entertainment System The Super Nintendo Entertainment System, commonly shortened to Super Nintendo, Super NES or SNES, is a Fourth generation of video game consoles, 16-bit home video game console developed by Nintendo that was released in 1990 in Japan, 1991 in No ...

developed by Kotobuki System in November 1994 and published by

Kemco , from Kotobuki Engineering & Manufacturing Co., Ltd., is a Japanese video game developer and publisher established in 1984. It is headquartered in Kure, Hiroshima. Its best known franchises are the '' Kid Klown'' and ''Top Gear'' series, the ...

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere, Northern and Western Hemisphere, Western hemispheres. North America is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South Ameri ...

. Released in

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

as and otherwise known as ''Drakkhen II'', it is meant to be a sequel to ''

Drakkhen ''Drakkhen'' is an early-3D computer graphics, 3D role-playing video game, initially developed and published by Infogrames for the Amiga and Atari ST, and subsequently ported to several other platforms, including MS-DOS and Super Nintendo Enterta ...

'' although it bears little resemblance to its predecessor. It uses the same pseudo- 3D

overworld An overworld or a hub world is, in a broad sense, an area within a video game that interconnects all its levels or locations. They are mostly common in role-playing games, though this does not exclude other video game genres, such as some pla ...

system for which the series is most famous. Other features of ''Dragon View'' are its side-view

action role-playing game An action role-playing game (often abbreviated action RPG or ARPG) is a video game genre that combines core elements from both the action game and Role-playing video game, role-playing game genres. Definition Action role-playing games empha ...

(RPG) hybrid gameplay (used when exploring more detailed areas such as towns and

dungeons A dungeon is a room or Prison cell, cell in which prisoners are held, especially underground. Dungeons are generally associated with medieval castles, though their association with torture probably derives more from the Renaissance period. An o ...

), its well translated first-person storyline, and its emphasis on player-driven undirected exploration. In 2019, the game was re-released through emulation for

Windows Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...

. In 2022, a reproduction SNES cartridge was released by

Limited Run Games Limited Run Games, Inc. is an American video game distributor based in Apex, North Carolina. The company produces and sells limited quantities of physical video game copies via its website and select retail stores. Josh Fairhurst and Douglas B ...

Gameplay

The ''

'' series' most recognizable feature is its custom overworld engine. First used by the original

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers produced by Commodore International, Commodore from 1985 until the company's bankruptcy in 1994, with production by others afterward. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16-b ...

version of ''Drakkhen'', it was later used in the PC and SNES ports. The ''Dragon View'' version sports basic terrain

shading Shading refers to the depiction of depth perception in 3D models (within the field of 3D computer graphics) or illustrations (in visual art) by varying the level of darkness. Shading tries to approximate local behavior of light on the object's ...

and mountainlike "boundaries" that enclose areas of the continent. While not "True 3D", the

engine simulates depth on its own (without the aid of supplementary hardware such as the

Super FX The Super FX is a coprocessor on the Graphics Support Unit (GSU) added to select Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) video game ROM cartridge, cartridges, primarily to facilitate advanced 2D and 3D graphics. The Super FX chip was design ...

chip) using sprite scaling and rudimentary rendering. This system is able to run smoothly on standard SNES hardware because little more than half of the total screen area is ever in use. Since the top and bottom panels are completely static during overworld navigation, all hardware power is focused on rendering the first-person view. Even so,

framerate Frame rate, most commonly expressed in frame/s, or FPS, is typically the frequency (rate) at which consecutive images (frames) are captured or displayed. This definition applies to film and video cameras, computer animation, and motion capture s ...

s can suffer as many sprites are sometimes present on a single screen.

Reception

Notes

References

Works cited

* * * * *

External links

* {{moby game, id=/dragon-view 1994 video games Action role-playing video games Kemco games Piko Interactive games Role-playing video games Single-player video games Super Nintendo Entertainment System games Video games about dragons Video games developed in Japan Windows games