Dragonsphere

Moby ID: 2257
DOS Specs
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The young Callash has been just crowned the king of Gran Callahach. Twenty years ago the land was in grave peril, as the evil sorcerer Sanwe planned to conquer and ruin it. But the old king's court wizard Ner-Tom magically imprisoned Sanwe using the powers of the Dragonsphere spell. The sorcerer swore to avenge his humiliation once the spell's energy runs out. Now, this time has come, and the young hero must defeat Sanwe before he breaks free. As he approaches the sorcerer's prison, he is yet to realize that dealing with Sanwe will lead to startling realizations concerning his own self, and unravel a new sinister plot...

Dragonsphere is a graphic adventure in the classic third-person LucasArts and Sierra style, and the third adventure game by MicroProse, similar visually and gameplay-wise to Rex Nebular and the Cosmic Gender Bender. The interaction with the game world is performed by applying one of the ten different verb commands to objects and/or people. Additionally, each object has several unique, specific verb commands that can be applied giving the player quite a number of possible combinations of object usage and sometimes more straight forward resolution to the problem. The game contains vast amounts of unique text responses to player's actions and branching dialogue with characters. Some of them are fatal for the main character so they need to be chosen wisely or accordingly to the presented facts and observations. The puzzles are, for the most part, inventory-based. The game features hand-painted backgrounds and some digitized animation.

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Credits (DOS version)

72 People (64 developers, 8 thanks) · View all

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 79% (based on 18 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.9 out of 5 (based on 44 ratings with 5 reviews)

Above average adventure from mid 90's

The Good
In the old days, when adventure games were in their infancy, the plot lines were quite simple. Perfect example out of this would be Sierra's King's Quest Series, of which two first games were rather simple "hunt for the lost objects without any bigger plot".

When the games grew, so did the stories, and Dragonsphere is a good example of how the plot can be more complex than it first seems, for it is the plot, that keeps Dragonsphere above the gray mass of "hero needs to save the day" games.

There also are a variety of puzzles, that don't require any object collection. Speaking and paying attention is enough.

The Bad
As much I did enjoy the plot line, I really need to say, that there are some elements in the game, which I could have lived without. Actually, if those elements would have been removed, or totally changed, like those pesky, annoying elves, the game could have been a lot better.

There also are some amount of leap of logic puzzles, which make the player think "What in the name of all mighty were the designers smoking?". But that is the case with almost all old-school adventures.

The Bottom Line
Dragonsphere certainly is above average adventure. The art is pretty enough, animation is well made and the story is rather interesting. Music in the other hand isn't anything worth mentioning, as it just lingers in the background. There isn't anything to complain about it, but nothing to remember about either.

Voice acting is decent, when compared in some of the mid 90's games, which truly gave new meaning to the phrase "bad acting", but the game works fine either way: with or without it.

So if you are interested about a game, with some interesting plot elements and all in all okay quality, then go for it, if you can find the game some where. It certainly has its place on the shelf of any adventure fan.

DOS · by tomimt (397) · 2006

Great fantasy-like adventure

The Good
Simple yet has great hand-drawn graphics. Good background music, while it's been out only at the begining of 1994. You don't get bored with this game. It's not too hard and not easy at all.



The Bad
What didn't I like? Umm, nothing? When I started playing it seriously I didn't stop before I managed to finish it. The ending was a bit disappointing but still, You can't expect a real outro for no CD games, could you?

The Bottom Line
If you liked the basic idea behind King's Quest series this one is kind of better since it makes a whole new world and doesn't use the Greek mythology and other things as in King's Quest.

DOS · by Auphyr Doitch (9) · 2001

Microprose murkiness

The Good
Its a medieval fantasy point-and-click adventure. I like the genre and I liked this. I especially liked the butterfly king on the toadstool (see screen shots). The story itself is good, and takes an unexpected and interesting turn half-way through, when you turn out to be something other than you think you are.

The Bad
It's a bit murky - both graphics and sound. In one way this adds atmosphere, but on another it suggests that the developers were short of cash. It has the feel of an older game, as if it was a long time in development. For example, although released on CD, the music has the plinky-plonky quality of older games that fit on a couple of floppies, and the voice acting is pretty poor, to the point I had to switch it off.

The Bottom Line
Not the best introduction to the genre - but worth playing all the same.

DOS · by jossiejojo (37) · 2004

[ View all 5 player reviews ]

Trivia

CD version

In addition to the disk version, Dragonsphere was also released on CD-ROM that featured full speech.

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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by ududy.

Linux added by Sciere. Windows, Macintosh added by MAT.

Additional contributors: Roger Wilco, Jeanne, Patrick Bregger.

Game added August 29, 2000. Last modified January 20, 2024.