Genre: Strategy RPG
Developer: Camelot
Publisher: Sega

A perusal of the credits readily reveals that the exact same cast that created Shining the Holy Ark made this game-- and judging by the game's art, that is no surprise. Everything from the town and field texture work, to the character designs, to the menu system, to the sprite renderings are straight from the aforementioned dungeon crawler. And like that title, the game's technical and artistic prowess is impressive and highly appealing.

Motoi Sakuraba returns, accompanied by the same MIDI-based instrument set he used for the Shining the Holy Ark score! It's probably fair to say Shining Force III's work doesn't have quite the same "verve" as the tunes from Holy Ark, but the contributions are still quite memorable. Sound effects have been lifted straight from Holy Ark almost entirely-- and that's not a bad thing, as they lend the game much of its unique character.

Shining Force III suffers from the same malady that plagues every single other strategy RPG, outside of Micro Cabin's 3DO masterpiece "Guardian War"; in many of the stages, it takes a long time to move your pieces across the stage just to engage in combat, which in turn leads to inedaquate pacing. Everything else about the core mechanics are very solid however-- there are a variety of character classes to enjoy, and the "side-dungeon" concept featured in many of the game's levels is unique and novel.

Like rare titles such as World of Warcraft, Shining Force III successfully takes an already-created game world-- the one that Shining the Holy Ark established-- and migrates that world to a new gameplay genre, while managing to maintain continuity with virtually everything else. The title is a bit dialog heavy, but the game's solid gameplay and wonderful sense of style make for a very pleasant experience nonetheless.