Not many video games have enjoyed a longer stay on the market than Dragon's Lair. Sure, older arcade classics like the original Pac-Man, Asteroids, and Donkey Kong are still out there, but they're usually packaged as part of a compilation disc with dozens of other retro games. On the other hand, Dragon's Lair all by itself has seen over twenty different home versions since its 1983 arcade debut, and a new fully polygonal cel-shaded remake, Dragon's Lair 3D, was released just last year on the game's 20th anniversary.

To further celebrate the occasion, Digital Leisure issued a Dragon's Lair 20th Anniversary Special Edition set on DVD, and has recently ported it to the PC in a deluxe four-CD version. Included is the original game, the arcade sequel Dragon's Lair II: Time Warp, the futuristic spin-off Space Ace, and a disc full of bonus materials. Has the definitive be-all, end-all edition of Dragon's Lair finally arrived? Maybe . . . but don't count on it being the last home version of the game by a long shot.

Let's examine what's inside the Anniversary Special Edition, disc by disc:

Dragon's Lair: The best transfer and presentation values were put into this first disc of the set, probably because the original game has been the most celebrated over the years. As in previous CD releases, control is handled via the keyboard, with the arrow keys moving Dirk the Daring (when the situation allows it), and the space bar functioning as the sword. This works just fine, and the game responds to the keystrokes quickly enough that most deaths will be the fault of the gamer alone, not because of a delay in processing commands (as was often the case with the DVD versions). The time window given for reacting to the flashing indicators onscreen even seems a tad more forgiving than in the arcade versions.

This CD is also the only one of the group to feature a DVD style front-end menu, along with an enhanced "watch mode" that sports five different methods of viewing the game's animation: Full game with deaths, Full game without deaths, Full game with new scenes, New scenes only, and Selected individual scenes based on production names. The six minutes of new deleted scenes included are a great addition and contain never-before-seen creatures and rooms in the dragon’s castle that were cut from the original release, as well as extended versions of existing sequences. All of the deleted scenes are 100% finished color animation that fits right in with the look of the rest of the game. Perhaps they were cut for length considerations or because they didn't flow as well from a gameplay perspective (although they're just fine from a viewing standpoint).

Space Ace is a futuristic twist on Dragon's Lair that trades Dirk and his damsel in distress, Daphne, for a space pilot named Dexter and his girlfriend, Kimberly. This time it's the evil Commander Borf who's kidnapped Kimmie, and Dexter's intergalactic quest to rescue her is complicated by Borf's "Infanta-ray," which has the power to shrink him down to a pint-sized kid. Space Ace hit arcades shortly after Dragon's Lair in the fall of 1983.

The presentation of the Space Ace and Dragon's Lair II discs feels a little barebones compared to the range of options available on CD 1. A title menu would have been a nice addition for the other two games as well. Instead, they automatically start playing their trailers upon booting up, and only have limited play options available from a pull-down file menu. There's a Watch mode, but no ability to skip, fast-forward, or rewind (though there is a pause). And unfortunately, there aren't any deleted scenes like those on the first disc.

The lack of an option to view the many scene-specific death animations is particularly disappointing, because the deaths are half the fun of the game (when you’re not the one putting in the quarters). Instead, to see all of the hilarious and gruesome demises that the animators came up with, one would have to manually play through with infinite lives and then make sure to die at every step of the way before continuing on - a time-consuming and tedious task.

Dragon's Lair II: Time Warp is the least celebrated game of the series. This sequel had a very limited arcade release in 1991, and by that point a lot of the animated laser disc game's novelty value had worn off. Time Warp enjoyed only a fraction of the popularity of the first two games, which is unfortunate because it contains the most dazzlingly imaginative animation of the three.