Damud Hellstrike, the Prince of Darkness, has taken away the Golden Axe, kidnapped the Princess, transformed the King into a humanoid Griffin minion named Eve, and put an evil curse over all of the warriors.

Kain Grinder and Sarah Burn are referred to as Ax Battler and Tyris Flare respectively in the Sega Channel localization of the game.

Some prisoners are trapped in barrels or stuck in crystal cells while others are guarded by an enemy that must be slain in order to free them.

The mounts in Golden Axe III have turned into a hybrid snail-ostrich, instead of the chicken-leg or the dragon-raptors in the previous games.

If the player defeats the last boss and they have a high enough score, they may get the good ending and fight Damud Hellstrike's second form.

"[6] IGN gave the Virtual Console release a 5 out of 10, saying "Legend has it that SEGA thought the quality of the product was so low, that it would be worthless or, worse, damaging to even publish the game in the States.

And whether or not that's actually true, the quality assessment at its heart is on target because Golden Axe III is certainly the worst of its franchise trilogy."