Dec 232019
After playing Nier, I also went on to finish Luigi’s Mansion 3
When Luigi’s Mansion 3 was announced, I had one major hope: that it would be more like the original than like Dark Moon.
After that, I saw a lot of things that convinced me it would be, and so Luigi’s Mansion 3 became a game I was truly looking forward to. Now that I’ve completed it, I can say I definitely enjoyed it… but it still didn’t quite reach the heights of the first game for me.
Luigi’s Mansion 3 begins with Luigi, Mario, Peach, and a few Toads traveling to a luxury hotel for a vacation. Once there, they’re trapped by ghosts, and it’s up to Luigi to stop the ghosts and free them all.
First of all, the mission system is gone! The mission-based structure was one of my least favorite parts of Dark Moon, and it thankfully was removed for the next game. You’re free to go back and forth in the hotel as you please, and there’s an auto-save feature instead of only saving at the end of each level.
It is still somewhat segmented, since each floor effectively acts as a distinct level, and I was disappointed that there are not puzzles that make use of multiple floors like an interview had said.
(In fact, since only the first few floors really feel like a standard hotel, being a hotel doesn’t really have much to do with the layout or puzzle structure.)
Nevertheless, it was enough of a compromise that I enjoyed it much more. The hotel felt like an important location I got to know as I progressed through the game, and I enjoyed my time with it.
Luigi’s Mansion 3 also has boss ghosts with personalities again, helping them to stand out more from the generic ghosts you fight around the hotel. Some of them were great, with one ghost in particular being my favorite both for his personality and for having one of the best floors.
The atmosphere leans more toward comedy than spookiness again, but while it isn’t as atmospheric as the original, it’s a lot of fun to play.
So many things in the hotel can be vacuumed up, and there are secrets to discover and puzzles to solve all over the place. The cutscenes are also great, and there is a decent amount of optional stuff you can do if you want, with Boos to catch and hidden gems to collect.
While Luigi’s Mansion 3 didn’t surpass the original for me, it’s still a fun game I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend. And maybe I ought to pick up the 3DS remake of the original to see if it really is as excellent as I remember…