Extremely underrated entry in the Shinobi franchise. Less Revenge of-style action in favor of slower, more cautious play, figuring out when to move in and attack or send your dog in to grab the enemy first. Very fun pacing when you get into the rhythm of it. I'm not a huge fan of the one-hit deaths, but the stages are generally fair and well designed enough to not need to totally commit them to memory. Only a few late-game slip-ups (in particular, the final boss is awful) feel a little too extreme.

Also, the soundtrack is incredible.

Getting the no-savestate 1CC on this? Coolest arcade achievement in a long while.

What really had me coming around on this game is the intricacy of the enemy AI - each sub-type has multiple ways they'll initiate attack against you based on environmental geometry, your positioning, whether or not you've bumped them, etc. And yet how these enemies behave is always consistent on a level-by-level basis, your memorization and commitment to a plan of action is always rewarded and repeatable. Impeccable, intensely-replayable level design with a punishing but plentiful lives system makes this one of the most exhilarating games to master.

Shinobi III is the game to play if you want to live out the cinematic, acrobatic ninja fantasy, but this is where's it's at for the mindgames, the routing, and that up-close martial arts struggle.

Just about everything I disliked about Shadow Dancer Arcade has been changed and fixed here. My main criticism was that the dog companion was not very fun to use despite being such a great idea for a game mechanic because of how you controlled him. Instead of Crouch+A, you hold A to charge your Dog Meter and then Yamato attacks when you release in range of an enemy.

Yamato's attack speed and attack range is a lot better too. He feels a lot smarter as a companion and I feel more in control over his actions. In Shadow Dancer Arcade, I'd be calling for Yamato to attack an enemy on the platform directly above and in front of an enemy and he wouldn't budge, but he'd go and attack some random enemy off-screen because I was trying to crouch-kick one of the disappearing ninjas. Now, Yamato can attack from pretty much anywhere as long as you're facing the enemy on the screen and he's barking.

Enemies generally feel more fair and fun to fight against, their placement feels more fair. Ninjas especially are much easier to deal with than the arcade version now that you can properly crouch-attack. They added these cool rolling armadillo ninja enemies that I like a lot, they have a cool design.

None of the levels are the same, which is a good thing, because I think every level in this version is more memorable and more fun than the arcade one. The elevator climb up the Statue of Liberty was way more fun than the sewer level with the alligators that decide to push you off the platform you're on.

The only thing I mourn is the loss of a couple of bosses. The train boss was better than the face in the wall and the guandao lady on the rocket platform was a cool boss, just not a great final boss, but even the really lame bosses like the giant floating wheel that shoots fireballs was better than the samurai throwing rubber bouncy balls in the airplane. The final boss is very challenging, but actually makes you think about patterns and what you're doing as opposed to mashing shurikens in place and jumping occasionally. He's also a lot cooler. The rocket launching platform was a cool setpiece, but travelling inside the Statue of Liberty to go underground and find the hideout of Union Lizard is pretty cool as well.

Oh, and score DOES reset when you use a continue, incentivizing getting really good at one-credit runs. That was something I was eventually hoping would be implemented.

Usually, I find that console conversions of arcade games are vastly inferior and not worth playing, but this is one of the Genesis' best imo.

High Score: 701,500