The storyline is incidental but for interest, after the last tournament, Heihachi is back having defeated his son Kazuya in Tekken 2. He then throws him into the same ravine that Kazuya threw him in after Tekken
1. However, Jun Kazama (from Tekken 2) and Kazuya have gone on to have a son Jin (don't ask me how) and then Heihachi's company has unearthed some powerful force which goes on to kill Jun. It doesn't really make a great deal of sense but it is an excuse for another tournament.
Some of the characters are sons or daughters of the original 2 Tekken's (ie:they're more or less the same) though Paul is back (and looking older) and for some reason Nina has been in cryogenic stasis for 20 years (which doesn't explain why her sister Anna hasn't aged though). There are some new characters with distinctly new fighting styles, other new characters have similar fighting styles to characters they replaced in Tekken 2.
The graphics are excellent and are very close to the arcade version. There is also the added bonuses of having a number of different game modes and also when you complete the game, this releases an animated movie sequence for that character, as well as a new character you can use.
A few characters are released by different means. Doctor Boskonovich (who rebuilt Yoshimitsu) can be accessed if you complete the Tekken Force option 3 times. It is worth the effort both because Tekken Force is practically a game in its own right, where you fight armies of henchmen and an end stage boss (one of the other characters), all against a fast disappearing time limit. Also, Doctor Boskonovich has a fighting style quite unlike any of the other characters available to use, so he is worth getting. The Tekken Force option definitely helps extend the life of the game with the player instead of if this had just been another Tekken retread.
Also, something you might miss is that after enough characters have been released, pressing the Start button on Eddy will allow you access to the character Tiger (which is more or less still Eddy but has his own animation).
All up I think there are 22 characters. You get Gon when, after releasing enough characters you get and win the Tekken Ball mode.
A few drawbacks, one is that to get most of the hidden characters, you have to just keep playing and winning the game which despite the excellence of the game, does eventually start to get a little boring. Especially since this is what you had to do in Tekken 2 and the games aren't radically different. As a result, I found myself losing interest sooner than with Tekken 2. I think it would be worthwhile for a different approach with the next Tekken where distinctly different things have to be done for accessing each new character than just finishing the game over and over. Also, essentially the game is still 2-D in the sense that the characters still fight in a line, apart from now being able to side-step (which you couldn't do in Tekken 2) which has mixed results in evading attacks. It will be interesting to see if the series will move to true 3-D arena fighting like Ehrgeiz or Tobal for example.
Another small gripe is that the version I've played in Australia, after the Ogre is defeated, the animation showing the transformation into the True Ogre seems to have been edited, it simply shows the Ogre raising Heihachi into the air, the screen going white and then the next fight starts. I'm sure I'm not imagining this, I could swear I remember in the arcade that the Ogre actually goes on to "consume" Heihachi's body and turn into The True Ogre. Why it would be cut at that point is beyond me, it was not a graphic scene at all anyway, more bright lights, electricity and metamorphising than anything else.
However though, Tekken and Tekken 2 were the sole reasons I bought a Playstation in the first place and the only games I have. Tekken 3 hasn't disappointed as a follow up and there's enough new stuff in the options, characters and animations to make it worthwhile, even if you've finished the arcade game.
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