Dark Delusion: Deception 3

by Tecmo

Product Details

• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S. and to APO/FPO addresses. For APO/FPO shipments, please check with the manufacturer regarding warranty and support issues.
• ASIN: B00004LN2R
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.5 x 5 inches ; 4.8 ounces
• Media: Video Game
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #19,466 in Video Games (See Bestsellers in Video Games)

Product Description

GameSpot Review
Most role-playing games cast you as a hero who enters dungeons and castles in search of treasure and who fights with monsters while avoiding traps. Tecmo's Deception trilogy, on the other hand, can be seen as something of a reverse RPG. Here, you wait for warriors and wizards to come to you and then try to catch them in your traps. As in Square's Final Fantasy series, the story in each new Deception has nothing to do with that of the last. In the first, you played as a man; the second, a woman; and the third, a woman again. Evil kings and nobles always come into play, and you kill them by setting your traps, acting as their bait, and springing your snares at the right moment. That's all the background that really needs to be covered, save for noting that the developers' fast and loose take on both translation and spelling make for many unintentional comedic moments. While the Deception III recipe is largely the same as before, there have been several changes and improvements. This iteration introduces the option to create your own traps out of several elements: basics, emblems, rings, and orbs. The basics you can choose from include bear traps to snag an enemy's feet, spikes that shoot from the wall, and swinging bladed pendulums. Emblems give the traps additional strength in a handful of different ways, such as making them explosive or serving as electrical conduits. Rings are an extra layer that you can use to, say, reduce the time it takes for a trap to charge or to set a trap to go off automatically when someone trips it, while orbs are an expensive way to increase a device's overall power. Once a trap is made, you can even go back and add or subtract parts, although this costs money that you unfortunately don't recoup by breaking the device down. There are also two new game modes: trap license and expert mode. The former is essentially a second training stage, while the latter requires you to accomplish a series of assignments such as performing a four-hit combo or earning 500 points in less than forty seconds. This may sound good and challenging on paper, but in practice it turns out clumsy and unrealized. If the traps you've earned don't suit a specific task in expert mode, you're simply out of luck, as you're not allowed a lot of room for experimentation. Need three devices to toss someone out of a room? If you didn't need to do this in the main game it's unlikely you'll have enough points to pay for the traps to do it now. Visually, Deception III looks almost exactly like Kagero: Deception II. It's obvious that the game uses the same engine as before, and not much has been done to alter or enhance it. The graphics are a little sharper, but the frame rate is still very slow, and the environments look eerily familiar. Sound is also close to nonexistent in the game, save for a few explosions. Since you don't need any audio clues to play Deception III, you're better served turning down the sound entirely, putting on your own music in the background, and imagining a really big boom every now and again. Sadly, only marginal improvements have been made to this latest Deception, making it feel more like a new iteration of a sports game than a full-fledged sequel. The second game in the series felt a little behind the times in terms of graphics and frame rate when it arrived last year, but its charm allowed you to look past that. It was, in every sense, a guilty pleasure. Deception III's use of the same engine, however, makes the game look and feel very dated now, and since the gameplay is basically just more of the same, the title gains no such allowances. There is still some fun to be had with Deception III, and it's probably too severe to call it a bad game, per se, but without a doubt it lacks the spark and originality found in the two previous titles. --Joe Fielder
--Copyright ©1998 GameSpot Inc. All rights reserved. Reproduction in whole or in part in any form or medium without express written permission of GameSpot is prohibited.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Tecmo Does It Again, February 28, 2000

By A Customer

Welcome to the world of Deception. The Deception series started out several years ago and became an underground hit. The love of the series has now spread to the point that tons of people play the series. Deception 3 is the best looking, best playing, and most enjoyable Deception of them all. For anyone who played Kagero:Deception 2 you essentially know how the game plays, for the rest of you you play in a third person, over the shoulder view, and you must set traps to kill all intruders. The reason the Deception series has become so popular is its innovation, Deception is without a doubt the most innovative game series created EVER due to the fact that you are the bad guy. The number of traps that you can earn and buy is incredible(2000+), that feature alone makes this game worth buying. Whether you're a first timer or you're a huge Deception fan get your hands on this game.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hours of sadistic fun, August 31, 2001

By	"numskull" (Holyoke, MA USA) - See all my reviews

I love this game to death. I want to be buried with it. It's flawed, but my love is unconditional.

Deception 3 takes the basic structure of the second installment, Kagero, and adds oodles more options and ways to torment your enemies (the heroine [?] isn't as scantily clad, though). You create traps by adding "emblems" such as lightning, cold, and chaos to core components like falling rocks and arrow slits. Furthermore, each trap can be upgraded by boosting its range or damage or by shortening the length of time it takes to charge up, and also by adding magic rings to add effects such as summoning (foes are drawn to the trap's location, making it ever so much easier to butcher them). There are several different buildings in which you run amok, each boasting its own assortment of rooms, some of which have built-in traps of their own such as electrified walls and pillars that can be knocked over to crush the unwary. Your adversaries include typical fantasy RPG types like thieves, knights, and witches, but Deception 3 is far more dark and grim than a standard game of Dungeons & Dragons. The death cries of your foes conjure up images of voice actors in a recording studio, frothing at the mouth with their eyes ready to pop out of their heads, and the non-linear storyline (with multiple endings, I might add) nicely illustrates that a human being can be a far more sinister, bloodthirsty monster than some lame dragon or werewolf.

The graphics during actual gameplay do a nice job contributing to the morbid atmosphere, but, admittedly, are a little dated by more modern standards. However, the images for the between-chapter menu screens are still mighty cool. Similarly, the music is lacking in variety, but what is there has a superb gothic feel and really enhances the mood of the game. Controls are simple and tight, and the challenge level is, for the most part, fairly low, but not so low that you'll be able to breeze through the game with your eyes closed (especially when you're up against a HellKnight...not only are they bad news with a capital B, they truly do look menacing enough to make you think twice about staying in their vicinity).

Few games give you such a great sense of "completeness." Deception 3 is undoubtedly the best game in the series. Its main story mode sustains its deliciously dark tone from start to finish, and the trap license mode, where you must accomplish tasks such as killing an enemy with a specific trap or racking up a certain number of points within a certain amount of time, adds to the replay value signifiantly. It's a real feast for the senses if your tastes lean towards the dark side.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Killer of a game...., March 5, 2000

By A Customer

The Tecmo people have put a very interesting twist into there latest game, Deception 3, by allowing you to be the "bad guy". If you are tired of the traditional " conquer the castle" type of game you will love this game. In here you can keep coming up with more and more imaginitive ways to kill off the "invaders" of your castle. An incredible game very much enjoyed by my husband and I, but may not be suitable for small children or squemish people.