Rise of the Dragon

About

Rise of the Dragon is a point-and-click adventure laced with puzzle solving and real-time combat. You play William 'Blade' Hunter, a detective navigating a 2053 Los Angeles where a designer drug called MTZ has triggered mutations and crime. The game’s standout mechanic is its dynamic world: characters remember your dialogue and choices, and time moves forward whether you act or not. Offices close at night. Investigations race against deadlines. Conversations and fights branch based on prior decisions, making each playthrough feel personalized. The game balances gritty detective work with over-the-top fantasy, like a drug lord transforming into a mythical dragon. Released in 1990, it pushed narrative complexity with systems that tracked player actions across hours. While its DOS-era graphics feel dated, the branching consequences and multiple endings still resonate with fans of choice-driven stories. Over 30 years later, it remains a curious mix of noir intrigue and sci-fi spectacle.

Storyline

In 2053, William 'Blade' Hunter is a former Los Angeles Police Department officer turned private detective. When the mayor's rebellious daughter Chandra is found dead and horribly mutated after experimenting with a new designer drug called MTZ, Blade is called upon to track down those responsible. Blade makes contact with a streetwise friend of Chandra nicknamed "the Jake", who indicates Chen Lu as the dealer who had been supplying Chandra with the lethal drug. Blade goes to Chen Lu's apartment only to find Lu assassinated with an overdose of MTZ, as a punishment for attracting public attention by causing the death of a powerful man's daughter. As Blade tries to reconcile with his girlfriend Karyn, who works at the Crime Records Bureau, he enlists her help to track down Lu's accomplices and discover the mutagenic nature of the MTZ drug. It is revealed that the MTZ business is part of an underground Chinese Mafia operation led by Deng Hwang, a megalomaniacal drug kingpin intent on world domination. Blade also meets an old fortune teller, who tells him the present year coincides with that of the foretold coming of Chinese dragon Bahumat. Blade disrupts the MTZ production schedule by blowing up the local drug plant, but in doing so he is spotted by Hwang's men. Hwang has the Jake captured in an attempt to lure Blade into a trap, but Blade manages to rescue the Jake and later sabotages the Triad's plans to poison the Hollywood reservoir with MTZ and exterminate the population of Los Angeles. In retaliation, Hwang has Karyn kidnapped and strapped to a chair, threatening to inject MTZ into her system. Blade infiltrates Hwang's headquarters and, depending on the player's actions, either manages or fails to rescue Karyn. He eventually comes face-to-face with Hwang himself, who suddenly transforms into the dragon Bahumat. In a climactic final battle, Bahumat is defeated by Blade. Outside the headquarters, Blade is greeted by the mayor but angrily punches him for using Blade as a pawn in his crackdown operation and endangering his life and Karyn's. Blade then walks away either with Karyn, if she has survived, or alone.