Through their official Instagram account, New Wave Toys revealed a first-look at their newest RepliCade arcade mini prototype machine. The game in question? Don Bluth’s 80s arcade Laserdisc point and click masterpiece, Dragon’s Lair.
While Dragon’s Lair on home media isn’t anything new (hell, I bought the Blu Ray release in 2007, I think, plus Limited Run Games just shipped their now out-of-stock DL Trilogy) having it preserved in arcade machine form (regardless of size) is hugely important. At a time when games were running off chip sets and pixels, Dragon’s Lair took the world by storm with its motion picture quality full animation led by master ‘all your movies make me cry’ legend Don Bluth.
And dude…come on…Princess Daphne and Dirk. Heart eyes for days.
The long and short without getting into too many technical aspects that this internet articlist isn’t qualified to discuss, New Wave Toys made an excellent decision with Dragon’s Lair stuffed into one of their mini RepliCade machines. Because Laserdisc technology was expensive and hard to come by, manufacture, maintain, and really afford back in 1983 when Dragon’s Lair was released, it’s a difficult machine to find in good quality among collectors. While other games in New Wave’s catalog such as Centipede, Tempest, Street Fighter II, and even the upcoming Asteroids have been easily licensed and released on a host of platforms, it’s more difficult to find Dragon’s Lair outside of DVD or Blu Ray release (like I’d mentioned, those Limited Run PS4 releases from October 2018 are gone, sold out, disappeared.
New Wave Toys have also released images of their Asteroids machine and their darling little USB hub that looks like– you’ve guessed it– a change machine.
Ah, the lost days of the quarter are among us again.