it's fitting that this game wraps up the little canon that it shares with Dragon Quests 1 and 2 because in a lot of ways this feels to me like not only a reiteration of DQ2, but an amelioration of a lot of the things i didn't like about it.

the largely unguided semi-open world collectathon structure of 2 is largely intact here, but the world design is a little more restricted and guided in such a way to make things a little more organized without stopping you from going wherever you want and doing anything after a certain point. the puzzle solving and navigation felt easier to keep track of to me too. it's hard to overstate how gentle the touch is here, of just gating the progression slightly to limit the number of key items you're gunning for at any one point in the game, and the number of hints you have access to, really really makes a huge difference in the feeling of pacing and player control vs the DQ2 feeling like a big sloppy mess despite being almost identical in structure and presentation.

the writing has more personality, but I'm not sure that's a point in the game's favor for me; this is the first dragon quest that REALLY fucks with separate little stories in every town you visit, and those towns being heavily themed, but that really highlights the comparative blandness of it all vs what will come later. still, as a step up from what's come before, it's streets ahead of its predecessors and considering it's still an NES game i'm impressed by how much the ambition has escalated with each of these.

the gameplay is also a big lip forward, though in subtler ways than 2 made over 1. the most obvious addition is what appears at first to be a simple class system and freeform party management that you have access to at any time, but throw in a surprisingly complex personality system that governs stat growths which can be altered temporarily by accessories or permanently by books found throughout the world, equipment limits by class, and a class change system that unlocks early on and allows not only for advancement but also extremely powerful hybrid builds if you combine all of these elements in smart ways, and DQ3 offers a deep and rewarding character customization experience despite what appears on the surface to be a very limited set of classes, equipment, and spells to play with compared to a lot of modern games. i would wish that the AI asked you to engage with that stuff a little better but on the other hand i don't really come to these games to engage deeply or be terribly tested strategically, i just appreciate the those options are there.

it's good that this game closes the loop on Original Dragon Quest; it feels like a real culmination of what this team has been building towards over these three games and it's certainly the most rewarding Gaming Experience, even if my heart will always belong to the strange and simple pleasures of the original game over this one. it's also good because even though i think the way that this game utilizes its DQ1 nostalgia is a LOT cooler and more clever than the way DQ2 does it, it's definitely in danger of returning to that well too many times, and i'm glad they decided to wrap things up for this setting with the trilogy.

this game is a real delight and i'm very excited to get to the fourth game sometime soon.