After a little over 50 hours of playtime, I have completed a full playthrough of Front Mission 3: Remake and added it to my list of completed games. I had been eagerly anticipating it ever since I learned it would be remade, alongside Front Mission 1st: Remake, which I completed in September 2023, and Front Mission 2: Remake, which I finished at the beginning of 2025.
There are two different storylines in Front Mission 3, and which one you play is determined after the tutorial. At that point, you decide whether Kazuki accompanies Ryogo (2 of the main characters) on a delivery. If you go with him, you begin the Emma storyline, where you meet Emma, who becomes your third main character. If you decide not to go with Ryogo, you instead meet Kazuki’s sister, Alisa, who takes on that role.
Regardless of which storyline you choose, the narrative unfolds through battles interspersed with dialogue, and at the end of each encounter you are awarded a medal depending on your performance. Here are the results of my playthrough of the Emma storyline.
Anyone bored enough to read my blog regularly may remember me writing about completing the original PlayStation version of Front Mission 3 back in November 2021. At the time, I discovered that a cheap RCA-to-HDMI video converter and an external USB video capture card could be used to let me play my PlayStation 2 through OBS (Open Broadcaster Software). Because the PlayStation 2 is backwards compatible (arguably its best feature) I was also able to play my prized copy of Front Mission 3.
The medal results from my Alisa storyline playthrough below show that I found it more challenging than Emma’s story. At first, I thought this might be because it was only my second playthrough of Alisa’s story, but on reflection I think several of the battles are comparatively more difficult.
The remakes of all three Front Mission games were developed by Forever Entertainment, who will always have my gratitude for bringing them back. However, I have to say that parts of the soundtrack are, in my opinion, not as strong as the original. It’s a harsh criticism, because everything else about the game is excellent. The graphics, while far from groundbreaking, are still a significant improvement on the original; there are many modern quality-of-life enhancements; the game is, as far as I can tell, bug-free; and, most importantly, everything about it feels as it was intended to be when Front Mission 3 was originally released in the summer of 2000.
Unfortunately, there are no plans for a Front Mission 4: Remake, which is a great shame, as I have always wanted to play Front Mission 4. However, it was only released in Japan and North America for the PlayStation 2. For me to play it would require a fair amount of effort, either by modifying my PlayStation 2 or by acquiring an NTSC (National Television System Committee) compatible system.
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