Luigi's Mansion 3 is not the original Luigi's Mansion. More importantly, it is also not Luigi's Mansion 2.

As a statement on it's own, that couldn't be any less obvious. Like, come on, duh Spike, the brain brigade must have been working overtime on that one. As obvious as it may be, on an emotional level, it's a statement I didn't know I needed to acknowledge. It wasn't until I've finally played Luigi's Mansion 3 with my own two hands that the realization occurred.

For context, as hinted with in my Super Mario Bros: Wonder review, Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon was a game I felt immensely disappointed by. Gone was the arcade-y set up of the original, the breezy and focused gameplay now replaced by a mission based structure with content that felt as if it's sole purpose was to extend the game's length. The terrifying chills and larger-than-life character given to the ghouls within the titular mansion were replaced with copy-pasted enemy fodder with zero charm, with your run-of-the-mill spooks and specters serving as your boss battles. Even the music was butchered from it's ghostly synths and harmonic whomps setting the ambience of the mansion perfectly. From the haunting Mansion theme to the silly and off putting funk beat made to emphasize Dr. E. Gadd's zaniness, it fit the mood like a glove. With Dark Moon, all it's soundtrack provided was a vapid, boring, safe score that never instilled anything into you. Maybe light-hearted whimsy at the most, the opposite of how I felt I should be feeling.

This is how I felt at the time, and given that I haven't replayed Luigi's Mansion 2 since my teens, it's easy to see why I was so apathetic to Luigi's Mansion 3 when it was first announced. I felt no desire to give the game a try, not after the immense disappointment I had experienced. The series had left me behind and was attempting a style I didn't really care for, so I figured, why bother with this one?

Fast forward to now. 5 years have passed since Luigi's Mansion 3, and a decade since I touched Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon. The disappointment and bitterness from my teen years have been shedded away by years of self reflection and personal growth. I've reflected on a lot of my personal life and my gaming life as I've grown, and re-evaluating the Luigi's Mansion series has been on my to-do list. Gratefully, I received this game as a gift for my birthday, and playing the game now in 2023 has left me with a number of thoughts that needed to be revalued.

The very first thought that came across my mind was exactly the first sentence of this review: Luigi's Mansion 3 is not Luigi's Mansion.

Luigi's Mansion 3 feels tonally off from the original game. In the original Luigi's Mansion, the ghosts as a collective had their quirks, but they were offset by ones that were more unnerving. Something about Chauncey the baby makes me uncomfortable. This pampered child shrinks you down to a pea's size, places you into a portal dimension, and tries to make you his play thing as he throws a temper tantrum, screeching demonically at you for giving him an owie. Bogmire is another great example. He's faceless in a sea of colorful faces, and he behaves so differently from everything else in the game. He's unsettling and gives the game a strong sense of mystery just from his presence alone. In Luigi's Mansion 3, there's a distinct lack of edge.

Alongside the characters of the ghosts themselves, there are design decisions within Luigi's Mansion 3 that stick out from being lost in translation from converting the original game's gameplay sensibilities to their new format. In Luigi's Mansion, the game would let you wander into a room and discover for yourself that something wasn't right. There were exceptions, of course, but this was a constant. Typically, you'd walk into a darkened room, and an object would appear to move or float before you. You wouldn't see the ghost right away, which lead into a puzzle solving phase of finding the right way to expose it's heart. This is very subtle, but this structure added a layer of uncertainty to these paranormal encounters. They're unknown until they're seen. You watch their actions to determine what their personalities are like. You're within the process of discovery yourself. With Luigi's Mansion 3, these boss ghosts are set up with a cutscene, taking the time to introduce themselves up front and personal, which loses a lot of the mystic and agency given to the player.

These critiques are based on a purposely faulty premise, however. All of these criticisms would be valid of Luigi's Mansion 3 if the game was attempting to contain the same tone as the original.

But again, Luigi's Mansion 3 is not Luigi's Mansion.

Instead, Luigi's Mansion 3 goes for a more light hearted tone with it's horror. The kind of tone that might startle you, but will make you smile after it's done. Ghosts jump scare you from time to time, but they're usually doing something goofy to deflate your fear and convert it to a smile. There's only one really mean jump scare, and that would be on Floor 8, Paranormal Productions. The entire game has been lulling you in for a false sense of security up until a bear statue just decides to violently grab you. Even then, the designers felt so bad for this that they give you plenty of money as an apology. It's the perfect example of this game's MO.

Much like Resident Evil 4 was to the original Resident Evil, Luigi's Mansion 3 puts the focus on action rather than scares. The gameplay uses the same design keys of capturing ghosts and performing small puzzles to figure out how to capture said ghosts, but it's recontextualized into a more gameified feel. The tools at your disposal have expanded, your list of actions increasing from a mere suck and blow.

Don't, don't mind that phrasing—

Sucking up the environment is a strong part of the gameplay loop now. The added physics to every object within the hotel creates an addicting kleptomanic drive to vaccum out anything and everything valuable from this shady hotel. The game feel to this reminds me of Paper Mario: Origami King and it's ability to make the simple act of hitting things feel immensely satisfying. The noises, the chaotic clutter of objects flying about, it's simply joyful.

Unlike Origami King though, it's main gameplay loop is also satisfying. The hotel is structured with each floor acting as a level to explore, setting up gags, ghosts to gobble up, and ghoulish bosses to grapple with. Flinging ghosts by slamming their ectoplasmic bodies sharply to the ground makes combat feel crunchy, which is something I neglected when I played Dark Moon many years ago. There indeed IS substance to this gameplay style that appeals to me, it was just hidden through a distinct lack of soul given to the direction.

The hotel is structured similar to the mission like structure of Dark Moon, creating bite sized chunks with tasks set out for you to accomplish. Yet, Luigi's Mansion 3 is not Luigi's Mansion 2. The game doesn't cause you to go back in and out of E. Gadd's lab to complete an objective, and if it does, you can quickly teleport there and back to where you last left off. Each floor builds upon gimmicks culminating in a boss fight. These bosses typically use mechanics already established through the floor you've spend the last 30 minutes on, finding clever ways to plunger enemies and drag them down, using your pal Gooigi to double team them in elaborate methods, along with an assortment of other tricks up it's sleeve. It's all fairly enjoyable. I almost wish there were more tools to expand your equipment in more interesting ways, but with what they accomplished here felt like they had enough to work with.

There's more I could say about the bosses not quite meeting my expectations in terms of personalities, the music not quite hitting the highs of the original game's, the overall structure causing me to put the game down more than feeling a strong urge to keep trucking forward. But these are all aspects that come down to personal preference. The structure plays well to the game's strengths. There's more to do and explore from this concept. The bosses and music are bit too light-hearted, but again, the tone of the game is different by design. You can't capture the same magic if your goal was never to do so. What's there is still charming. My teenage self wouldn't have understood that.

I'm no longer the bitter sad sap I once was, and my reaction towards Luigi's Mansion 3 has been a reflection of that change to me. 5 years ago me and teenage me were wrong, both for different reasons. This gameplay style does suite me — it just took another entry with refinements to prove that it did. Just because it's not the same tonally from what I loved in the past doesn't mean I can't still enjoy the game.

Are there aspects lost from this direction? Sure. Do I prefer Luigi's Mansion over 3? Of course I do. It's my childhood favorite, it's hard not to. But this does not make Luigi's Mansion 3 any less valid in existing like I once so stubbornly believed. Luigi's Mansion 3 executes ideas pulled off within it so superbly well, it's hard not to love it. And that feels good to say.