A definite buy for the old-school player in all of us!
GAMEPLAY ~
The DW series always stood by the one thing, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. An that is what you get with DW3 the Remix. It's the same turn-based random battle system featured in EVERY official DW title. You as well get the ingenius system of teamate creation, were you form a team of 3 other characters from the given clases offetred. Later in the game these classes can be changed again, but there is always a sacrfice for begining anew. Thought some changes were made in translation (Zipangu? & Expel is now Disperse?) and I could have still used a map for each dungeon, everything else was left practically intact. Everything that is but difficulty. I felt like this game was WAY too easy. The reasons being one of two things...
A) It's been 10 years since the last time I played an I learned the wisdom to level up before the major boss battles.
B) I'm old... and remember actual game progression...
So those are them. I'll use an example. BaraMos. Back in the day this beast leveled me and a friends team in one round! One round! An now I beat him without going into the red! The only thing that killed me were the "defeat" spell (thanks VileShade) and Zoma the first 3 rounds he killed my Cleric, Fighter and my Sage. That is it. There is, however a new class to be used. The Thief. I didn't use him, cause I have a set plan on how to approach the title. So maybe he is good. There is also a personality generator for the Hero (programmed at the games beginning) an books scattered around the world that effect the other members personality. These personalities effect how the characters level up. So if a mage is "valiant" he'll gain level boost in strength and HP, but nothing in Int. or MP. So choose wisely before reading any special materials. An your guys now move ultra fast in dungeons an towns! No more dragging their feet like in the original!
Basically it's the same ol' same ol', but with a bit of sugar added in for fun.
STORY ~
You are the son (your name is programmed by you, so there is no default) of the legendary Hero Ortega. After several years your father has not returned from vanquishing the evil dark lord. So, after your 16th birthday you are called by the King to continue the quest started by your father. You are given a team an set out into the world! Why does this feel so cheesy to write out! But again, early 90's!
GRAPHICS ~
This "remix" is actually just an amalgamation of the original game and the Super Famicon rework. So you basically get the same NES over-world to explore, but each dungeon is enhanced with larger obstacles an fully detailed map enclosures. The newest idea added to these games is "moving pictures" of Akira Toriyama work, you know, he is the guy best known for the Dragon Ball series. The enemies now move! So you no longer need your imaginations for how an enemy moves, cause they now do it for you... though some are completely silly! The character sprite design got an overhaul, nothing fancy but mechanics are slightly altered. The only graphical downside is... the white backgrounds during battles. The backgrounds were changed so that it allowed the animations to stand out more, but if I played DW3 on my GameBoyPlayer, it would leave the sides of my TV bruised (purple and black respectively). Damn the burning whiteness of the constant random battles!
SOUND ~
wow! I love this game score! I've loved it an hummed it for over 10 years now! From the tower song to the theme on the Phantom Ship. Each one is brilliantly composed in all it's 8-bit glory! Where would I be today if I didn't remember the song from Jipangu (now Zipangu... why the change? I guess it was stereotyping that the Japanese live off on foreign floating continents...) Anyway nothing was changed except for some FX, but those too were basically untouched. DW3 still has one of those soundtracks you'll hum 'till our end-days!
REPLAYABILITY ~
Lets begin by mentioning the "field log" aspect. This is the DW3 answer to the quick-save. An it worked beautifully! Again, like in many of my GBC and GBA reviews, every portable RPG needs this function! The one big difference between the original game and this one is monster medals an the "bag". Monster metals are acquired after countless battles with every monster in the game, sometimes they leave a metal... sometimes they don't. Actually, most of the time they didn't. So I didn't bother with this sub-quest. Next was the "bag". The "bag" was the portable deposit for your Hero's. In the original you got to utilize a safe in the bank area where you can deposit unwanted items an rare items as well. The safe was removed an made portable. So this wasn't bad, it just became very cluttered. The monster drop rate or rare-items was greatly increased as well! So I acquired some of the rare drops (Plush Suit, Thor Sword) with little to no trial whatsoever.
There is also "Tiny Medal" collecting where each time you collect 10 you get a special item from the Medal King! An than was the added excitement of the Patchi (sp?) game which required Tokens found throughout the game. The Patchi game lead to wonderful rare items if completed. There is also the money wasting Arena, which I didn't utilize this time around... cause it's pointless.
An the final repayable option was the secret dungeon only accessible after the game is completed. So go bash Zoma (cause the difficulty was lowered) an get going to the all new dungeon we all are drooling for! Oh yeah, there was no "time counter" for me to keep track of how long I played, but it was around 40+ hours, so... I’ll just say 40 to 100... best guess...
OVERALL ~
A definite buy for the Old School player in all of us, but this game will not appeal to the ADD based kids of today. Not at all, the game moves slow for the first 10 to 20 hours than eventually picks up. So unless your kid is on some Ritalin to slow them down for a few hours, or you are a classic gamer yourself who wants to re-experience DW3 but with a little extra added in for variety, than I’d take a chance and play this reworked classic. It's the best remix I’ve played for the GBC system to date!