Double Dragon (World Set 1)

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Title: Double Dragon (World Set 1)
Name: ddragonw
Averall status: good

good
Year: 1987
Category: Fighter / 2.5D
Manufacturer: [Technos] (Taito license)
Available since MAME™ version: 0.077
Player(s): Two players simultaneously

Type:

Clone of Double Dragon (Japan)

BIOS: Not needed

Status Detail

Emulation: good
Color: good
Sound: good
Graphic: good

Options

Save state: available

Display

Palette size: 384 colors
Type: raster
Screen rotation: 0 degrees
Screen size: 256x240 pixels
Refresh rate: 57.4449Hz

Misc. Technical

Behind a clear front glass, the dedicated cabinet has a decorative cardboard frame surrounding the monitor that includes instructions for game play. The cardboard frame is usually 2 sided. There is the TAITO design on one side and the Double Dragon design on the other. The marquee and control panel art features a drawing of a dragon and pictures of Billy and Jimmy Lee. The control panel includes their names. Most cabinets used blue buttons for player 1 and red buttons for player 2, but a middle release cabinet used yellow buttons for both players and used thicker bezel glass with white plastic protectors along its outer edges. The side art features the name TAITO at the top with a Y-shaped pattern of lines in red, white, gray, and black. The first cabinets of Double Dragon had a different color combination for the side art. The black part of the side art was orange and the gray part was yellow. The cabinet features a lockable pullout drawer at the bottom that contains the power supply and game-boards.
Game ID : TA-0021
Main CPU : HD6309, HD63701
Sound CPU : HD6309
Sound Chips : YM2151, (2x) MSM5205
Screen orientation : Horizontal
Video resolution : 240 x 224 pixels
Screen refresh : 57.44 Hz
Palette colors : 384
Players : 2
Control : 8-way joystick
Buttons : 3

ROM Content

MAME needs 23 dumps to start the ROM "ddragonw":

"21j-6"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: adpcm
Offset: 0
Merge: 21j-6
CRC checksum: 34755de3
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 57c06d6ce9497901072fa50a92b6ed0d2d4d6528
"21j-7"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: adpcm
Offset: 10000
Merge: 21j-7
CRC checksum: 904de6f8
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 3623e5ea05fd7c455992b7ed87e605b87c3850aa
"21j-5"

Size: 32Kb (32 768 bytes)
Region: gfx1
Offset: 0
Merge: 21j-5
CRC checksum: 7a8b8db4
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 8368182234f9d4d763d4714fd7567a9e31b7ebeb
"21j-a"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx2
Offset: 0
Merge: 21j-a
CRC checksum: 574face3
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 481fe574cb79d0159a65ff7486cbc945d50538c5
"21j-b"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx2
Offset: 10000
Merge: 21j-b
CRC checksum: 40507a76
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 74581a4b6f48100bddf20f319903af2fe36f39fa
"21j-c"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx2
Offset: 20000
Merge: 21j-c
CRC checksum: bb0bc76f
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 37b2225e0593335f636c1e5fded9b21fdeab2f5a
"21j-d"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx2
Offset: 30000
Merge: 21j-d
CRC checksum: cb4f231b
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 9f2270f9ceedfe51c5e9a9bbb00d6f43dbc4a3ea
"21j-e"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx2
Offset: 40000
Merge: 21j-e
CRC checksum: a0a0c261
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 25c534d82bd237386d447d72feee8d9541a5ded4
"21j-f"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx2
Offset: 50000
Merge: 21j-f
CRC checksum: 6ba152f6
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: a301ff809be0e1471f4ff8305b30c2fa4aa57fae
"21j-g"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx2
Offset: 60000
Merge: 21j-g
CRC checksum: 3220a0b6
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 24a16ea509e9aff82b9ddd14935d61bb71acff84
"21j-h"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx2
Offset: 70000
Merge: 21j-h
CRC checksum: 65c7517d
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: f177ba9c1c7cc75ff04d5591b9865ee364788f94
"21j-8"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx3
Offset: 0
Merge: 21j-8
CRC checksum: 7c435887
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: ecb76f2148fa9773426f05aac208eb3ac02747db
"21j-9"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx3
Offset: 10000
Merge: 21j-9
CRC checksum: c6640aed
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: f156c337f48dfe4f7e9caee9a72c7ea3d53e3098
"21j-i"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx3
Offset: 20000
Merge: 21j-i
CRC checksum: 5effb0a0
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 1f21acb15dad824e831ed9a42b3fde096bb31141
"21j-j"

Size: 64Kb (65 536 bytes)
Region: gfx3
Offset: 30000
Merge: 21j-j
CRC checksum: 5fb42e7c
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 7953316712c56c6f8ca6bba127319e24b618b646
"21a-3.24"

Size: 32Kb (32 768 bytes)
Region: main
Offset: 18000
Merge:
CRC checksum: dbf24897
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 1504faaf07c541330cd43b72dc6846911dfd85a3
"21j-1.26"

Size: 32Kb (32 768 bytes)
Region: main
Offset: 8000
Merge:
CRC checksum: ae714964
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 072522b97ca4edd099c6b48d7634354dc7088c53
"21j-2-3.25"

Size: 32Kb (32 768 bytes)
Region: main
Offset: 10000
Merge: 21j-2-3.25
CRC checksum: 5779705e
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 4b8f22225d10f5414253ce0383bbebd6f720f3af
"21j-4.23"

Size: 32Kb (32 768 bytes)
Region: main
Offset: 20000
Merge:
CRC checksum: 6c9f46fa
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: df251a4aea69b2328f7a543bf085b9c35933e2c1
"21j-k-0"

Size: 256 bytes
Region: proms
Offset: 0
Merge: 21j-k-0
CRC checksum: fdb130a9
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 4c4f214229b9fab2b5d69c745ec5428787b89e1f
"21j-l-0"

Size: 512 bytes
Region: proms
Offset: 100
Merge: 21j-l-0
CRC checksum: 46339529
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: 64f4c42a826d67b7cbaa8a23a45ebc4eb6248891
"21j-0-1"

Size: 32Kb (32 768 bytes)
Region: sound
Offset: 8000
Merge: 21j-0-1
CRC checksum: 9efa95bb
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: da997d9cc7b9e7b2c70a4b6d30db693086a6f7d8
"63701.bin"

Size: 16Kb (16 384 bytes)
Region: sub
Offset: 0
Merge: 63701.bin
CRC checksum: f5232d03
MD5 checksum:
SHA1 checksum: e2a194e38633592fd6587690b3cb2669d93985c7

Development Status

n/a

Trivia

Released in August 1987.
Licensed to Taito for manufacture and distribution (Prom Stickers : 21J) in America and Europe (July 1987).
Double Dragon may not have been the world's first scrolling beat-em-up (that accolade belongs to Technos Japan's own "Renegade", released in 1986) but it is the world's first CO-OPERATIVE fighting game and as such defined its era. The varied, multi-colored sprites and hugely detailed backdrops - married to instinctive, one or two-player game-play - was something that had never really been seen in the fighting game before and Double Dragon quickly became a legend in its own right. The game would be the inspiration for an entire genre and classics such as Capcom's "Final Fight" owe a huge debt of gratitude to the Technos legend. The game was such a huge hit, that when the home versions finally came out, the rear side of the package advertised, 'You'll never have to stand in line to play Double Dragon again!'.
Double Dragon's hugely innovative game-play and superb graphics proved to be too ambitious for the host Technos hardware and the game was plagued with the now notorious 'slowdown', that occurred whenever a large number of fighters appeared on-screen.
The game's director, Yoshihisa Kishimoto, reportedly conceived his initial idea for Double Dragon around the date of July 20th in 1986, the 13th anniversary of Bruce Lee's death.
Director Yoshihisa Kishimoto got the idea of picking up an enemy's weapon from his previous game, "Renegade" ("Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun" in Japan). During the first stage of Renegade, he noticed that the armed enemy characters were not holding their weapons when they were on the ground.
On the first stage of the game, a billboard for "Nekketsu Kouha Kunio-kun" (the Japanese version of "Renegade") can be seen atop a building prior to the first boss battle.
The car at Billy and Jimmy's garage resembles the interceptor from the laserdisc game "Road Blaster", which was one of director Yoshihisa Kishimoto's previous games at Data East before he left the company to work for Technos.
The 3 kanji characters on the game's official logo are (in order) : 'Sou' (Twin) 'Setsu' (Cut or Intercept) and 'Ryuu' (Dragon, also pronounced 'Tatsu'). Thus, the title can loosely be translated as the 'Twin Intercepting Dragons'.
The fictional martial arts practiced by the Lee brothers is called Sousetsuken or 'Twin Interception Fist', which is described as a combination of Shaolin Temple Kung Fu, Karate and Tai Chi Chuan. The name is derived from Bruce Lee's own martial arts style Jeet Kune Do, or Sekkendou in Japan, which is known as the 'Way of the Intercepting Fist'.
The character names are derived from the 1973 Bruce Lee film, 'Enter the Dragon'.
Double Dragon contained a number of bugs, most of which were never fixed despite several revisions of the ROM. The best known is a bug in the way enemies attack the player. Sportingly, enemies will not attack the player from behind, but will instead walk up to them and try to move past so they can attack from the front. Thus, by standing with your back to an enemy, it was possible to wait for them to get close and then elbow them in the face, without fear of being attacked. Another common bug was the 'infinite bouncing' bug. Due to the fixed way in which objects in the game would bounce off walls, trees etc, it was possible to drop an item between two tree stumps on the forest level, and it would bounce back and forth forever. In the first version of the game, this could happen to player characters who fell off either stump, the only way to continue the game being to allow the timer to run down. Another less serious bug was the ability to throw weapons from one level to the next. Usually, weapons were discarded at the end of a level. On some levels however, the transition to the next level was achieved simply by scrolling the screen one whole screen to the right, or down a cliff. By standing at the extreme right of the level and jumping just as it ended, the players character would drop their weapon in mid air, throwing it far enough to be picked up again once the screen had scrolled on.
Jason Wilson holds the official record for this game with 171,210 points on July 24, 1999.
Apollon Music released a limited-edition soundtrack album for this game (Original Sound of Double Dragon - KHY-1026) in cassette format on 21/02/1988. Also released the soundtrack album in CD format (Original Sound of Double Dragon - BY12-5028) on 21/02/1988.
Scitron released a limited-edition soundtrack album for this game (Legend of Game Music 2 ~Platinum Box~ - SCDC-00473~82) on 18/01/2006
A Double Dragon unit appears in the abysmal 1994 movie 'Double Dragon'.
A Double Dragon unit can be seen in Drake and Josh episode 'Movie Job', but the marquee reads 'Dragon'.
Tiger Electronics released a board-game based on this video game (same name) in 1989 : The winner is the first player to successfully fight his or her way around the game board to Jimmy's Hideout to rescue Marian. You will pass through the slum section, the industrial section, the forest section and the hideout section on the rocky road to victory.
Comic Book : Six-issue limited series published by Marvel Comics in 1991. (cover dated from July to December). Written by Dwayne McDuffie for the first four issues and by Tom Brevoort and Mike Kanterovich for the final two. In this comic, Billy and Jimmy Lee were the twin inheritors of the 'Dragon Force', a mystical force that granted the Lee brothers their powers, as they fought against the occult crime lord Nightfall. Marian is reimagined as a policewoman (a depiction later featured in the cartoon series) and Stan Lee appears as Billy and Jimmy's long-lost father.
Cartoon : TV series produced by DIC Entertainment and Bohbot Entertainment, which lasted two 13-episodes seasons in 1993 and 1994. In the series, Billy and Jimmy are twin brothers who were separated at birth, with Billy being raised by his father's sensei, the Oldest Dragon, while Jimmy was raised by the evil Shadow Master to become his successor, the Shadow Boss. After the second episode, Jimmy realizes the evils of his way and joins his brother, becoming the Double Dragons. Inspired the 1994 home console fighting game "Double Dragon V: The Shadow Falls".
Live-Action Movie : Released in 1994 by Imperial Entertainment. Starred Scott Wolf as Billy, Mark Dacascos as Jimmy, Alysa Milano as Marian and Robert Patrick as original villain Koga Shuko. Directed by James Yukich, with a screenplay written by Paul Dini (of Batman: The Animated Series) and Neal Shusterman. In the movie, Billy and Jimmy are young twin brothers who possess one half of a magical medallion, with the other half possessed by crime lord Shuko. It inspired the 1995 Neo-Geo game "Double Dragon".

Series

1. Double Dragon (1987)
2. Double Dragon II - The Revenge (1988)
3. Double Dragon 3 - The Rosetta Stone (1991)
4. Super Double Dragon (1992, US/EU Nintendo Super NES) / Return of Double Dragon (1992, JP Nintendo Super Famicom)
5. Battletoads & Double Dragon - The Ultimate Team (1993, Nintendo Super NES)
6. Double Dragon V - The Shadow Falls (1994, Nintendo Super NES)
7. Double Dragon (1995)

Tips 'n tricks

n/a

Staff

Director & Producer : Yoshihisa Kishimoto (Yoshi Kishi)
Programmers : Hiroshi Satoh, Tomoyasu Koga, Naritaka Nishimura, Hideshi Kaneda
Animation : Koji Ogata
Character designer : Koji Kai
BGM : Kazunaka Yamane
SFX : Kenichi Mori
Art staff : Kumiko Mukai, Mizuho Yama, Akemi Tasaki, Misae Nakayama, Masao Shiroto
Director & Game designer : Shinichi Saitou

Ports

* Consoles :
Nintendo Famicom (1988)
Sega Master System (1988)
Atari 2600 (1989)
Atari 7800
Nintendo Game Boy (1989)
Sega Mega Drive (1992)
Atari Lynx (1993)
Nintendo Game Boy Advance (2003, "Double Dragon Advance")
Microsoft XBOX 360 (2007, "Xbox Live Arcade")
* Computers :
Commodore C64 (1988)
Commodore Amiga (1988)
PC [MS-DOS, 5.25''] (1988)
Sinclair ZX Spectrum (1989)
Amstrad CPC (1989) [Virgin Mastertronic - 128 Ko Disk version]
Amstrad CPC (1989) [Animagic - Spanish Version]
Atari ST (1989)
Commodore Amiga (1990, "Amiga Champions")
Commodore C64 (1990, "100% Dynamite")
Sinclair ZX Spectrum (1990, "100% Dynamite")
Amstrad CPC (1991) [Melbourne House]
* Others :
LCD handheld game (1989) released by Tiger Electronics : You have 3 lives to save Marian in 4 missions of increasing difficulty.

Scoring

n/a

Updates

* The original Japanese version by Technos has a different storyline than the one used by Taito in the International version. The Japanese storyline is more developed and does not use the Spike and Hammer aliases.