Evaluating a new entry in a series your a big fan of can be tricky. It can be difficult to rein in high expectations and all of your thoughts on what would be ideal for making the best game possible based on your preferences. I'll give a quick, somewhat grounded, view of my experience with DQM3: The Dark Prince and save my ramblings on what I'd like to see for the series for the end.
Overall The Dark Prince is a pretty by the numbers entry in the series with the highlight being a focus on a more dynamic storyline and characters than in the previous entries, Joker series included. The new features like seasons and finding eggs helps to change up gameplay just enough while progressing the story. There are still some issues, but the core gameplay loop manages to still be fun and compelling enough to make for a good time. For better or worse, the overall game design philosophy here appears to be an attempt to simplify and streamline some aspects of the series by keeping the number of monster families restricted, keeping monster sizes limited to large/small when previously it was possible to have 3 slot and 4 slot size monsters, and tweaking what monster traits are possible.
Pros:
+Core gameplay of scouting, battling, and synthesis is still in tact with a solid difficulty curve
+Seasons, weather, and egg hunting adds some more exploration depth to the otherwise limited areas
+Story does offer some fun scenes, characters, and moments that is a general step up from previous entries and their simplistic stories.
Cons:
-Monster cuts from previous games, and the dramatic number of recolors being counted as individual monsters is very frustrating. The thrill of finding or creating new monsters is soured a bit by the new monster just being a previously seen monster but now in red or blue or green. It also stings older fans who looked forward to recruiting their old favorites just to find them completely missing for the first time in the series.
-The story has some big moments with diminished impact due to confusing transitions, dialogue, and/or were just executed poorly.
-Performance issues on release like framerate drops, pop-in, and some generic, flat or barren looking places all create a cheap feel that make the game seem rushed or completed under a very limited budget.
-Day one DLC besides being a gross practice in general, includes content that would have been fun additions if well implemented into the core game. Content like extra dungeons with party restrictions like only allowing monsters of a certain family to be used, etc.
-Making specific monsters be egg exclusive finds necessary to make some other monsters is a frustrating design choice.
Some ramblings about the DQM series: As a fan of the series from the start, I appreciated the addictive loop of exploring, recruiting, and synthesizing new monsters. I also grew to enjoy the subsystems such as the monster personalities impacting their battle AI in the first game, and the monster family system. These systems helped make DQM feel unique among other monster taming games.
I was naturally excited when DQM2 added a new family with the water based monster family and then disappointed when later entries would combine several families together into one: Bird, Plant, Bug, and Water Family Monsters all got reassigned, with most of them going into a nebulous Nature Family. I'd love to see new entries expanding this system again. It was a neat and distinct way to categorize monsters. Mechanics-wise, it helped group monsters by shared attributes such as general stats, weaknesses, resistances, and traits. It also gave more depth and possibilities to the synthesis recipes. I think it's also easy to enforce understanding of these families and their differences with in game flavor and lore. Stuff like the library on monster families in the first game, monster scholar NPCs, and having primary habitats and settings where you'd be most likely to find monsters of a specific family. You could even have specific monster family themed dungeons, and themed NPC teams to challenge. The series does have specific attack skills that do extra damage to monsters of a corresponding family but it could be taken further and both add unique flavor to the world building but also to combat and strategy.
Besides expanding families and experimenting with systems, I'd like to see more randomized dungeons and challenges incorporated in the main game, especially something like the key system in DQM2. The number of unique areas in DQM3 and the changing seasons is great, and I think consistent areas like that should stay to a degree, but I think the series does well with the randomized places to explore as well assuming they are well varied enough.
I also just tried DQM Tact on mobile, which looks a lot like DQM but with tactical grid based combat, and I really hope they consider a full spin off non-mobile exclusive game with that kind of battle system. Movement and spacing your monsters in battle would add just the perfect next dimension of depth and strategy to that addictive loop of team building already present in the core series. There continues to be a lot of potential for this series that I hope gets better utilized in future entries.
