THANATOS

Thanatos has a bit of trouble with a local human who insists on lobbing spears at his scaly hide. Nasty man must have read too many St George stories

Let’s face it, the dragons of this world have had a pretty bad press. Ever since George did his bit of dragon bashing, people have been going around being very butch and sticking it to these badly misunderstood creatures.

Quite understandably, the dragons have always resented this. Lovers of the peaceful life, constantly being harassed by these tin plate tinheads just didn’t fit in with their lifestyle. Thus, in order to be able to put their feet up and get a good (k)night’s kip, your average dragon has to torch a good fifty mile radius around his home just to be sure of a bit of ’ush. And thus the legend of the bad old drag’ with a breath problem was born. So, he makes a snack of the odd maiden or two? Well, nobody’s perfect!

In a bid to rehabilitate the image of these poor old creatures, Mike Richardson has foresaken his previous hi-tech worlds of fast cars and high flying helicopters for a more rustic setting.

In this pastoral land, the good dragon — Thanatos the Destroyer — must do his duty. The good Sorceress Eros has been imprisoned by an evil Lord of the underworld, and to add to her problems the rest of her belongings — spell books, trusty cat and so on — have been locked up in separate castles. These must be restored to the Sorceress so that she can bring light and enlightenment to the land, and forever clear the good name of dragons.

The Dragon is controlled by joystick or keys with up, down, accelerate and decelerate. Hitting the fire button does just that — the Dragon breathes fire, either up or down depending on the up/down keys. Pressing fire and the decelerate key causes the dragon to reverse direction.

The action takes place against a scrolling background. Thanatos and the meanies move in the foreground while mountains and villages in the background scroll past more slowly giving a perspective effect. All the meanies and Thanatos are animated: men throw spears, gulls wheel around in the sky and sea serpents writhe in the sea and plunge back into the water.

The dragon flies through the air by flapping his huge wings, waddles around on the ground on claw, or can paddle and swim in the sea. To take off, just trudge along and press the ‘up’ key. Apart from breathing fire, the drag’ can set about his foes by picking them up with his talons and carrying them aloft. They are dropped again by pressing fire, and plunge to their death. By hitting another baddie with the falling body, two ‘birds’ can be killed with one stone and extra points won.

The higher the level, the more damage is done to the dragon with each brush with a meanie. These come in various shapes and sizes. Killer bees mob him, nasty two-headed dragons give him a hard time, sea serpents are out for his blood and deadly spiders hang from silver threads in the caves. On the ground he comes up against the odd pack of wolves, and has to cope with soldiers chucking things at him.

Thanatos’s life force can be restored by taking a quick breather on the ground. His life force is shown by a beating heart and as he takes damage the beat quickens. If he gets really badly damaged, the heart turns blue. If he runs out of fire, he has to refuel by taking a quick snack of nasty witch. But watch out for the knight on a white charger doing his dragon slaying bit. The only way to deal with him is to grab him with your talons while he’s galloping along — very tricky.

To win the game, Thanatos has to rescue Eros from one castle, and then take her on his back to other castles to collect various objects. There are three castles on the lower levels and four on harder levels, and it’s no day trip rescuing damsels when you’re a dragon...