【Double Dragon III: The Sacred Stones】 Blind NES Reviews | Squiggy Seven (Episode #028/896)

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Published on April 24, 2017 8:30:01 PM ● Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6BdnF0rVcA

Game:

Double Dragon III: The Sacred Stones (1990)

Category:

Review

Duration: 20:25

219 views

4

What's crackalackin' friends? Today's episode of Squiggy Seven brings us to one of the most classic NES beat'm up experiences of all time -- Double Dragon!

Double Dragon III: The Sacred Stones is not the best known in the series -- that classic tale of Bimmy and Jimmy -- but it seems to hold up just fine. Unfortunately, I am and always will be terrible at the beat'm up genre, regardless of how hard I try, so it's hard for me to tell how this holds up to others. If it's not Renegade or Turtles in Time, then I can't play it.

It plays a lot like I remember the original game playing. Smooth controls, hard as hell difficulty and consistent predictable threats. It's the kind of game you play a thousand times and do a little better each time. I can dig it.

For something so simple, the soundtrack really gets stuck in my head. Always a huge plus in my book. On that note, the graphics are also really crisp. Like, look at those colours!

They did a really good job with it all. But, at the end of the day, it's still a beat'm up and I'm still terrible at it, so I probably won't be buying this anytime soon. Even though it's surprisingly cheap at about 15 bucks or so... I'd figure a classic game like this that came out so late in the NES history would be super expensive.


---[ Wikipedia Information ]---------------


Double Dragon III: The Sacred Stones, released in Japan as Double Dragon III: The Family Jewels (ダブルドラゴンⅢ　ザ・ロゼッタストーン?), is a side-scrolling beat-'em-up produced for the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1991. It was the third Double Dragon game for the NES, developed by Technos Japan Corp. and published in North America and Europe by Acclaim Entertainment. Although loosely based on the similarly titled arcade game Double Dragon 3: The Rosetta Stone, it is not a port, but rather a parallel project that was developed at the same time.

A year after the downfall of the Shadow Warriors, a new enemy threatens Billy and Jimmy Lee, as Marion is kidnapped by a mysterious organization. The only witness to her kidnapping, Brett, dies before he could divulge their leader's true identity. A fortune teller named Hiruko informs the Lee brothers that Marion's kidnappers are searching for the three Sacred Stones of Power that had been scattered around the world and that the only way to rescue her is to procure them before the kidnappers do. After the initial battle in the United States, the Lee brothers embark on a worldwide journey to find the stones, which takes them to China, Japan and Italy, where they face numerous formidable fighters in each country. The final stage is set in Egypt, where the Lee brothers uncover the truth about Marion's disappearance and come face to face with the true leader of the enemy.

Double Dragon III can be played by one or two players simultaneously, with an "A mode" where both players can't harm each other and a "B mode" that allows friendly fire. Like its arcade counterpart, the NES version of Double Dragon III reverts to having punch and kick buttons as the standard control scheme and the ability to dash by pressing the d-pad left or right twice has been added. The rest of the combat system is a bit closer to the previous NES games, retaining the hair grab move that was removed in the arcade version (although the shoulder throw is gone, as well as the flying knee kick and hyper uppercut from the NES version of Double Dragon II: The Revenge). New moves in this version include a running jump kick (which can become a triangle jump kick when performed on a wall) and a midair somersault that allows the player to throw enemies by jumping on them. During 2-player mode, when both players are controlling each Lee brother, they can perform a twin cyclone spin kick and a triangle jump kick.


---[ Series Information ]---------------

Squiggy Seven: First Impressions is a series where I blind review random NES games in an effort to learn more about the hidden classics on the system. I have gotten into retro collecting for the NES and I am on the hunt for those games I've never played that I'm missing out on.

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