Even though Apogee Software would release games with richer, more varied levels and significantly better graphics shortly after this release, Dark Ages still handles better, I think, than more sophisticated side-scrollers like the following year's Cosmo's Cosmic Adventure.

Here, you play as a hunky MS-Paint-looking prince with flowing yellow locks who jogs and leaps around and flings a magic boomerang beam at the monsters that cross his path: giant, gnarled hands the reach up from the dirt and creeping spiders and gangly, kneeling dudes whose role within the fantasy of the universe of the game is never clear to me. Worst are the flying creatures (too pixelated to properly identify) who fly toward prince rather quickly and take two boomerang hits each to kill.

The level design is pretty bland, and the game's biggest drawback is its lack of variation, as the second and third episodes (from what I've seen) are essentially repeats of the first. That said, as you work your way through each episode, it's possible to pick up upgrades for your boomerang that send them hurtling back to you through enemies and eventually become a stream of deathly energy. The looping music by Keith Schuler slaps, and the gameplay was genuinely satisfying enough to get me halfway through second episode, where I got stuck trying to boomerang my way out of a waterfall heavy section whose visual textures were starting to make my eyes cross. Despite its clear shortcomings, this game was, at its core, a fun time.