WELCO METOT HENEX TLEVEL - Rise of the Dragon

Publisher: Dynamix Original Developer: Dynamix Sega CD Port: Game Arts Release: 1992

Although adventure games were booming on the PC in the early nineties, the genre was massively underrepresented on home consoles. The Sega CD held the promise of bringing the genre to the platform. Leading up to the release of the add-on, Sierra in particular was reported to be supporting it in a big way.

Developer Dynamix had been acquired by Sierra in 1990, and so came along for the ride on the Sega CD. We’ve already covered one of its games - The Adventures of Willy Beamish. And while that is a great game, it’s a technical mess on the Sega CD. A fully voiced game where every clip suffered terrible load times, creating knock-on issues with the cartoon-style animation and ruining the pacing of just about every scene. The loading issue was so bad that Dynamix included a sort of “toy” to pass the time that users could play with by holding down one of the controller buttons.

Dynamix founder Jeff Tunnell has since pointed to the fact that Willy Beamish was the developer’s first experience with the hardware. Luckily, Rise of the Dragon doesn’t suffer from any of the issues found in Willy Beamish. And that has a lot to do with the port being performed by Sega CD experts Game Arts. The game was originally published by Sega in Japan.

Rise of the Dragon is a cyberpunk adventure along the lines of Blade Runner or Konami’s Snatcher. Actually, when the game was released in Japan Sega appended the subtitle “A Blade Hunter Mystery.” That’s a reference to Ridley Scott’s cinematic masterpiece if I’ve ever seen one.

In Rise of the Dragon you play as private detective William Hunter. The Los Angeles nightlife has become a dangerous pastime. A new designer drug is mutating and killing people. During his investigation, Hunter discovers a much larger plot by the Chinese mafia under the direction of the mysterious kingpin, Hwang.

Rise of the Dragon really leans into the film noir aesthetic, and was definitely not created for children. It received an MA-17 rating on the system due to some strong language and references to drug use, prostitution, sex and partial nudity. At least one scene was deleted from from the port, where it’s suggested that Hunter has sex with his girlfriend following their date.

The trip from the PC to the Sega CD the game went from being exclusively text based to fully voiced, featuring some pretty big name voice actors including Cam Clarke (Robotech, TMNT) and Tresse MacNeille (Tiny Toons, The Simpsons) in the lead roles. Every single piece of dialogue in the game is spoken on the Sega CD, with varying levels of acting. Some of the voices can be downright hilarious. Especially the hobo at the train station who keeps shouting about “DOOOOOOM!” Either way, it’s a great upgrade to the console version that makes the whole game feel much more modern.

As with other PC ports on the system, Rise of the Dragon looks noticeably different on the Sega CD thanks to the limited color palette. The whole game has a slightly greenish tinge to it, which kind of works with the subject matter. I mean...hey, it worked years later in The Matrix. Why not Rise of the Dragon?

Rise of the Dragon often gets forgotten on the Sega CD, which I think has a lot to do with Snatcher being so valuable and, let’s be honest, a better game. But that doesn’t make Rise bad by any stretch of the imagination. I love that we got two separate video game homages to Blade Runner on the system. It’s worth checking out both of them.