Being a very early title, still sold in cassette tapes, Dragon's Eye is a simple game, beatable in an hour or so. You start by naming your hero, then choosing a weapon and a title, after which you'll get a random selection of spells and be sent to the world map.

Your goal is to find the mythical Dragon Eye and return with it to the starting city within 21 days. Once you do so, you win the game and will be rated on how many battles you won and treasures you recovered.

You play by moving around the world map and searching locations for treasures or clues to their location. Actions like walking, searching and resting take a certain amount of time based on factors like your speed and weather, but you can use spells such as Cure Self or Teleport to help with the time limit.

Unlike other games of this kind, Dragon's Eye has no competing AI opponents, quests, special events or dungeons – you just walk around searching areas repeatedly, as there's a high percentage chance to find items.

What makes Dragon's Eye stand out is its combat. When you encounter an enemy, the screen goes to a 2D side-view and you control your character much like in a fighting game, but in turns: you can order it to move left or right, chop, do an overhead attack, leap, dodge, block, use an item, fire an arrow, etc.

Each action drains your strength, reducing the power of blows and forcing you to rest afterwards. It's primitive and unreliable but highly original, coming from a time before fighting games even existed.

This unique blend of 2D combat and turn-based RPG would be revisited in Windwalker (1989), and later games like Wizards Wars (1988) and Moonstone: A Hard Days Knight (1991) would greatly expand the “find all treasures” concept, but Dragon's Eye deserves its praise as one of the many forgotten pioneers that helped shape video games.