For starters, if you dislike puzzles, DO NOT GET THIS GAME. While puzzles have been a hallmark of the series, they take center stage in this installment. From key-finding to tool-using to the Millennium Puzzles, there are puzzles literally everywhere. Me being a left-brain person, I rather liked the puzzles. But I can't guarantee the same for everyone.

The game sans puzzles is of moderate difficulty. Bosses are rarely much more difficult than the random enemies, and the game itself does not have very many unique features -- those bits that are original or somewhat different are explained in the opening scenes. On the other hand, healing items can only be acquired through lucky enemy drops, treasure chests, or, late in the game, "gardening". Gardening isn't terribly well explained, but it's easy enough to get the hang of. On the other hand, Wild ARMs 3 features a wide variety of "side bosses", and until you've beaten most of them and gotten yourself to a decently high level, they can be quite difficult. I still tremble in fear when thinking of fighting the "adult magazines".

Difficult or not, this game requires a bit more thought than other RPGs. Besides the many puzzles, it is a turn-based game, and it is often imperative to know who goes when and what actions will trump other actions. You don't necessarily need to have a strategy going into the side-boss battles, but if you don't develop one in the first few turns you're going to be in trouble.

The plot is moderately inspired, but enough of it is given away in standard anime/japanese video game style (i.e. you have to figure out what's going on) to guarantee that there are rather few surprises in the later stages of the game. It also has an adventure-game influence to it that I rather liked -- for instance, instead of finding the picture on the table and having your characters know exactly what to do with it, you search through your inventory and then use an item, and if it's the right one something happens.

On to specifics:

Graphics: Cell-shaded 3D gets the job done. The black borders around the characters threw me for a bit, but it's easy enough to get used to. The characters, while moderately to heavily detailed, did remind me of FF7's characters in several ways. Monsters are frequently color-shifted, both to save time and to give a sense of what type each monster is. A few anime scenes appear during various functions of the game -- for instance, after loading.
Overall: 8

Sound: I am a very musically-inclined person, and I tend to notice such things as sound. Wild ARMs 3 has respectable if not brilliant music and sound. As you spend much of your time dungeon dwelling, most of the music is geared towards that and combat. The western theme was not as pronounced as I would have expected, and there are several pieces that I'm fond of. Sound effects were there, but nothing in particular made me go, "Wow!". I'd also like to note that there was a definite underabundance of annoying effects or background music.
Overall: 8

Story/Plot/Characters: One of the things that impressed me right off the bat was that I actually liked -three out of four characters-. And my little brother liked the 4th. I must say, that is an impressive achievement, in my eyes. The thing I noticed after that was "Hey, there are only 4 characters?" Wild ARMs 3 is not the game to play if large and complex plots, layers of secrets, and numerous betrayals are what you're looking for in a game. The plot is kept somewhat simple and easy to understand, and the game is nearly completely linear until towards the very end of the game, when you have some leeway for side-questing. This means that there's not a heck of a lot of replay value, and the cast of playable characters is kept rather small. On the other hand, this means that there is actual character development, as each of the characters is apportioned parts of the plot. While there are few great and important surprises, there are a few unexpected turns (that I shan't share). While perhaps suitable because of its relative simplicity to a younger audience, there are several tongue-in-cheek references that might not be the best thing for young, impressionable minds -- I'd say 10-12 year olds and older would be fine with it. Overall, it's a light-in-tone, well-scripted, linear plot. Overall: 8.5

Gameplay: The gameplay for Wild ARMs 3 is either very good or very bad, depending on who's judging. Having already mentioned that it's puzzle-heavy, the gameplay is very close to what it should be for such a puzzle game. Enemies can be avoided for a certain period of time, and as you progress you can avoid all easy enemies completely. The camera is perhaps the best I have ever seen in an RPG -- it rotates fully and without problems, and the walls cut away nearly perfectly to let you see what you're trying to see. Whenever you're trying to do an acrobatic feat like hanging on to a mesh wire panel or jumping off a wall, the game catches your intentions very consistently. There are only a few problems with the controls -- mainly the boomerang controls are rather difficult (intended or not, I'm not sure), horses can be a pain in the arse to jump, and the Millennium Puzzle problem. The latter being that the "use item" and "dash" functions reside on the same button, so while trying to solve the Millennium Puzzles, you can have a nasty habit of dashing into a block and rebounding off the edge of the cliff instead of grabbing the block you were hoping to move. Neither is anywhere close to fatal. Overall, the control is excellent -- just as it should be. And mega-kudos to the camera.
Overall: 9.5

Miscellaneous Notes: the sandcraft and dragon battles seemed, to me, to borrow from Xenogears a bit, but are easily the most original parts of the game in their own right. The sandcraft system assigns one of your characters to each essential function, and when their turn comes up they can do whatever jobs they've been assigned to. With the dragons, each person has control over every dragon function. I much prefer the sandcraft combat -- it's quite fun, and if you spend long enough you can just go around blasting things to smithereens and not have to worry about running away. Dragon combat is more useless than not, and the only random enemies take FOREVER to beat, for very little reward, unless you follow a very specific set of actions that will kill said enemy dragon in the first turn. Some of the Millennium Puzzles are very tough indeed, and may take quite a long time to solve. Gardening is a nice difference as well. Enemy AI isn't always the most complex thing, but it has some rather nice touches (for example, Melody, whom Clyde pisses off severely at one point, will simply kill Clyde turn after turn). Horse combat is interesting, even if it's hardly any different from regular combat. They do add more tools after a while, which makes things more interesting. Gimel coins = save nearly anywhere = good. And note that you'll spend much time lusting after money that you may never get. Gella cards are your friends.

Wild ARMs 3 is a very good game for those of you who don't think of yourselves as RPG elitests. Regardless of whether you're looking for a lighter, less serious style of game or if you're relatively new to the genre, this would be a good game for you. I enjoyed it immensely, myself -- it's not a Final Fantasy clone! However, while it is very good, I would refrain from calling it a masterpiece. Think of it like a Blizzard game -- it's a very polished product that doesn't necessarily introduce new elements, it just does good things with the old ones, and makes ideas that others have tried (and, for the most part, failed at) work.