I picked up Tekken 3 yesterday. I never played the arcade version, but 
I did play the hell out of 2 in the arcade and at home.  Here's some
impressions and observations between 2 & 3 worth noting.

First, the intro fmv.  Very nice.  Although I think 2's was far
superior.  I still get chills of excitement while watching 2's,
particularly when Heihachi pulls himself out of the hole, the Jack's
on patrol, and then later during the image of a purple suited Kazuya
and the Angel spreading her wings behind him.  I didn't experience
that feeling at all while watching 3's.  It's very good, mind you, but
it just didn't induce any feelings of awe.  Maybe the techno-rock
music playing in the background has something to do with it?  (Soul
Blade still has the best intro fmv ever, btw)

I was expecting to be WOW'd by the graphics.  I was, kind of.  The 3
character models are very smooth, and nowhere near as blocky as the 2
models.  2's have a a fine chizeled look to them, however.  I find I
like them both for the asthetic themes they represent.

I had thought that the complaints of dropping frame rate were just the
incessant ramblings of overly nit-picky netizens.  I experienced it
too, and more than I had expected.  It seems to happen whenever the
camera takes an angle that calls for some extra light sourcing.  It's
very noticable on Xioya(sp?)'s stage.  On other's it doesn't happen
near enough to be irritating, but it does pop up here and there.

I don't know if it's my tv or not, but those squared backgrounds sort
of give me a headache.  I don't know if it's how they scroll by, or
how they wrap around, or warp, or whatever, just that when I look
directly at them, I can tell something's not right, and it just plain
old hurts my eyes.  Hopefully I'll adjust.  I've just not seen an
effect like this in a game before.  It's not the perfect right angle
square'd circle I was expecting.  Anybody else experience this?

The gameplay in 3 *is* the natural progression I expected, and I'm
overly satisfied with it.  For my first game I picked Yoshimitsu, and
was able to do all my favorite old moves.  A little bit of tinkering,
and I was able to do a whole new set of moves, almost all of which
were satisfying to perform as well as watch, which is a stapled
trademark of the Tekken series.  The transition in play style from 2
to 3 is easy, and learning the new elements is gratifying.

Does anyone else think that 3's background music(both arcade and
remixed) isn't up to par with Tekken 2's original arcade bgm?  2's
seemed kind of dramatic.  I can still remember the drum beat while
fighting Devil, and the dark toned melody while facing off against
Heihachi.  3's seems kind of techno-rockish, and it seems to be
everywhere, even on the character select screen.  Nothing really
character specific, nor memorable.  This is only after a day's
playing, maybe it'll grow on me.

I was really dissappointed that Jack doesn't laugh demonically while
he does his Russian dance attack.  It's only a minor nit-pick, I know,
but I loved that move in 2 solely because of the laugh.

The Ogre bosses were kind of dissappointing.   Ogre looks like the
character design was plucked from War Gods, and Ogre 2 looks like
Bloody Roar's demonic last boss's brother.  Kazuya/Devil was a much
more stylish and classy foe.

Force mode was more entertaining than I suspected it would be and is a
very welcome plus.  I'm partially biased to sidescrolling fighters,
however.

3 was worth the purchase.  However, I was expecting to want to get rid
of Tekken 2 after picking up 3, but I'm finding that I don't.  How
odd.


Peter Bott