Rune Factory 3 Special
Bridge the divide of an ancient schism between humans and monsters in Rune Factory 3 Special as half-human, half-wooly protagonist Micah. Farm, fight and fall in love as you revisit a classic in the series that perfected the blend of RPG & Life-sim genres.
Rune Factory 3 Special is a rpg, farming sim and romance game
developed by Marvelous Inc.
and published by XSEED Games, Marvelous USA, Inc. and Marvelous.
Released on September 05th 2023 is available only on Windows
in 8 languages: English, French, German, Spanish - Spain, Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese and Traditional Chinese.
It has received 574 reviews of which 549 were positive and 25 were negative resulting in a rating of 8.9 out of 10. š
The game is currently priced at 15.99ā¬ on Steam and has a 60% discount.
The Steam community has classified Rune Factory 3 Special into these genres:
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Requirements
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Windows
- OS: Windows 10
- Processor: Intel Core i5-1135G7
- Memory: 8 GB RAM
- Graphics: Intel Iris Xe Graphics
- DirectX: Version 12
- Storage: 4 GB available space
Reviews
Explore reviews from Steam users sharing their experiences and what they love about the game.
I haven't powered through to end game yet and in fact hit a stopping point for the story (possibly a timegate) but I figured 20 something hours is probably a fair time to review. I think this is good but doesn't have the quality of life you would expect from later rune factory games. This is a visual upgrade to a ds game, I haven't played the original for a direct comparison, but the models definitely look really good, and the UI is crisp. I think they put more effort into the upgrade than they did with 4, but I feel like they probably didn't touch the core game at all. The characters and town is nice. I think the characters are all charming and have a lot of work put into them, and this is the only one where I was split between like three bachelorettes. On that note, you can only play male and romance the women, so it's a lot more restrictive on the sim life front than the other Rune Factory or Story of Seasons offerings on store, but there is actually a plot reason for this and they have relevance to the story, so I suppose you can view it as quality over quantity, but they still have all the cute boys as villagers so I'm sure a lot of the audience of this game was pretty bummed about it. You cannot immediately grow anything out of season, and item management is a lot more tedious. I think normal story of seasons games can get a pass for this because they're juggling a lot less, but it kinda gets under my skin in this? There is a metric ton of inventory management in these games. I wish they implemented the tabbed inventory and the ability to pull up the inventory at the shipping bin the same way it is in 4 and 5. Maybe late game will wow me, but I recommend this game on sale. Rune Factory 4 costs less, and much more fully featured in the quality of life, romance and farming aspects. 5 is less and while some consider it a weaker entry, it still retains a lot of the basic quality of life that 4 had, as well as letting you experience it from a more intimate angle. I recommend getting 4 or 5 first if you don't have them.
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9.7/10 took off the 0.3 points cause they are scummy about the DLC a little over priced at 40$, would grab on sale 5$ for the Another Episode Pack WTF???? should be in the base game with all the other hardly worthless DLC's playing on steam deck and everything appears to work fine so far played every single RF game and this is the 1st one i played, my introduction to the franchise. got it for Nintendo DS and played the living hell out of it i can get rune factory 5 working on windows 7 but i cant get 3, it keeps crashing when i load up my saves
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Rune Factory 3 Special is a remake/enhanced port/what have you of Rune Factory 3 for Nintendo DS. Itās a farming sim RPG, where you farm, combat, and converse with unique residents of Sharance village. I want to mostly focus this review on how well it does as a subsequent significant rerelease of the original DS game. Which, in summary, good enough but couldāve been better. THE GOOD: -The game performs better than the DS original, which is an obvious improvement. That version struggled to maintain a consistent framerate around other entities. Modern PCs and Nintendo Switch are up to the task. -The graphics are also obviously improved. And unlike Rune Factory 4 Special , they are better on a technical side AND artistically. I think the devs took the criticism of simple upscales to heart and made an effort to make them more appealing (granted, upscaling DS assets wouldnāt cut it as much as 3DS ones). The item sprites are redrawn or at least updated enough to be more recognizable and actually look quite good. The models are also greatly improved, the human characters look nice, and monsters, I think for the most part they use the same designs as those from Rune Factory 5 . Only backgrounds seem to remain AI upscaled. Still, I applaud the effort. -You can skip crafting animations, which greatly speeds up the process (especially if youāre someone who tries to brute force a 10% chance item). -The dashing is now mapped to a separate button instead of requiring to double-tap a direction, which is far more convenient. -Upgraded material box and fridge have greatly expanded storage capacity. Great for item hoarders. -You can change language options (text/voice acting) in case you are curious how original Japanese VO sounds like, a feature since Rune Factory 4 Special . -All additions from the previous āSpecialā re-release: Newlywed Mode, Another Episode DLC, Hell difficulty, more than 2 save slots. THE OK: -The English script and voice acting have been completely redone, which is understandable, since the original was published by Natsume and that original work is likely in their basement somewhere, restrained by copyright issues. I heard that that script did have some issues/mistranslations, so this new translation is probably more accurate (they did keep all the old character names like how Chocolat is now Colette). As for the voice acting itself, I honestly think that some of the new voice lines tend to lack exaggerated emotion compared to the originalsā¦ but maybe Iām just being nostalgic and find the old VO charming. Of course, you can just change it to Japanese if you wanted. Or donāt. Itās your choice. Now, letās finally move onto LE BAD: -This game does NOT include analog control. Youāre stuck with d-pad movement even when using a stick, it sounds like a no-brainer change, itās baffling why itās not present. The thing is, the original DID have analog controlā¦ if you used the touch screen. Highly doubt you did, but it was always there, in the dark corner, saying nothing. They couldāve mapped that analog movement onto a stick, but they didnāt. But even if the original didnāt have itā¦ cāmon, itās such an obvious missed opportunity. -This game does NOT fix clunky movement that was in the original. You have a slight slip to your movement, like you carry enough forward momentum instead of stopping dead in the tracks, which can make the controls frustrating early on (I had to re-learn this after not playing original game for a long while). -The game does NOT include multiplayer functionality from the original (going through Sharance Mazes (randomized dungeons) with other players). Personally I don't think it's that big a deal, but it would've been neat to try it out with others over the internet, at least for the novelty of it. -The game does NOT adjust stat displays. In the game, stats like vitality, inteligence, etc. are capped at 999... but only visually, they keep progressing beyond that number up to a maximum of unsigned integer - 65 535. Another basic adjustement that this re-release utterly misses. -The game does NOT include more quality of life changes, mostly from the future entries. This is a ābrand newā game, released after Rune Factory 4 Special and Rune Factory 5 , available on the same platforms, and is a mechanical step backwards. Makes sense if youāre playing originals back to back, not so much here. Some of these include Escape spell being a separate button like in Rune Factory 4 Special , better item storage (stashing an item makes it take its own slot instead of adding it on top of an existing one, e.g. you stash 2 iron and thereās already a 7 iron stack. Instead of adding on top of that stack, the 2 iron will take its own slot) and āShippedā indicator for those looking for 100% ship all the items. -Digital Deluxe Edition is legitimately overpriced (it can be argued the base game is overpriced in itself). You pay 10 extra dollars forā¦ā¦ā¦ā¦ā¦ā¦.. a swimsuit toggle. How is this enticing? Sure, itās a very fan-service-y DLC, however, you didnāt have to pay extra for it when pre-ordering Rune Factory 4 Special on Nintendo Switch. Thatās right, it was just a small bonus, for fans that havenāt been served in years. It was a nice little bonus, and now itās whopping TEN DOLLARS??? Are you really going to pay for that? Freak. -Credits donāt include original DS staff, which is really lame. Shouldnāt it be standard to include original credits? They worked hard on the original, yāknow. This game isnāt even developed by Hakama, the new crew behind Rune Factory 4 Special and Rune Factory 5 which includes some of the original staff, like the series director, Yoshifumi Hashimoto. Itās byā¦ Three Rings Inc. (and I saw some IREM in there). I think they were handed a checklist of how to make a āSpecialā re-release, which could explain itās faithfulnessā¦ but I dunno. Just food for thought. Overall, I think this is a solid way to experience the original. Itās accessible, has some new content, great new visuals and a few improvements, but I canāt help but feel disappointed by the missed opportunities for even more improvement, I think it could've been better, as it is, it's faithful to a fault. Of course, it also couldāve been worse, it couldāve been riddled with issues that werenāt there before (say hello to Half-Life: Source ). That being said... PLEASE, I hope the pontential Rune Factory 2 Special and Rune Factory Special and those two non-numbered entries almost no one talks about will have better mechanical treatments, or they'll end up being underwhelming re-releases. But, alright, what if you have never played a single Rune Factory game and this is going to be your first? How is it on its own? Itāsā¦ pretty good! Itās the first (numbered) entry to introduce fast paced gameplay, and itās great. The characters are very unique and fun, the writing is, in my opinion, the funniest out of all entries, which makes this game stand out. The music is great, it has some of the most memorable tunes that I remember for a long while after putting the game off. Itās a little lacking in terms of content and its story is short compared to its successors, but itās still a quality game with a decent about of things to do. Like most fans, I would still recommend Rune Factory 4 Special since that game offers much more, but you canāt go wrong with this one. Itās simply a great game. (Edited after 100% completion, added a couple more negative points and edited some other parts)
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I have enjoyed this game very much, more so than rf4 or rf5. The story is good, the characters enjoyable, and the aesthetic makes me happy
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My Favorite version of the Rune Factory Series, I love Raven (Tuna), I only miss the old Intro Music from Nintendo DS, would be cool if they also put the Old Intro.
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Last Updates
| Steam data | 16 November 2024 04:10 |
|---|---|
| SteamSpy data | 21 December 2024 21:15 |
| Steam price | 23 December 2024 12:36 |
| Steam reviews | 22 December 2024 08:05 |
Online players
45
Developer
Marvelous Inc.
Publisher
XSEED Games,
Marvelous USA, Inc.,
Marvelous
Release
05 Sep 2023
Platforms
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