The last time I posted anything about Luigi’s Mansion 3 was back in October. Other games distracted me for those months, but I recently committed to finally finish the Luigi’s Mansion 3 game. Sure I played a few small sessions here and there over the months, but only just recently, I pushed into the hours long sessions. After reaching the end, I can say this is my favorite switch game so far.
The Egyptian Style Tomb Suites Floor
This whole floor was Egyptian tomb themed. There was even a pyramid in the main room, surrounded by sand. The game designers used that sand for several inventive puzzles. Some involved sucking up sand to reveal buttons or hidden items, while others involved creation of sand ramps.
One semi-stressful puzzle combined finding hidden pieces in the sand with matching them to shapes in the wall. Toxic fumes poured out of the shapes in the wall, so it was a race against time to plug them up. There were plenty of tomb raider style booby traps. There was even a Egyptian scale puzzle using idols and sand to weigh down the correct amount.
The level was complete with an Indiana Jones style escape running up stairs before the roof collapsed on Luigi. I even battled a Cleopatra-like boss in the sand. She used the sand like the Mummy movies to create a medusa head with and snakes.
I loved all the Egypt style references of the level.
The Twisted Suites Floor Full of Magic
The whole theme of the floor revolved around a Magicians parlor. There were 3 magician ghosts I followed around the floor. They were complete with their magic top hats. The level was filled with cards, water torture chamber and box with the saw to cut a lady in half.
There was a bit with upside down furniture thanks to the Magician ghosts. The puzzle to leave that room stumped me for a bit, until I remembered the black light to reveal a hidden door. It was not long after that I reached the stage that resembled a magician club setting.
When I finally caught up with the magician ghosts, it led to a magic fight. Cards went flying and became weapons, while the magic hats spun with the ghosts hiding inside. They eventually stopped spinning and I used the Poltergust vacuum to pull each out of their hat.
Once I took out one, it became a shell game with the empty hat holding a bomb. Took a bit of correct guessing to not blow myself up. The themed boss fights match their floors so well and this magician fight was no different.
The Spectral Catch to Get to the Pirate Ship
The next floor was full on pirate style. Plenty of wood planks, skulls and cross bones. There was even a giant pirate ship in my way to the rest of the level. I tried to vacuum some planks, but not enough power. That’s when the professor informed me of a super charger for the Poltergust vacuum.
He sent me after Toad who went missing. He tried to retrieve the part in the basement. I wasn’t happy to go back to the basement, but it was a short trip. A few puzzles I solved by launching Toad with the vacuum. Funny to watch him bounce around.
That Poltergust part super charged the suction and completely tore through the pirate ship in my way. It’s definitely overpowered, so smart move by the developers to require Luigi be near a power plug to activate it.
Beyond the area previously blocked by the pirate ship, I entered a cave with skulls and waterfalls that reminded me of the Goonies movie. The artwork was well done and definitely hit the nostalgia spot in my brain. The cave led to a sandy beach with some buried treasure and a dock.
That dock had a bell to call a large pirate ship to shore. As soon as I climbed onto the ship, a pirate shark with a hook hand and eye patch attacked me. It was a weird boss fight. The shark morphed into the ship at times, taking on the shape of jaws made of wooden planks. Other times it tried to stab me with it’s hook that stuck into the wood planks and that’s where I got him.
The pirate hotel floor was fairly short, but I definitely enjoyed the heavy theming of it.
The Fitness Center Floor Workout
The whole fitness center floor included a bunch of things you expect to see in a gym or a spa. I fought ghosts hiding in lockers. There was even a boxing match against a large ghost with gloves on. It was a tricky balance act as his other ghost buddy threw weight plates at me. I had to lure the boxer ghost to where those weights landed.
There was an interesting cardio room with treadmills and bikes. Those involved an interesting puzzle using the vacuum to drive up the RPMs on those machines to max. Beyond that room, there was even a yoga studio. There I found a slightly frustrating puzzle where I rolled up the yoga mats to fit a pattern on the opposite wall, using a mirror to see those.
The shower room sort of doubled as a sauna room. With the hot water running, it steamed up the room and prevented me from capturing ghosts. It was a nice touch to require use of the poltergust gun to turn those showers off to stop the steam.
Every room on the floor revolved around the pool. There I found a lifeguard ghost with classic wavy blonde hair and he wanted to play dodgeball. I dodged and hid until I could launch the balls back at him when he flexed his chest.
Those didn’t hurt him and only stunned him. It took me a bit to figure out using Gooigi to sneak around to drain the pool was necessary. Once I drained the pool, the ghost was stuck in the drain. From there, he was as easy as any other ghost. Again the developers did great fitting the boss fight to the theme of that floor.
The Polterkitty Ghost Cat Stole a Floor Button Again
Just when I thought I was off to the next floor, the damn polterkitty returned and stole the button again. I mentioned before how annoying the thing was. Again, I equipped the black light to track the cat’s paw prints, until I corned it and fought it.
Unfortunately, the ghost cat phased through the floor. I guess the developers wanted to squeeze more use out of the art from previous floors. Since I didn’t spend much time on the pirate floor, I didn’t mind going back. It was the same combo, track with the black light, confront and fight.
After our fight on the pirate beach, the cat again escaped through the floor. It was back to the Twisted Suites again. No surprise the cat hid in one of those magician hats there. That fight on the magician’s floor was it, I finally captured the polterkitty. I felt relieved there was no more visits from that annoying cat.
Went Clubbing on the Dance Hall Floor
I really liked the artwork of the Dance Hall floor as soon as I stepped out of the elevator. There were neon speakers, boom boxes and records. Even the floor squares lit up in various patterns. Walking on those squares in the correct pattern solved a puzzle.
Club graffiti lined the hallway to the dance hall. It was like an entrance to a club. The dancehall/club floor displayed an even larger array of neon light floor tiles. Large speakers lined the wall with strobe lights on the ceiling. The club theme was heavy.
It’s only natural that was the location for the next boss fight. That boss was a female DJ ghost with a huge red afro wig. Before I took her on, I took on her dance crew. They wore red jumpsuits and big chains while they breakdanced like America’s Best Dance Crew TV show. All this took place while the DJ was spinning her records.
Once I defeated her dance crew, the DJ came out to spin her records on my face. My poltergust jump came in handy to knock her wig off so I could stun her. It was a short level, but I loved the whole combo of the dance crew and the DJ.
Reaching the Penthouse Master Suites Floor
I knew I was near the end when the exit to the elevator was more of a loft style than hotel style. It led straight to a theatre room where Hellen Gravely, the hotel boss, projected her face on the screen. Puzzles on each side of the screen raised it to reveal the door to the suites.
There were 4 rooms beyond, each with a colored key to unlock the door to Gravely’s office. My first room was the library with the key protected by laser beams thief movie style. My next room was the study with a big portrait of Big Boo above a fireplace. The middle of the room rotated to reveal another laser puzzle.
My third room was the master bathroom, so fancy with more lasers and a tub to fill to fetch the next key. The final room, the master bedroom, converted into a weird seesaw lift puzzle. I balanced Luigi and Gooigi on it to raise up to the level of a switch to turn off lasers and then fetch a key.
With all four keys in hand, a Big Boo vault door stuck its tongue out to receive the keys. The hotel boss ghost waited behind it.
A Stressful Boss Fight with Hellen Gravely
Hellen Gravely was tough to fight. After barging into her office, she locked us and kept a steady stream of laser and energy beams coming after me. At certain points, I dodged rotating laser beams by running and jumping. Other times 4 colored force fields slowly rotated and sectioned off the floor.
That’s where things were rough. Hellen Gravely periodically attacked and got stuck. Those were the points I could attack, but she constantly dragged me into the force fields. The obvious grates in the floor clued me in on the trick. Gooigi could ooze his way through the floor and turn off the switch for each force field color.
It’s tough playing that part solo. I balanced between moving Luigi out of the way of harm and running Gooigi around to turn off those switches. It was stressful and I highly recommend grabbing a coop partner for this part. I managed it on my own, but my son would have made things much easier.
Once I defeated her, I saved Mario from the portrait. He was obsessed with going to the roof. I knew why. My fight was not over. Big Boo was still on my hit list, but he also wanted to save Princess Peach from her portrait. Unfortunately, Big Boo captured all my allies and the fight was down to just me with Gooigi.
Final Confrontation with the Big Boo Boss
The final boss fight with Big Boo was a pain. It took me a dozen times to defeat him. It was a 3 stage process. The only way to stun Big Boo was to launch a bomb into his open mouth. In handheld mode, it was tough for me to line up my shot quickly enough. When I did stun Boo like that, I grabbed its tongue and activated Gooigi to do the same. That was the only way to damage Boo. Taking the motion controllers off allowed enough refined aiming to finally defeat him.
Each stage involved a similar set of challenges: lighting, fireballs, tongue drops, tongue lashes, ground pounds and spike cluster bombs. I really hated the tongue lashes. The first stage only required jumping at the right time, but later stages I had to walk under the arch of the tongue at the right time. That part was super frustrating to me.
After the first stage, boo duplicated himself into two. That gave me a 50/50 shot to bomb the correct boo, until I realized the eyes were the key. On the final stage, there were three Big Boos, but the eye trick helped me. The aiming of the bombs was annoying, but the last stage was the worst.
The 3 Boos dropped a ton of bombs ready to explode, so it was a bit of luck to grab one with the poltergust and quickly launch into the correct boo’s mouth. Once I finally succeeded, I couldn’t help but swear at the screem a nice F*ck Yeah! I was very happy to be done with the most annoying boss fight.
Happy Ending for Luigi Mansion 3
With Big Boo defeated, I rescued all the friends and released the ghosts from Big Boo’s influence. The crew and the ghosts worked together to rebuild the hotel. After that little cutscene, Luigi rode off into the sunset.
The premise of the game is still ridiculous to explain to people. Luigi stunning ghost and sucking them up with a vacuum backpack is crazy, but Luigi’s Mansion 3 is my favorite game on the Nintendo Switch so far. It’s a must play.
the game was to hard i never finished it i no longer play the switch the games are to hard