Dragon's Lair Animator Coming Back To Games

Filmgoers may know Don Bluth for his work on animate classics like All Dogs Go To Heaven, The Land Before Time, and The Secret Of NIMH, but his 1983 arcade hit Dragon's Lair made a significant impact on the video game industry as well. Now after more than 20 years since his last game released, Bluth is working on a new title based on another classic arcade game.

Gamasutra is reporting that Don Bluth and his business partner Gary Goldman are working in conjunction with Warner Bros. and Square One Studios on a new iPhone/iPad game called Tapper World Tour. The original Tapper had you slinging suds for for an unending string of ornery customers. Tapper World Tour sounds like it will feature the same gameplay, but with the added bonus of having characters created and animated by Bluth in his iconic art style.

Bluth says it's the first time he's done animation in years, and that even though the film industry's transition to CGI movies motivated him to return to video games, he thinks it's a good fit. "The character side of [the game], and the entertainment side of it – that's the stuff that gets me interested," Bluth told Gamasutra. "To me, that is entertainment and it's more like the movie business. That's the thing that pulled me into this whole project."