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Breath of Fire III

Platform: Playstation

Released: 1998

Developer: Capcom

Genre: RPG

Rating: Teen for no good reason. Okay, so there's some "nudity" in there, but you don't see anything. C'mon, they're sprites! And blood. And there's not much of that, either.

Storyline: 500 years after the "Battle between Good and Evil," with the dragons on the evil side, a young dragon (who looks like a boy most of the time, and doesn't know he's a dragon) named Ryu befriends two thieves, Teepo and Rei. They get into trouble, stop their thieving ways, and become do-gooders. They accidentally make enemies of those they shouldn't, and Teepo and Rei get killed. Ryu goes off to find them, makes new friends (Nina, Momo, Peco, and Garr), discovers he's a dragon, and goes to ask God (who's actually a goddess) why she sent people to kill all the dragons. Because dragons are bad.

That's about as much as I can tell you without giving away too much. And most of what I said occurs within the first hours of gameplay. There are many twists in this game, and that's partially why it's so good.

Graphics: The people are sprites. That means they appear shorter than they actually are. And you only see what they really look like at the end of the game. I'll use Rei as an example. On the left is sprite Rei, and the actual Rei is on the right.

The scenery, however is 3D. This means you can look around corners and such. The sprites look fantastic, but the buildings look, well, not so good. However, since it's an RPG and was made in 1998, I'm not complaining. At all. The special effects are on the good end of the spectrum, but nothing to rave over.

Music: Meh. I'm not sure what they were thinking when they made the music for this game, but some of it's awful. And some of it's really good, too. Like the end music, "Pure Again." That song rocks. And some of the mood music's good, too, but some of it's also annoying. For the most part, it's tolerable.

Gameplay: This isn't an RPG known for its innovative battle engine. However, that doesn't mean it's bad. It's very easy to get the hang of, and there's even an autofight option. Which is good, because the random battles occur too often.

The dragon transformation system is the best of all the BoF games. Throughout the game, you acquire different dragons genes, and can mix and match them (up to three genes at a time) to transform into different dragons. The dragons range from the itty bitty Whelp to the gigantic Behemoth, and there's also Warrior and the Kaiser dragon.

Comments: Now you're thinking, "If it's got so much wrong with it, why do you act like it's the greatest game in the world?"

Part of it is the storyline. Y'know how I mentioned Teepo and Rei getting killed? Ryu doesn't take their deaths very well. He's just a little kid, and when he stops crying, he decides to go look for them. I don't know about anyone else who's played the game, but for some reason, I really connected with Ryu all throughout the game. There's a lot of emotion involved, and it toys with the many themes: the definitions of good and evil, vengeance, religion, and more.

Then, there's the characters. Ryu starts out as an incompetent crybaby, but matures into a kick-butt guy whose sense of right saves a number of lives and shows not all dragons are evil. Nina is the general "princess who's sick of being a princess and runs away with the dragon boy to go on an adventure," but what separates her from the other rebellious princess is she wonders if running away was the right thing to do. Momo is the bazooka-wielding mechanical whiz that gets herself into trouble when her inventions blow up on her. Garr is a warrior (I'm desperately trying not to give anything away here) who's as nice as he is big and tough. Peco is... an onion. A mutated onion. All he says is "pukyuu," but grows into one of the strongest characters in the game, if you let him. Teepo is a punk kid who likes taking the easy way out, although he does have a conscience.

And then there's Rei. He's got a sense of humor, a catch-phrase (Doesn't that beat all), stripes, a tail, knives, he's one of the fastest characters, and a vendetta roughly the size of the Empire State Building.

Minigames: There're a ton of minigames in BoF III, from fishing to drawing water from a well. I thought most were a little easy, but some were fun. Like making Shisu.

Conclusion: If you get this game for no other reason, get it for the storyline. There's a ton of stuff I can't tell you without wrecking it, so you're gonna have to get the game to find out. DO IT!!

You can find BoF III on ebay and other online places. You can also look for it in used game stores. Good luck finding it new.