Getting Whimsically Spooked With Luigi’s Mansion 3 at E3 2019

One of the most pleasant experiences I had at this year’s E3 came in the form of Luigi’s Mansion 3. As a longtime fan of the series (like many others, a friend and I play the first game every Halloween), I was thrilled to get the chance to try out Luigi’s latest supernatural excursion. Though my skills were definitely rusty, I had a terrifyingly good time with the demo, as it builds upon Luigi’s Mansion and Dark Moon in essentially every way.

Atmosphere is a big part of Luigi’s Mansion, which the third entry seems to once again nail. Thunder and lightning boom in the background as soft but enchantingly spooky music played in the background. Shadow would flash on the walls, ghosts would peek out from their hiding places, and Luigi looked cartoonishly mortified the entire time. This theme park-esque haunted house vibe is exactly what I hoped to see in Luigi’s Mansion 3, and the medieval theme of the demo area made this even better. From one house to multiple mansions to a huge multi-themed hotel, Luigi’s Mansion is a series that knows how to handle escalation.

Now for the gameplay, which is more involved than ever. As with previous series entries, your main means of busting ghosts is flashing them with light and sucking them into your Poltergust. This time around, however, there are some clever ghosts that use shields, armor, and other obstacles to make your job a bit harder. Luigi can shoot a plunger projectile at shields, then suck up the attached rope to yank the shield from the spectre’s slimy hands. Once you start sucking them up, you can slam ghosts around like the Hulk, doing a ton of damage to them while feeling incredibly satisfying. Ghost-busting has always been one of the best parts of Luigi’s Mansion, but it’s never felt as good as it does in Luigi’s Mansion 3.

“Luigi’s Mansion 3 has me tapping my foot impatiently as I await its launch later this year.“

The few puzzles found in Luigi’s Mansion 3’s demo were plenty of fun as well, requiring a little thought without feeling too simple or too complicated. The addition of Gooigi, Luigi’s goo-sona, allows for some neat new puzzle ideas. I had to use Gooigi to wade through spikes at one point, and as a remote switch-puller at another point. It seems that Gooigi will play a big part in the puzzle-solving of Luigi’s Mansion 3, which I am certainly excited about.

I also had the chance to take on a boss ghost, which was a medieval king who fought as though he was jousting. Though it took me a bit to figure out the admittedly simple solution (blame it on E3-brain, I swear I’m good at video games), I had a blast as I blinded and slammed the monstrous monarch with everything I had. The fight felt perfectly in-line with the boss fights of Luigi’s Mansion and Dark Moon, which were already some of the highlights of their respective games.

Luigi’s Mansion 3 has me tapping my foot impatiently as I await its launch later this year, as its E3 demo has shown me that this will be a more than worthy entry into one of Nintendo’s strangest but most fun franchises.