User Summary:
Wonder Boy III: The Dragon's Trap is an action adventure game with some roleplaying and metroidvania aspects, first released for the Sega Master System in the West. It is the fourth installment in the Wonder Boy series (and second carry the title Wonder Boy III) and also the second in the slightly overlapping series Monster World.
The game is a direct sequel to Wonder Boy in Monster Land (arcade, Master System), and starts with the hero defeating the Dragon, but being cursed and forced into the form of a dragon. The player starts in a village, and must explore the stages, gradually being cursed into one form after the other, each of the forms with a different speciality.
The The Dragon's Trap Master System original was never released in Japan, but was ported to the Game Gear in 1992, and then got its Japanese release. A version for TurboGraphx-16/PC Engine called "The Dragon's Curse" (in Japan: Adventure Island) was done in 1991. It was also included in the Monster World Complete Collection for Playstation 2, released in Japan in 2007. Both the PC Engine Version and the original Master System version were released for Wii Virtual Console, but in the West only. Finally, in 2017, it was remixed with HD graphics, and released for Playstation 4 and Nintendo Switch, globally.