Dragon's Lair and Other Marvels of Don Bluth

Today we talk about the creative genius behind Dragon's Lair and Space Ace, two of the first video games to blend traditional animation with joystick control. Meet one of the fathers of interactive movies and the man behind spectacular animated works that rattled the Disney empire. Someone who did all that deserves a special introduction... Ladies and gentlemen, the one and only, the incomparable, the talented Don Bluth!

Don Bluth's Early Career

In El Paso, Texas, on September 13, 1937, a little boy named Donald Virgil “Don” Bluth was born. That cloudy day (a fact NeoTeo staff is still trying to confirm) would be the first of the life of one of the most influential North American animators in history. After earning his university degree in English Literature, in the sixties, Mr. Bluth joined the army of animators of the world's largest media conglomerate : The Walt Disney Company.

After working on films like “101 Dalmatians”, “Sleeping Beauty” and “Robin Hood”, and after many ups and downs, lack of credit and money fights, Don Bluth decided in 1979 to leave the company of the evil mouse to found his own animation studio and enter the cartoon market. There, Don Bluth Productions and the short “Banjo The Woodpile Cat” were born.

Don Bluth's Video Games

In July 1982, Bluth released the acclaimed feature “The Secret of NIMH” and it was then that he was tempted with the idea of entering the world of video games based on the new interactive laser disc technology that was in vogue those days. The challenge was to develop a video game that maintained the quality of his animations but gave the player the ability to interact with the elements of the environment. Thus, in 1983, the title Dragon's Lair emerged, considered one of the first “interactive movies” where the user, besides enjoying a piece of traditional animation full of beauty, could actively participate in the plot of the adventure.

Published by Cinematronics, this arcade marked a milestone for its visual and narrative quality, quickly becoming a classic. It told the story of Dirk, a knight who would give his life to rescue Princess Daphne from the claws of the evil dragon Singe, who had locked the woman in a magic castle. The game mechanics presented a series of animations in which the player had to move the joystick or press the only button that controlled the sword within a given time segment.

The key was a central character who, although he seemed a brave hero who would face all risks to rescue the princess, was often his own fear that determined the course of actions with very funny and entertaining outcomes. The player did not control the character's movements, but rather had to be attentive to react quickly whenever the game demanded it.

The success of the title prompted Don Bluth to launch, just four months after Dragon's Lair's release, another adventure game, this time a space one, called Space Ace.

Using the same laser disc technology and maintaining the quality of animation films, Space Ace used the same mechanics as its predecessor, but it allowed choosing the difficulty level and a series of different paths throughout the story. Space Ace told the misadventures of the muscular Ace, who was attacked at the beginning of the game by Commander Borf with an “Infant Ray”, which turned him into a teenager, while his girlfriend Kimberly was kidnapped. Our goal was to guide Dexter (the more childish version of Ace) through different obstacles that appeared on the way that would lead him to rescue his girlfriend and save planet Earth from the terrible plans of the villain.

Don Bluth's Films

During 1984, Don Bluth and his team began collaborating with Steven Spielberg on the production of a film that would become a box office record. “An American Tail” was released in 1986, grossing more than 84 million dollars worldwide. That same year, Don moved his production company to Ireland, quickly becoming the largest animation studio in Europe. In 1988, with the release of “The Land Before Time”, Bluth achieved another box office record, leading critics to consider his last two works true animation classics.

By the end of the eighties, Don Bluth became one of those responsible for Disney's “renaissance”. The quality of his films was increasingly superior, and with films like “All Dogs Go to Heaven”, produced in 1989, this independent competitor, full of talent and good ideas, was putting Mickey Mouse's empire at risk. This led the millionaire mouse company to return to the roots of classic story animation. It was during this period, which extends from 1989 to 1999, when Disney produced excellent animated films such as “Beauty and the Beast”, “The Hunchback of Notre Dame”, “The Lion King” and “Pocahontas”, among others.

Dragon's Lair II: Time Warp

But for video game addicts, old Don had a surprise: in 1991, after eight years of development, Dragon's Lair II: Time Warp was released, the true sequel to Dragon's Lair. Years after the events of the first title, Dirk was married to Princess Daphne, and from that union a large number of children had come. A new villain named Mordroc captured the princess to force her to marry him. Dirk had to rescue her again to calm his children's anger. With the help of a talking time machine (which seemed “possessed” by the villain's brother), our hero had to travel through different dimensions, parallel universes, and historical periods to find his beloved. Linear and with hidden treasures, the game managed to become another industry classic, being re-released years later on new generation supports.

And More Movies!

Don Bluth's path in animation art continued with great successes in the nineties. There he produced new films like “Rock-a-Doodle” (1991), “Thumbelina” (1994), “A Troll in Central Park” (1994), and “The Pebble and the Penguin” (1995). However, his work was severely affected after ending his business and content production relationships with the great Spielberg. It was in 1997 when, with the film “Anastasia”, Don returned to the big leagues, grossing 140 million dollars and using the infallible formula of classic princess stories against cruel villains.

Then, combining traditional animation with computer techniques, Bluth dedicated himself to producing the film “Titan A.E.”, which appeared in theaters in 2000. Without the commercial success he expected, the animator began to move away from classic animation films to try again in the video game industry. Trying to take advantage of his fans' nostalgia, Don Bluth released in 2002 the game Dragon's Lair 3D: Return to the Lair. Based on the original 1983 game and with the same enemies and settings known to all, the title presented a series of new puzzles and an aesthetic based on the Cel Shading technique. However, the reviews were not entirely positive and even its reception by fans was very limited.

Without a doubt, Don Bluth is an artist who left an indelible mark on the industry of video games of high artistic quality and on animation films competing on the big screen. Thank you for so much, Don!