On August 1, 1988, Barbarian II: The Dungeon of Drax (titled Axe of Rage in North America) was first released for gaming platforms Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum and MSX. The following year, the game was distributed to Acorn Electron, Amiga, Amstrad CPC, Atari ST, BBC Micro and MS-DOS. Barbarian II: The Dungeon of Drax was the sequel to the hugely popular retro video game title Barbarian: The Ultimate Warrior (titled Death Sword in North America), which was published in 1987.

Barbarian II: The Dungeon of Drax is the sequel to Barbarian: The Ultimate Warrior, the first of which offers a one or two player mode. Unlike its predecessor, Barbarian II features only a single-player mode, where a player assumes the role of either a sword-wielding Princess Mariana or the titular Barbarian, who’s armed with a battleaxe. The goal of the game is to pursue the evil wizard Drax, who has fled to his underground lair after his defeat in the first game. Players battle their way through a dangerous wasteland, a system of caves, and a dungeon before facing Drax in his inner sanctum for a final showdown.

Fantasy artist Frank Frazetta’s paintings, which often included sword-wielding warriors and damsels in distress as their subject, has been cited as an influence on the development of both video games. The Arnold Schwarzenegger and Grace Jones adventure film Conan: The Destroyer was also a large influence on both games. Sword-fighting moves from Conan: The Destroyer, including the behind the back “Web of Death,” were integrated directly into the animation and available attacks. Character sound effects from movie Red Sonia were integrated into the soundtrack of the games as well.

During production of the first game, game developers used rotoscoping techniques to create the animation, overlaying live-action video clips onto animation cels.

The original video game was simply Barbarian initially, but publisher Psygnosis had a competing title on market with the same title. So the title of that game was changed to Barbarian: The Ultimate Warrior.

During this era of video games, cover art was generally hand-painted by illustrators. However game designer Steve Brown opted for an eye-catching photographic cover instead. Bodybuilder and actor Michael Van Wijk – who went on to play Wolf on British TV series Gladiators – posed as the Barbarian, and Sun Page 3 model and actress Maria Whittaker posed as Princess Mariana.

When the box art premiered for the first game, there was a huge backlash regarding the suggestive nature of the photos, along with Whittaker’s past modeling assignments for The Sun Page 3. This was during the era prior to the Entertainment Software Rating Board (ESRB) game ratings board being established. When Barbarian: The Ultimate Warrior was licensed to Epyx Computer Software in North America, the game’s name was changed to Death Sword and featured different cover art with only a male figure with a sword. That game was also flat out banned in Germany when Palace Software was taken to court in Germany. The ban was only lifted when Palace Software agreed to again, remove the female figure from the packaging and turn all blood in the game from red to green.