Splatterhouse 3

Splatterhouse 3 was released in 1993 for the Sega Mega Drive, developed by Now Production and published by Namco. It closes the original horror trilogy on sixteen-bit hardware and departs furthest from the simple left-to-right march of its predecessors.

Where the previous game led the player along a single route, this one is built around space. A house is explored room by room and floor by floor, the path is not unique, and a clock presses on every decision. Combat shifts accordingly, from a walk-and-punch progression into a series of enclosed encounters where a room must be cleared before the way onward opens.

The side-on view stays, but the move set is broader than before and the protagonist has more ways to break up a group of attackers. By 1993 developers understood the Mega Drive thoroughly, so the animation runs smoother and the characters are drawn larger than on the console's early titles.

The presentation remains what the series was known for — mask, gore and monsters — yet the setting is tighter. Interiors replace streets and sewers, which gives this instalment a claustrophobic quality the earlier games never quite reached.

The clock does more than hurry the player along. It changes how the house is approached, replacing methodical room-by-room searching with a decision about which route to take and what to leave unexplored. That was an unusual structure for an action game in 1993 and still separates it from the brawlers of the same generation.

Listed among the playable entries at OldGame.cz, it launches in the browser, so walking that house takes no console and no cartridge.