An improvement from Dream Land 2, but still underwhelming for what I would expect from a Kirby game. The level design is a bit clunky sometimes and the controls can feel strange on occasion. The camera caused a lot of problems since it didn't center the player on the middle of the screen.

And something about the graphics made me feel uncomfortable. Idk if it's the color palette used or the fact that it looked like it was made using crayons, but I feel like it could have been better, despite me knowing that the pixel art is very well-done.

The allies all have their pros and cons, but I will not argue the fact that the cat is objectively the best option most of the time.

Was really excited to get into Kirby's Dream Land 3 right after having played all the prior mainline Kirby titles, hearing a lot of praise for this one. Unfortunately it didn't hit as well for me as it did for others.

Right off the bat just after having played Kirby Super Star, you immediately feel how sluggish and unresponsive Kirby controls in this title, compared to it's other SNES counterpart. With an open mind, I didn't immediately let this sour my taste as I took in the factor that this could just be a slower paced Kirby by design. Eventually though, I really did not like how Kirby controlled and that is a huge minus for me considering KBL2 on the Game Boy controlled better than this.

The game is basically an evolution of KBL2 in both title and design. Everything introduced in KDL2 is brough back and expanded upon, from the same copy ability convention, to the mix and matching with the animal buddies. But is slightly more copy abilities as well as new animal buddies introduced, allowing for much more mix and matching abilities. Initially, I gave this system a pass in KBL2, but did not enjoy it as much in KBL3 due to how sluggish and underpowered all the mixed copy abilities felt in this game. Most of the time you're better off just as Kirby by himself as it feels like the copy abilities are the most effective solo.

Now comes the biggest flaw that really brings this game down for me, the level design. If you want to really enjoy KDR3, you have to go for the 100% completion. All levels have an "optional" mission that grant you a star at the end if you fulfil it's requirements. Unfortunately, to me, fulfilling those requirements are not fun due to the fact that if you miss something while playing a level, most of time you have to restart it. Another big issue with this is that the game does not tell you what the requirement is, so if you're not using the internet or a guide, you'll need to constantly retry the level to figure out what the mission requirement is.
If you try to play the game without doing these optional missions, like I initially did, every level is a boring barren wasteland. Just a left to right stretch from point A to B with a few blocks an enemies in between, but no proper design. I gave KDL2 some slack for not having as good level design as KDL1, but the level design in this game makes KDL2 levels look great by comparison. So yeah, the levels are designed around these optional missions, otherwise you won't have as much fun.

The best thing about KDL3 is the artstyle and soundtrack. This one of the most beautiful looking games on the SNES, making the crayon looking world KDL2 on the Gameboy come to it's full realization on console. These don't look like sprites, they look like actual hand drawn images.

Although the general consensus of this game is very positive, I think this is probably my least favorite mainline Kirby game that I've played. I'm glad the future titles went more for the Super Star route than it did the Dream Land route.

This isnt no Dream Land 2. This punk ass pink punk got himself a highschool clique. This time, I wasn't deadset on abusing the same ability throughout, although like an addict relapsing it happened again in 64. If you were wondering why small gatherings of minors were forbidden at certain malls, well this is because Kirby has been there! This is certainly logical. We have watched his career with great interest and he's still finding more and more people to help him suck. One of his friends is a bit more independant than the others, his name is Gooey and he keeps me from sucking! That is why I avoided using him because I'm not about that life, but it was easy to press the wrong input and summon the fool. Go to bed already!

Eating crayons is good but how about using them for a good artstyle? Now thats making a killing! I'm kidding this absolutely FLOPPED every american was playing Ocarina of Time by then. But still, there are particles, visual feedback, the...flying Touhou witches, moving backgrounds. I'd drink to that, but I must stay sharp, for the fog is still coming. Once again you have to grind out if you wanna book a meeting with the eldritch abomination of a final boss during lunch hours. I suggest looking up some of the ways you can finish levels properly if you do not want to experience the walk of shame upon your way back to the world map. As there aren't many worlds, the darker side of this truth is that levels can take quite some time to finish, but it's reasonably okay. So I guess you can shamewalk a bit.

This guy Dedede is not doing no Ramadan, even his belly is in on the feast. I know he didn't brush his teeth down there. This and the spiders with them freakishly long legs make this the scariest entry in the mascot horror genre. I love spiders too, but maybe not legs. Everybody gangsta when Whispy Woods got a pair of his own and starts chasing you! top cinco rumpscaré yup and then there was a tanuki wow and the world watches in horror as I put him 6 feet under.

I know Kirby was starting to get stale for some people and they wanted another Super Star, but to me that is a better game. I am fine with this. This is definitely one of the games I like. If it wasn't absurd with the invulnerability frames I wouldn't be passed around like a blunt but I guess it'd be less funny. What was Meta Knight doing during all this though like naaaah fuck that harbinger of evil shit I'm hitting my Zzzs.

Dream Land 3 is one of those games that appears lacking on the surface, but everything comes together in such a unique and beautiful way.

The animal friends are back along with three new ones, and it's tons of fun playing around with different ability/animal combinations. Cleaning was added as a new ability, it's really cute (especially with Nago) and many of its animal combinations are surprisingly effective against enemies. The sprites and animations are all super expressive.

The level designs are basic as with most Kirby games, though still quite memorable and fun. Each stage has its own puzzle you must solve to get a heart star, all of which are needed to face the final boss.

The visual and sound direction is some of the best in the entire Kirby series, only surpassed by Epic Yarn and Mass Attack.

You don't have as many techniques and moves as you do in Super Star or any other main game after 64. But, to me, Kirby isn't about that stuff anyway.

If it isn't obvious enough from the above, or from my Epic Yarn review, Kirby games are something I admire deeply not only on a gameplay level, but on an aesthetic one. If I wanted to play an action-platformer, there are many more challenging and engaging options out there for me besides Kirby. But Dream Land 3 offers something I can't get elsewhere, quite literally a land of dreams filled with incredible charm and atmosphere. It even has 2-player coop.

Se a primeira impressão for a que fica, esse jogo é a exceção. Esse jogo é o mais focado em vender pra criança, não que os outros não fossem, mas começando pela estética do jogo que parecer ter sido desenhado por aqueles lápis de crayon, é bem óbvio, e ótimo, é bonito e estiloso.
E acabou os elogios, apesar de eu achar que esse Kirby tem a melhor movimentação, as fases dão um sentimento de que duram 10 horas cada, e ainda tem umas quests muito específicas pra pegar os colecionáveis desse jogo, os Heart Stars, — que assim como nos jogos anteriores, levam ao final secreto — de forma alguma tem como você fazer elas sem um guia. E falando no final secreto, o boss secreto continua super divertido, ou eles manjam muito nisso ou eu sou fácil de agradar, mas o DeDeDe desse jogo é muito buxa... nem com uma segunda fase ele causou dificuldade.

Veredito: Bonito, fez um uso bem melhor dos poderes pros animais, mas foi cada escolha questionável pro level design...

i was actually a little worried going into this game cuz i thought it was just gonna be more dream land 2, and in a way it is, but (pardon my poor explanation) that's not really a bad thing? specifically, i was worried about 100% with the heart stars in EVERY SINGLE LEVEL being required. thankfully, the amount of pain to collect the macguffins has been significantly reduced compared to DL2. every level, with the exception of one, (6-5 in case you were curious) gives you the tools to collect the heart star within the stage itself. this might sound like the lowest of low bars, but this is an absolute godsend compared to DL2. i genuinely wake up in a cold sweat sometimes remembering the cloudy park crystal drop. anyways yeah the game is pretty good and you should play it. if you liked DL2 this should be a no-brainer

Nunca pensei que daria nota 2 pra um Kirby

É.. assim, eu gostei do DL 1 e do Adventure mas o Dream land 2 e 3 realmente foram minhas maiores decepções, até cheguei a achar que o 3 melhoraria um pouco mas pra mim só piorou, o Kirby ficou muito lento e o jogo cheio de puzzle e quests chatas de se fazer pra saber o final verdadeiro (que obviamente, não fiz), as fases dele achei legal e sua trilha sonora também me encantou, mas isso não foi o suficiente pra fazer eu curtir o jogo por inteiro e me divertir pra caramba com ele

Muita gente elogia o Dream Land 3 e alguns consideram ele como masterpiece e tudo, mas pra mim ele é totalmente o contrário e espero nunca mais encostar nesse jogo novamente

This is literally one of the most charming games I have ever played, it's peak silliness. The aesthetic is also absolutely lovely and makes this one of the most gorgeous games on the snes. Unfortunately, I feel that it's charm kind of carries the actual gameplay, and many of the heart stars feel a little confusing, making me have to consult walkthroughs more times than I'd like to admit. However, this game still makes me really happy and I think you should play it if you like silly and cute games, although keep in mind that you probably won't get anywhere near as much out of this game without going for 100%

Phenomenal presentation, Dreamland 3's pastel look is so memorable and pleasant. Between that and the soundtrack, it's gotta be one of the most relaxing platformers I've ever played. Sure, it has some occasionally clunky level design but what can I say, I love playing this game and chilling out with it. The level objectives are such a nice little addition, it's just a charming thing to go through and make the various characters happy... some of them are a bit difficult to figure out without a guide but I think most of them are pretty manageable without help. The new animal buddies are all a lot of fun to play with too, Pitch in particular stands out to me as having some really fun takes on abilities. Beyond that, it's a great co-op experience and brings us playable Gooey, so I can't not love it.

Expands DL2 into a more consistently fun and better paced game. Outside of the awesome art style and the animal friends it's just kind of a base line good kirby game. All around solid and always fun but not much special in the context of the whole series. Absolutely hate that the animal friends are sad if you don't pick them tho. If they're really considering doing more 2d kirby along side the new 3d ones I think a dreamland 4 or something to that effect would be a great way to make a new game that feels distinct from the run of modern 2d kirby beginning from return to dreamland whilst justifying it's place alongside 3d kirby by offering something a little different.

- Poyo!!! -
Por fin tuve la chance de jugarlo y terminarlo, y siento que es muy mal juego de Kirby, artisticamente es super bello y tiene muy lindas mascotas.
Pero del otro lado sus niveles son muy X y los poderes se siente muy malos, en cuanto al movimiento es raro y medio tosco.
Se me hizo muy aburrido conseguir todos los corazones para lograr el final, que a mi punto de vista no debía de estar encerrado detrás de esa mecánica de conseguir el 100% de algo xd.
Amo a Kirby pero este juego de plano no lo volvería a jugar o lo recomendaría a nadie xd

It’s never a good signal when a short game, and I’m talking like FOUR HOURS short, feels overly long. Kirby 3 is a fun and often clever game, particularly when it’s showing you new abilities or new ways to use them with your animal pals, but just never differentiates from the rest of the series in a way that feels exciting, and if you’ve played these games recently it really starts to feel redundant. It is the best looking game in the series up until this point, and it is in my mind better than the almost unplayably slowness of the 64 Kirby, but just doesn’t cut it.

Kirby's Dream Land 3 is a game I wish I could love more, but unfortunately, while it's not bad or anything, it doesn't live up to the expectations I had for it. I was hoping this would be my favourite of the three Dream Land games, but in all honesty, I think 2 was the one that gave me the best time. I didn't 100% either 2 or 3 but I found that you get more out of trying to 100% this game rather than actually just going through the levels, since the true final boss is behind it and every level has a side quest to do to unlock it. Now I wouldn't have an issue with this, if side quests were obscure in objective for most and the game didn't feel awkward to play. I found that the movement just felt off, most likely since it feels a lot slower than every other Kirby game I've played so far. The Animal Friends also felt like a downgrade this time around, with a lot of them being a lot slower or having very close range attacks with the Copy Abilities. The old ones were fine, but the new ones, specifically ChuChu I didn't really like, though I do really like Nago and Coo felt slower this time around. I mainly stuck with Nago + Fire but I still felt like a lot of the combos killed your movement and just didn't feel as smooth to use as something like Sword in Kirby Super Star for instance. There's still some great things about this game, it has a lot of charm, mainly due to the art style and cute OST, and the final boss is pretty fun too. I played this on Nintendo Switch Online so there was the special mode that had a full save file, so I opted to do that over the side missions because I got tired of them after Level 2. The true final boss is pretty fun to fight and probably my favourite part of the game because it isn't plagued by any issues that I mentioned earlier like movement, but it's a hassle to get to for only four minutes of gameplay. I don't know, I wouldn't say this game is anywhere near bad but I would say I was a bit disappointed that this didn't live up to my expectations. Overall, the game has a lot of charm and personality, but it doesn't quite live up to the expectations I had for it.

This is a game I owned as a kid but never ended up beating. There are a bunch of missions to complete to get the real ending, and I could never figure out all of them to be able to actually beat it. I sat down with a wiki open on my computer and finally beat this game after so many years. I have Bone to thank for me finally getting off of my butt and completing this after I read his review of Dream Land 2 a week or so ago ^^;. It's not my favorite Kirby game on the SNES, but it does have a lot of nostalgia for me, so I'm really happy that I was finally able to conquer this mountain of my childhood (even if it ultimately wasn't that difficult ^^;). It took me around 4 hours to beat the game on my Switch's Super Famicom Online service.

The story is another fairly light Kirby affair as is so standard for their games. Kirby is chilling on Pop Star (or as it's called in Japanese: "Pupupu Land") when those weird, shadowy eyeball fellas land on it and start wreaking havoc again. Kirby needs to go to all five sections of Pop Star and complete the six levels in each and then fight a boss at the end. And, if they complete the special mission in each of the six levels in a world and then beats the boss there, they'll purify that area of the shadows. Purify all five worlds and you unlock a true final boss to fight to kick those shadowy jerks back into space. It's a simple, cute story that sets up the gameplay nicely, as is so often the case with Kirby.

The gameplay is very much Kirby and an evolution on what Dream Land 2 brought to the table. Like in Dream Land 2, there are a scaled back number of powers compared to just how many there are in Kirby's Adventure or Kirby Super Star Deluxe, but they're modified by the inclusion of Kirby's animal friends. Pair up with an animal friend and the power you have gets turned into something totally new that also happens to have that power. It's a neat gimmick that is also pretty clearly what led to the power combining mechanic that we'd see a couple years later in Kirby 64.

The main issue I found is that a lot of the animals just aren't that fun/quick to go around as, and a lot of their power combos suck. A fair few of the animals feel like power-downs as compared to how you usually get around (let alone compared to other animals), and several missions require the use of certain animals. Kirby themself controls alright, despite a bit of a heavier walk than I'm used to in Super Star, but a few of the animals are paiiiinfully slow and it feels like you're trudging through levels for no real benefit other than the novelty of the animal companion. Gooey, your co-op partner, is also a really cool idea, but Gooey (as far as I can tell) can't ride animals, which is a bit of a stinker (and Gooey is nowhere near as cool as the partner system in Super Star). It's certainly a change from the normal just-Kirby stuff, but it's got a flawed enough execution that it's not surprising to me that they were dropped from future Kirby games (though my personal favorites are Rick and Kine <3 ).

The level design and overall difficulty are quite good, and lend to a game that's not dead-easy but also isn't brutally hard. I actually did die at a few points, and the game hits a nice sweet spot between not really hard enough to make you feel like you're on edge, but also not easy enough that you just stop caring. There are a few parts that require the animals' respective unique platforming abilities to complete the mission in that stage, and those are usually really good fun (if above-average in their challenge), but there are only a few of them. The mission design on the whole varies a lot in quality from a good challenge to nearly unknowable nonsense (like the one in level 2 that had me stumped for literal decades), and while their overall construction is a big improvement on how they're done in Dream Land 2 (you can always find everything you'll need to complete a mission in that level, so you don't gotta go get animals/powers and bring them to a different level to complete that mission), but they're still a fairly flawed idea.

The presentation is very strong, as is normal for a Kirby game, but has some ups and downs. The music is overall very good, and I'll leave it at that. Kirby music is something HAL has always excelled at, and this game is no exception to that. The bigger sticking point for me is the graphics. Now, for a very late SFC game, the picture-book style of the game looks really cool. The way things look drawn with crayon or pencil gives the game a really unique style that I adore. The main thing I don't like about it is the fact that Kirby doesn't change depending on the power he has like with the hats they'd get in Super Star and such. I realize this is no doubt a compromise for needing to ride on all the animals, but it's still an aesthetic of those games that I love that I missed having here.

Verdict: Recommended. It's got some issues as far as Kirby games go, but it's still a really solid game. It's gotten to be quite the rare physical release, so it's pretty darn hard to recommend it that way, but if you already have Switch Online, I'd say there's no reason not to give this a go if you're in the mood to kill an afternoon with a fun platformer. There's certainly better Kirby to be found on the SNES, but this is definitely not a choice either.