Dragon Warrior III (NES) - Retroview

Review Breakdown
Battle System	6
Interface	6
Music & Sound	8
Originality	7
Story	6
Localization	5
Replay Value	10
Visuals	6
Difficulty	Moderate
Completion Time	22-26 Hours
Overall
Following the red brick road.

   When this game was released about a decade and a half ago in Japan, chaos ensued—children skipped school, adults skipped work, and some even quit their jobs, just to get their hands on, and play, this RPG, a creation of scenario writer Yûji Horii, manga artist Akira Toriyama, and composer Kôichi Sugiyama, who were each quite famous in the Land of the Rising Sun, thus ensuring the Dragon Quest series’ success on that side of the Pacific. Hence, the Imperial Diet needed to pass a law saying that Dragon Quest games could only be released on Sundays and holidays, a big surprise, given that no such thing of pop culture in America could cause so much turbulence and force Congress to pass any similar law. Indeed, here in the States, the series, known of course as Dragon Warrior, bore a minor following at the time, and thankfully, streets across America were free from the chaos caused by the third game in Japan.

   What exactly was it about this game that caused the mentioned chaos in Japan during the late 80s? Most certainly it isn’t the simple plot, with you playing the son or daughter of the hero Ortega, who fell into a volcano fighting a beast during his quest to defeat the evil Baramos, which is now, on your sixteenth birthday, your quest, and with the help of three allies, whether pregenerated or customized, you must travel across the world, a distorted version of Earth, visiting many towns, dungeons, and towers along the way.

   With the creators being famous in Japan, of course, the scenario by Yûji Horii, which bore much crude humor and cursing, could probably have caused a good ruckus, since anything he wrote was an instant hit. Sadly, the American script doesn’t do Horii’s original work much justice, as all that humor and swearing was censored at a time the U.S. didn’t have any sort of video game rating system, although the title’s localization proved to be a small step in the right direction, as many original names were kept, with mostly those late in the game being changed. I for one was surprised to see a character named Galen (one ‘l’ short of my last name), known as Gupta in the Japanese version, a legitimate change given that we normally don’t see folks named Gupta.

   Equally famous was Akira Toriyama, the creator of Dragon Ball and Dr. Slump, whose art glazed the Japanese box and instruction book, and is quite noticeable in the monsters you randomly encounter during the game. Although his box art showed some maturity in his style, it was sadly eradicated during localization, as was his art in the instruction book, which was a tad bit more comical, as I’ve read. Personally, I would’ve kept the original box art, while perhaps getting someone like Don Bluth to do the instruction book art, rather than an unknown fantasy artist, as mentioned in my previous DW reviews.

Right below a tower.

   Perhaps the only one of the original creators for whom the American version does justice is composer Kôichi Sugiyama, whose music, of course, is heard all throughout the game. While the castle town theme sounds a bit like the Itchy and Scratchy theme song and the overworld music like something out of Star Wars, all his other music was quite enjoyable, sounding much better when you whistle along, what with the flagrant blips and blops of game music at the time.

   Moving on to a more important aspect of this game, the interface, I begin by saying that the general setup of the game was tolerable, but clearly flawed. One particular bugger is the encounter rate, which was either really high at points and really low at others, the latter frustrating me in times when I needed to level up (which you need to do quite often if you want to beat the game without any trouble, and doing so accounts for about 50% of the game). Gold gathering, on the other hand, wasn’t as big as a problem late in the game as it is early on. Still, the menus could have used a little work, and it would’ve been more convenient if you had some sort of sack for unused items, and if you didn’t have to resort to the same menu just to hunt for a key you need to open a door. Still, I liked the system of being able to create your own characters at the beginning and all the way throughout the game, which accounts for endless variety and replayability.

   Finally comes the battle system. It’s turn-based, as is the case with the other games in the series, with you inputting your characters’ commands and letting them and the enemy go at it with one another in unpredictable turn orders. What with the unpredictability of this system, healing can sometimes be a pain, and what’s more is that ally and enemy attack patterns constantly seemed to change throughout a single battle. Still, I took advantage of a loophole in the battle system that lets your second and third characters Parry (the character in front can’t do this, or the last character) and perform other commands while retaining the bonus defense of parrying.

   Overall, the original Dragon Warrior III proved to be a taxing, yet enjoyable, experience, and an RPG any old-school gamer deserves to experience. While the title is a bit outdated nowadays, what especially with a remake for Gameboy Color, I consider it an eternal classic in the rough.