Mega Man III

"Great improvement over the previous 2 Megaman games"

Dr. Wily is back again, and again you have to beat 8 Robot Masters. Thank God Capcom is better at making games than inventing new stories. This game features Robot Masters from MM3 & 4 on the NES.

Gameplay
This time Capcom got it all right! You can slide, fire the Mega Buster and use your dog Rush. Protoman even shows up in some sections of the game to give you a little power up.
The control is perfect unlike the previous Megaman and the game's difficulty is just right, it's not too easy but it's not too hard either!
This game follows the same boss select methods of the previous games, beat four Masters and then beat another four. However this time, after you beat the first four Masters you must beat a mini-boss. The Robot Masters in this game are: Shadow Man, Spark Man, Gemini Man, Snake Man, Drill Man, Skull Man, Dust Man and Dive Man. Following the other 2 Megaman games on the GB you have to beat a brand new boss after defeating the 8 Robot Masters. This time your new enemy is Punk, a rather cool looking robot which isn't too difficult to beat but at least he puts up a fight unlike Quint in Megaman 2...
Wily's castle is fairly long and not very easy, and Wily himself is also difficult to kill. Just like the other 2 Megaman games this one features a password save function so as long as you write those passowrds down nothing will be lost.

Graphics 9/10
The graphics come directly from Megaman 3 & 4 on the NES which look great indeed. The game now has some very detailed backgrounds and some even have little animations in them! Some enemies are really large and everything moves along at a nice pace. There is however a little slowdown here and there but it doesn't affect the gameplay at all.

Sound 8/10
Just like the graphics the music comes directly from the NES. No funky remixes this time but you get the real deal instead which isn't bad since the original tunes are excellent.Too bad Capcom didn't bother to take their time to change the bad sound effects though :(

Conclusion
This game is almost perfect, it still has that NES Megaman feel to it but it plays better. I can safely recommend this one to anyone who is looking for a solid platform shooter, although it doesn't have all the extras Megaman 4 and 5 have the gameplay still is top notch.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 03/09/00, Updated 03/09/00