DOUBLE DRAGON DOUBLE DRAGON is a translation of the martial arts game that has been a favorite in arcades and on the Nintendo system. Binary Design converted it for the computer, Arcadia (ROCKFORD, ROADWARS) and Tradewest publish it, and Electronic Arts distributes it. DRAGON features colorful graphics, fast action, simple joystick control, and a 2-player mode. This review is based on the Commodore 64/128 version; IBM-PC version notes follow. DRAGON is okay as an arcade game, although (as noted in the instruction manual) the limited memory of the C64 forced the programmers to make some compromises: The characters were created from "stacked sprites," a coding design that leaves a gap between the upper and lower portions of their onscreen bodies. While this probably won't mar your enjoyment of the game, it does illustrate a burgeoning problem: Game programmers are losing control. The plot of DRAGON concerns twin brothers, Billy and Jimmy Lee, a pair of good-guy thugs with extensive street and martial arts knowledge. Billy's girlfriend Marian has been kidnapped by the Black Warriors, a street gang led by the elusive and mysterious Shadow Boss. In order to rescue Marian, you must use martial arts skills and whatever weapons you find to defeat the members of the Black Warriors, including Shadow Boss. In the alleys, slums, and backstreets of the city, you'll battle Lopar, Abobo, Williams (who wields a baseball bat), Linda (who cracks a whip), Chintai (a karate master), and Shadow Boss (who uses a machine gun). The C64 screen display consists of a scrolling area made up of a city street, burned-out buildings, and factory docks. Your character, controlled by the joystick, moves through the scenery. At certain points, one or more members of the Black Warriors appear to impede your progress -- which is to say, they want to kill you. DRAGON is controlled with a joystick that works in two modes. Without using the trigger button, moving the stick steers your character in one of eight directions. Moving the stick and then pushing the button results in any of three jump maneuvers, a punch, three different kicks, an elbow smash, and a head butt. On defeating an opponent with a weapon, you'll automatically acquire that weapon, which can be used by way of a button push. Below the main display are energy bars, a lives-remaining indicator, and score. A character starts with five lives; when the energy indicator runs down, a life is lost. As in the arcade version, DRAGON offers five levels, each of which descends deeper into gang territory. In 2-player mode, both brothers will be onscreen, and both energy/lives/score displays will be active. That's about it. The graphics on the C64 are fair -- hardly excellent, but not particularly cheesy, either. Gameplay is frantic for the wrong reasons, and sometimes frustrating. It is impossible to stand toe-to-toe with any Black Warrior: two combat moves and you're kissing the pavement. The only way to defeat an opponent is to run around like an imbecile and perform a lot of forward, backward, and straight-up jumps. This serves to elude an attacker so that you can wait for him (or her or them) to catch up. When he (or she or they) does catch up, you'll have time for one or two kicks to a face, at which point you'll have to do more running and jumping. You'd think that with all this activity, your opponents would get tired of chasing you and drop dead from exhaustion. My only question concerning DOUBLE DRAGON is this: Why was it ported to the Commodore? Scores of (original) arcade and strategy/arcade games have been created for this machine -- DELTA PATROL and MAINFRAME come to mind immediately. On the flip side, I can't think of any arcade translations (other than maybe ROCKFORD) that have been worth the effort. Well, obviously, the programmers thought DRAGON would be worth the effort.... DOUBLE DRAGON more or less fills the bill as an arcade game, and I'm sure arcade gamers will be pleased. Personally, I'd rather go to the arcade room. IBM-PC VERSION NOTES The MS-DOS version of DOUBLE DRAGON is not one of Arcadia's finest efforts. Not that it's a poor translation, but it does have a major problem that can add up to a frustrating game experience (depending on your system). I think Arcadia has done better in the past. ROCKFORD, for example, is a high-resolution, fast-action arcade game (also from Arcadia) and is absolutely phenomenal in the way it overcomes the IBM's limitations. DOUBLE DRAGON isn't quite as ambitious; more's the pity because it's a popular arcade game and is liable to garner more attention than ROCKFORD. The game comes on two 5-1/4" diskettes; the 3-1/2" version is available from Electronic Arts (the distributor) for a $10.00 exchange fee. This is an amazingly expensive (and generally unwarranted) option. You can probably find a way around it; the disks are entirely without protection, so you can copy the files to a 3-1/2" disk (if you have access to a machine that sports both drives formats). Your machine will require 512K and a CGA, EGA, or Tandy (for Tandy 1000 family computers) graphics card. Although the manual makes no mention of a hard drive, a "README" file describes the simple installation procedure. No key disk is required. The graphics are excellent if you have EGA. CGA graphics are...well, CGA graphics. The backgrounds especially are colorful, atmospheric, highly detailed, and truly of arcade quality. The bodies tend to be a little grainy, and some strange color combinations are used that make details hard to see. But overall, the graphics are superb. As in other versions, two players can battle the villains at once. You may, if you wish, start a single-player game and add a second player at any time; however, the game slows down slightly every time a new character enters the screen. Therefore, if you have two players on screen battling three or four bad dudes, you'll suffer a noticeably funky slowdown, and gameplay will become awkward: A basic 4.77 MHz PC may turn out to be too slow. Forcing CGA mode speeds up the gameplay, if you consider CGA graphics adequate. I don't. The box will tell you that a joystick is optional. This is where I vehemently disagree and, in fact, encountered DOUBLE DRAGON's outstanding weakness: its interface. With a joystick, the game gets my nearly unconditional approval (given the speed caveat mentioned above). Without a joystick, though, you're up the bitstream without a paddle. Get this: In a single player game, you control the right-left movements with the "O" and "P" keys, and the up-down movements with the "Q" and "A" keys. The space key assumes the role of fire button. So, if you want to move diagonally down and to the left, you hit "O" then "A"; if you want to make a defensive/offensive move (a kick, jump, punch, elbow, head butt, or other fancy move), you have to press the correct two- or three-key combination. The numerical keypad, usually available in these cases, is only functional in a two-player game (to the second player). This arrangement is positively unworkable. Not only is it unintuitive, but a two-player game requires that both players have small hands; therefore, I deem a joystick mandatory equipment for the MS-DOS version of DOUBLE DRAGON. Moreover, if you're planning on playing many two-player games, I'd recommend two joysticks, not with a "Y" adapter (which won't permit two-player simultaneous play), but with a genuine two-port game card. There are several on the market, but tracking them down may take some work. DOUBLE DRAGON is a fine translation that goes further toward recreating the arcade game than some of the other ports (noticeably the SEGA and NINTENDO versions). The characters are larger and closer to their arcade counterparts. But my recommendation demands that you have an EGA card and at least one joystick. If you lack either or both of these, you should definitely try the game before you plunk down the cash. Ideally, you should purchase the game from a dealer who will let you return it if you find it unsatisfactory. DOUBLE DRAGON is published by Arcadia and Tradewest, and distributed by Electronic Arts. *****DOWNLOADED FROM P-80 SYSTEMS (304) 744-2253