don bluth

November 4, 2020

Dragon’s Lair 1/6 Scale Replicade Now Available

Peter Paltridge arcade, collectibles, don bluth, dragon's lair, replicade, video games 0

Replicade specializes in miniaturizing the world’s most popular arcade classics to pencil size. These devices not only look nifty displayed on your desk, they are fully playable. They’ve produced twelve-inch replicas of the Asteroids, Tempest and Street Fighter cabinets, and now they’ve turned their attention to 1983’s Dragon’s Lair. Despite its size, the Replicade contains everything the original cabinet did…the trapezoidal marquee, the digital score displays, the attract mode on an endless loop. While the Kickstarter campaign for these things was a massive success, delays occurred in production (the original date of release was March 2020, but…yeah). It’s out now, though. Replicade’s commitment to detail here is so obsessive, the Dragon’s Lair cabinet includes a mini replica of the Laserdisc player installed in the back that powered the thing. Just open the back panel and you can remove the plastic Laserdisc model, and even insert a tiny facsimile of the Dragon’s Lair disc. Plays the original Dragon’s Lair arcade game running on Daphne LaserDisc Emulator Fully functional secondary scoreboard displays

September 10, 2020

Don Bluth Announces New Animation Production Company

Peter Paltridge Animation, don bluth, don bluth studios 0

In the late 1970s, Don Bluth was considered the top new talent at Walt Disney Studios — but he found it incredibly frustrating working on safe Miller-era fare like The Fox And The Hound. He wanted animated films to go dark, to take risks, and he felt the only way to do that was to strike out on his own. So, that’s what he did. He founded his own independent studio, took half of Disney’s animation department with him and they started work on The Secret Of NIMH. It was only the first wild step in a career fulled with highs, lows and surprising twists, from unexpected success with video games (Dragon’s Lair) to working with Spielberg (An American Tail) to getting stuck making incomprehensible kiddie fare (A Troll In Central Park, Rock-A-Doodle). It has unfortunately been a long time since we’ve seen a new feature from Bluth…part of the problem lies with the industry shift to 3D animation for features. But Don’s not dead yet, and he’s about to