Dragon's Lair: The Legend

Dirk the Daring held the maid's limp and lifeless body gently in his arms, as he surveyed the carnage of the bloody battle scene. With the last gasps of her dying breath, Princess Daphne's loyal servant, Dirk, had been told the horrible tale of their undoing. It seemed a traitor in their ranks had informed the evil Mordroc that the princess' caravan was carrying the mythical Life Stone, an ancient artifact rumored to give its owner limitless power and eternal life. His barbaric army had ambushed the princess' helpless band, mercilessly slaying all but the beautiful Princess whom they had taken into captivity. Fortunately, before the attack, the maid has used her limited powers of sorcery to shatter the Life Stone into hundreds of pieces and scatter them throughout the land. Dirk knew what he must now do, though he did not relish the task. The Life Stone must be reassembled before Princess Daphne could be rescued from Mordroc's evil clutches![1]

The player can use either the A or B button to jump and left or right on the control pad to walk. The Start button pauses and the Select button resets if pressed on the pause screen.

The goal of the game is to move screen-by-screen collecting all 194 fragments of the Life Stone, then reach the final screen where the Good Knight lies in a deathlike trance.[1] Each screen has a set width and the player advances to the next by reaching the edge. Dirk begins with 10 lives and loses a life by either landing on a deadly object (certain spikes, rail tracks, deadly water), falling from a great height, or depleting all of his energy meter. Dirk has no weapon, as there are no enemies or bosses. There is also no on-screen display that shows the player their remaining lives, energy meter, number of Life Stone fragments collected, or score. Only after a death does the game show the remaining lives and fragments collected. The score is revealed after a game over.

The world consists of 11 distinct regions covering themes from the medieval Dragon's Lair setting.

There are some differences in gameplay between the European release and the Japanese/North American releases.:

Developed by Elite Systems, the game is a port and re-skin of the 1985 ZX Spectrum game Roller Coaster. Even though the graphics have been altered to a medieval theme, many areas resemble amusement park rides. There are three mine cart sections that were clearly roller coasters, spinning objects that match a Ferris wheel, and several buildings that were once bumper car rides. Elite Systems acted as publisher for European regions, Epic/Sony Records published in Japan, and CSG Imagesoft and UbiSoft both published North American versions.

The US version of the game received almost entirely negative reviews. EGM rated the game a 17 out of 40.[9] It currently holds a 1.63 out of 5 user rating on GameFAQs, placing it 1,052 out of 1,068 Game Boy games.[10]

Reviews of the European version were more favorable, even receiving scores as high as 93% and 5/5 stars.