I thought I’d do a mini review of the new Pokémon game that came out, on account of I think it’s really good and as far as I’ve seen it’s free from even a hint of woke nonsense. Very light spoilers ahead.
To start with, the game has jettisoned a LOT of the baggage built up over the years. I know that a lot of people have issues with Gamefreak, and some have dragged the graphics of the game, but in terms of gameplay and function there is a LOT that is done subtly and very well. Menus take far less time than ever, which have become one of pokemons most cumbersome things. Battles against wild Pokémon happen right in the over world and don’t make you wait through five seconds of starting animation. Level ups, evolutions, and new moves all happen seamlessly in the hud. You can move around during battles, making it so you are almost always able to DO something. You have the option to easily release multiple mons. These are all subtle but very good steps forward that show that Gamefreak is actually able to be competent a with game design when they want to be.
The mechanics of moving and catching Pokémon are great. You can do the usual battling, or surprise them and just Chuck a ball. You can just observe Pokémon, feed them berries, and much more. It just feels really fluid and most importantly it feels FUN. It makes me feel like a kid playing again.
This is good, because the gameplay loop has shifted more towards Pokémon research. Meaning you have to catch AND use every mon you catch (or at least catch and defeat a bunch of them in the wild) to get their Pokédex entries. To spice things up there are giant ‘alpha’ Pokémon who are bigger and tougher, and also add a nice element of potential danger.
The exploration is also very fun. You can catch Pokémon, gather items for crafting (surprisingly fun) or just explore. In a series first, Pokémon can attack YOU as well, which means you have to actually use some thought when traveling- you can’t just run through a swarm and assume you’ll be ok.
Speaking of, this is easily the ‘hardest’ Pokémon game I’ve played. I actually have to think and strategize a bit, because just running at some mons will result in you getting hit and attacked and losing some items. Now, I should contexuakuze this by saying it’s hard for a Pokémon game- most non game journalists will be able to do fine. But if you’re coming to Pokémon for a dark souls experience then you will always be disappointed. For what it is, I think it strikes a good balance between being accessible to kids and actually presenting a bit of challenge.
Finally the story! There actually is one, which is a nice change of pace. Without giving away too much (though I haven’t beaten it yet so I can’t say everything), it actually is pretty good. The motivation for making the dex is to help people who are just settling in the region. People are freaked out by Pokémon, viewing them as potentially dangerous. The village is safe, and those outside it on their own will likely die. You’re basically sent by Arceus (God) to help them out. All of this is actually fun worldbuilding, and above and beyond what happens in other games. In addition, there’s strong emphasis on helping to unify the local Diamond and Pearl clans, who have differing perspectives on the powers and abilities of god. Again, there’s a typical Pokémon emphasis on understanding different perspectives, and while not groundbreaking, it’s a nice little thing. Conspicuously absent is any polemic against ‘colonizers’ or anything remotely similar. Not a hint of wokeness have I found.
So all in all, I’d say that it’s a great game. It moves the franchise forward in huge ways, and I hope that it does well and that Gamefreak learns a good lesson from it. If you’re at all attached to the Pokémon franchise then I highly recommend it!
As someone who has actually played non-Pokemon Game Freak games, they are the kings of "great idea, but jesus you need to polish and improve technically." Which is the description of most Pokemon games too and this one is no different.
If this was a Gamecube era title, it would probably be hailed as the greatest Pokemon game ever and probably a top title in general because that's what it feels like. Its not bad and is certainly fun, but the content and graphics feel very much in line with a AAA title from that time instead of now. Its certainly a huge step forward for them, but that's more indicative of how far back they are to begin with.
But, I enjoy it because I love simply little checklist grind games (please make more DK64 platformers gaming industry) and it manages that quite well. Between this and the New Pokemon Snap it actually feels like the series has somewhere to go after the last mainline entries were huge disappointments.
My first reaction to screenshots and video of this game was 'Wow, this looks like a game dev student's unity assignment'. But everyone I know who has played it says it's one of the best things they've played in years.
I won't call it the best thing, but its certainly the best Pokemon in a very long time.
Its simplistic fun, which I think is an underrated type of game in this day and age, and does so without being condescending about it like Sword/Shield or the like.
Very well said! Exactly how I feel about it.
Gameplay wise, it's the most fun I've had playing Pokemon for a very long time.
Graphics are a mixed bag. The Pokemon, humans, and buildings are actually pretty good, with nice effects when wet due to rain. Animations are also quite good, except for the strange design decision of throttling the animation frame rate at a distance to absurdly low values.
The terrain and trees are terrible looking though.
The terrain and trees are what really give it that 'unity asset store' look. I don't know how a company with much money as Game Freak can bring themselves to care so little.
Agreed. I’ll be honest though, terrain and trees are pretty low on my needs in a game, and I’m honestly kind of sick of games that cram as much ‘realistic’ tree rustling and such in as possible. And honestly, some of the trees actually aren’t bad- it’s just really noticeable with the pine ones. Definitely could have used polishing there.
The visuals seem to be based on those old Japanese woodblock print, without the heavy black outline.
I just meant a solid platform collectathon in general. All the 2D platformers just want to be Metroid and all the 3D ones are following Mario into the "so many collectibles you accidental get enough to finish" level.
DK64 was just the epitome of the genre for me, and no amount of zoomer whining, tranny streamers, or bugs can change that.
Sorry for the long post, but this triggered my "gamedev mode" and I have to rant. I'm 100% with you on wanting more engaging 3D Platformers.
I really, really want to like DK64. It oozes with charm and has so many fun ideas, but I find it fundamentally flawed in far too many ways to really be a good game. There are five characters, but they all play essentially the same. Same guns, same instruments, same general movesets, with only one or two specific moves really changing their movement in any significant way. Most abilities boiling down to being keys that are only used with specific locks with the Kong's face on them. (Making DK's special unique move be pulling levers is downright criminal and I want to shoot whoever came up with it. In Minecraft, with a coconut gun.)
The fact that all the collectables are gated to each character severely limits your choices and forces you scour each stage five times over. And wasn't enough to color code the bananas and coins. They also had to double gate objectives off behind redundant instrument pads and gun targets. They clearly weren't confident in their ability to design interesting platforming challenges because every chance they got, they'd toss you into some vehicle challenge or tedious bonus barrel mini-game.
So much of the game just feels like busywork, instead of being an engaging experience in of itself. There's a good game buried deep in DK64, but it was far too ambitious for its own good, needed a lot of refinement, and was so busy trying to add lots of characters and gameplay styles that it lost focus on making the core experience enjoyable. It makes me think of Sonic Adventure in that respect.
See, I disagree with a lot of what you say, not because its wrong but because the way you describe it makes it sound like an inherent bad thing when in a different perspective it isn't.
Most levels after the third (where you get the last Kong) require very little backtracking after the initial once over with any character, if you are capable of remembering a map in your head (this isn't an attack, but its a very necessary skill to the game itself). Its also meant to be attacked in chunks, instead of shotgunned. Most levels are divided into smaller pieces that you can break apart and finish before moving onto the next piece. If you pay attention to the locations of swap barrels, they are often placed to facilitate this and you will rarely have to go far to find one for a necessary challenge.
Most of them play the same to keep the overworld area traversable by any with little chance of getting stuck, while the gun/instrument locks block out tinier challenges specialized to each one. I agree having both guns and instruments to be useless, but I also found it absurdly cool as a kid so that might be their reasoning.
Coins and regular bananas are over placed intentionally to make you have to collect a little, but never be so lacking you have to leave and grind. As shown by coins not even being tracked (and you having enough to finish the game by like level 4 if you are diligent), and bananas capping off at 75/100 for completion. Which, when mixed with how often most of them are used as trail markers towards specific challenges for their own character, most people would end up with close to that anyway if they played smartly.
I won't defend the minigames. Most are awful, the worst ones get repeated, and generally the game would be better with 80% of them gone. Same with DK himself getting completely shafted in his own game by getting the lamest abilities, on top of one of the worst Bananas (the Mario arcade).
Its certainly not perfect, but I feel like it was reaching the peak of the genre and instead of refining that, people cried so hard they basically cancelled the entire genre over it. I simply overcompensate my defence of it to make up for decades of people treating it like some horrible awful travesty.
As a positive, it makes the speed runs of it extremely impressive!
You can always play the Rare startup sequence before launching the other game.
... I think I'm going to go listen to it now.