I wish I knew that back in the day, then maybe I could’ve gotten further than Bruce Lee at the Great Wall of China (weird sentence…)Īlso available to buy in these shops are “Extra Guys” (that is the actual term the shop uses) but unlike traditional extra lives they’re actual other characters you take control of if the Lee brother you’re play as dies, and they changed depending on which level you’re on. You have some special moves as well, though a lot of them have to be brought at the shops that appear at the start of several levels, making this game feel like a cross between the first two games in this weekly feature! Sadly (in a way…) nearly all bosses can be defeated by grabbing, doing a handstand on their heads, kicking them to the floor and then jumping on their bodies. You can punch, kick, jumping strike, running strike and grab people for throws or a close kick (rather than the old “knees-to-the-face” combo). If only these guys breathed fire like any self-respective overweight scrolling beat ’em up enemy would, the game would score another “point”.Īt its heart Double Dragon III is still very much a Double Dragon game, though will no NES-forced platforming sections (though a level full of archers, which is just as annoying, frankly!).

Can’t find info on the European release, but since I had a copy and no way of playing imports back then, it presumably had one! It was released in North America in November 1990 and Japan two months later. Did I not give it a fair shake, or was I bang on the money? Let’s find out…Ĭalmly ignoring the bikers jumping behind him, Billy looks both ways before crossing the road.ĭouble Dragon III was originally released in Arcades, as they all are, and while a “not at all like it” port was released on the NES like the previous game I reviewed, this Mega Drive port was a much more faithful one, by all accounts (with the exception of only being 2-player simultaneous, compared to the Arcade’s three).

It’s slow, unresponsive and not very pretty to look at, and it didn’t take long for me and my friends to head straight back to SoR2. Sadly, I was wrong, as Double Dragon III is … not good, or at least not the Mega Drive port anyway. I brought Double Dragon III quite cheap at some point in my childhood, thinking it would “be like Streets of Rage”, a series I loved to death.

Double dragon 3 review