"Dragon Fire" represented the end of an era for fans of "Quest for Glory" and the company that produced the series, Sierra. For many years, Sierra churned out very thoughtful computer games that were usually based on solving brain-teasing puzzles instead of mindless, "Doom"-style action. However, the computer game market changed over time, and as action games became more fashionable, Sierra's thoughtful brand of game died out. "Dragon Fire" is pretty much the last gasp of the traditional Sierra game.
Sadly, it attempts to compromise between the old, story-driven style of "Quest for Glory," and the more trendy action-oriented style. For an old-school Sierra fan like me, the game simply has too much action. Far too many "puzzles" can be solved by killing loads of monsters and guards - there's not too much of a cerebral component. There are some occasional brain-teasers, but most of them are associated with an area called Science Island, which is an aggressively anachronistic and sort of annoying part of the game anyway.
But I don't mean to bury "Dragon Fire", because it is pretty enjoyable. Like other "Quest for Glory" games, it has a very well-developed internal mythology, and pretty good (if sometimes rather wordy) dialog. The voice acting is generally strong, and the graphics are rather attractive. The Greece-like setting is cool, and the blend of different mythological elements - Atlantis, Hades, the Hydra - works really well.
The first time I played the game, I missed many of the "side quests," so I developed the (perhaps unfair) impression that it was very shallow. Once I did some further research on the game, however, I returned to it with a desire to explore it more thoroughly, and found the second play-through more rewarding. But, to be honest, much of the depth really is too easy to miss.
For example, I actually think it's too hard to get married in the game. You're given a choice of potential wives, but wooing them is sort of a superficial and tedious process that involves giving them just the "right" presents. Some of these presents are bloody hard to find! There's also a problem with the Thief's storyline - if you forget to contact a fellow thief very early in the game, you'll be up a creek much later on. Those kinds of elements bother me.
Still, this is a fun game, and probably the best of the latter-day Sierra titles. Other late Sierra games - Gabriel Knight III, The Mask of Eternity - were really pretty poor attempts to make adventure games "cool" in the eyes of a new audience that simply couldn't appreciate them. Despite its action-oriented bent, "Dragon Fire" is at least faithful to the spirit of "Quest for Glory," so it outshines other Sierra products of the period.
