Battle SHIRYU

Swing the dragon. Send the Moai flying!

Raise your hand in front of a webcam and the paper dragon follows. Swing it around and use the recoil to whip its tail into a crowd of Moai. Hit a group of the same colour and watch the chain reaction spread.

Make a fist and open your hand again to click. Lower your hand to pause, then raise it to get back to the action. You can play every stage with a mouse, too.

Chase the next chain through time

Fly from the present day through Edo-era Japan and back to prehistory, then see where the dragon takes you. Each stage gives you a new layout of Moai and obstacles. Steer around the tougher statues, line up your next swing and see how far you can keep the chain going.

Learn the moves as you play

Paper pictograms show you what to do. Leave the title screen idle for a moment and a tutorial starts automatically so you can see the controls in action. The interface supports 16 languages.

Paper pictogram showing an open hand, a webcam, and the paper dragon in a stage; hand movement can control the dragon.

A dragon 24 years in the making

In 2002, engineer Takahiro Yonemura, Ph.D., and his co-authors used a single camera to track fingertip and head movements. In 2026, he brought that idea back to steer a dragon through a world built around real paper models. Hackaday featured the game's camera controls and the research behind them.

Comparison of a 2002 CCD-camera study of finger and head recognition with a 2026 webcam hand-recognition demonstration.

Camera and mouse controls

Hand controls require a compatible webcam and camera access on Windows, macOS or Linux. Lighting and how your hand appears on camera can affect recognition. Mouse controls are available throughout. Steam Achievements are available in the Windows version.

The Gaming Diary covered the Steam launch and highlighted how an ordinary webcam lets you steer the paper dragon with your hand.