Zzap


Double Dragon

Publisher: Melbourne House
Machine: Amiga 500

 
Published in Zzap #47

Double Dragon

The Shadow Boss has kidnapped your true love and taken her to the Black Warrior hideout! You must set off to the rescue... once yu've found your deadly karate slippers...

Members of the Shadow Boss's gang have been left along the route to 'duff you up', but you're an ace karate expert and can smash them in just as much. Whoar! Not only are you a whizz with your hands and feet, but also with weapons which found along the route. To rescue your girl, you must battle through various stages to the hideout itself, where the Boss awaits...

Can you do it, or will you end up looking like ground beef on the pavement?

Gordo

Double Dragon

The conversion of Double Dragon is one of those that falls into the 'long awaited' category. Now the Amiga version has arrived, we can all breathe a sigh of relief... well, maybe not. The graphics are great, as is the sound (the title music is sampled from the coin-op), but the game itself doesn't present too much of a challenge.

The aggressive feel of the fighting in the original has been mostly lost, making the game a lot easier. All said it's not a bad game, it's just got something missing...

Maff

Double Dragon is one of my favourite arcade games, so when I saw the pretty title page and listened to the excellent music (both exactly like the arcade machine) I thought I was in for a treat. However, after two games of an average beat-'em-up, I found that I'd finished it. In a total time of around twenty minutes. Not much in the way of lastability, don't you think?

Double Dragon

Maybe I'm being too harsh, as I've completed the arcade version already, but as I remember it wasn't that easy! My advice is to try it first.

Verdict

Presentation 60%
Dodgy multi-load and tricky controls let the side down. The rest is fine though.

Graphics 81%
Quite close to the original, but they should really be closer than that.

Double Dragon

Sound 83%
Arcade-identical music and 'unusual' in-game effects.

Hookability 87%
Great fun to play the arcade classic for free at first...

Lastability 34%
...but it's rather easy to complete within a few goes.

Overall 62%
Not a bad game, but a rather weak conversion.