text: Dragon Warrior III (NES) – Twentieth Century Gamer
  Author twentiethcenturygamerPosted on January 19, 2019 March 1, 2020 Categories NES, ReviewTags 1988, Chunsoft, Dragon Quest, Enix, RPG
  3 thoughts on "Dragon Warrior III (NES)"
  I probably have too much nostalgia wrapped up in this game to be objective about it. I rented this game many, many times from the the local video store, and eventually got to buy that copy, too. Still have it, even, with the box and manuals!
  It definitely doesn't have any designs on telling a more nuanced tale. In a lot of ways, it mirrors Dragon Warrior II in the way the game plays out. But much like many of the Dragon Quest games, it presents a lot more self-contained story vignettes that somehow, at least to me, have more charm than other 8-bit games of its ilk.
  The combat balance has been improved a lot more here, too. I didn't grind nearly as much here as in the first two games. I'd dare say it might be better balanced than Final Fantasy, and really marked the point at which the series probably should have started shedding the "grind-heavy" reputation. I also think the combat options here are a lot more interesting than those presented in Phantasy Star, which gives you single-enemy stacks to fight, with random targeting. I was informed later that much of Phantasy Star's structure can be directly traced to Wizardry, and now that it has been pointed out, I totally see it now. (Of course, Dragon Quest did so as well, with some Ultima to boot.)
  It's definitely a huge step up from the previous game. The rushed nature of Dragon Warrior II is very apparent in hindsight. It's very much overshadowed by IV in my heart, but I did enjoy this one quite a lot.
  Yeah, Dragon Warrior IV is a stone-cold classic. I actually remember being a little concerned with the "chapter" format when I read about it, but in practice it gives a lot more personality to the cast, while still giving a large "proper" final chapter that pretty much matches the length of the prior entry.