Pokémon Legends: Arceus

I'm 35 and I've been playing the first games when I was a kid. Some friends were into Switch and over time I wanted to make myself a little gift and got the Nintendo Switch Oled and this game.

To be honest, I've been out for like 15 years. So maybe I shouldn't even complain. First I was super disappointed that there are no voices at all in this game. In 2022 I would've expected that the characters and creatures have real voices. And this is joined by average graphics and annoyingly silly and repetitive music. Honestly the music reminds me of music from adult flash games. If you know you know. The trumpets and instruments sound like farrting elephants.

And since there are no voices of characters we have to read a whole lot. I mean I get it. It has that old feeling and maybe also trying to make the kids read and use their imagination, but to me that was a bummer.

Think back of the first three iconic Pokémons you got to choose from in the first games. And now you get some random looking ones. Honestly. As if someone had like a randomize button to design them.

If I had a wish or two it would be that they make a new version of the original games. In 3D. With all the original characters. Imagine running through them spooky houses in a version for the switch.

And make a new one that is a little darker. I read another version that mentioned that. We grew up. Make kiddy versions and make something for us. Nostalgia and new stuff. Will ya ?

Pokemon fans have been dreaming of an open world game since the 90s.

We wanted breath and scale, challenge, adventure, exploration and mystery.

I guess we kinda got some of those things.

In the end this feels like a game that sort of met us half way. But also revealled that Game Freak are too scared to take actual risks.

There are some nice game mechanics, and it is kinda nice wandering around. But it's the same old game when you think about it. It's old pokemon in a more open field minus the gyms. That's it. Pokeballs are supposed to be a brand new invention but we're still unlocking better and specialised balls .... that's the exact same old mechanic with a brand new mesh added. There is nothing new here. I repeat there is nothing new.

The concept is you're supposed to be in a time where people know very little about pokemon. You start the game with people being confused and terrified of weak common pokemon. I thought that was fantastic. That we're gonna dive in the deep end where nobody has been before. Have conversations about a pokemon evolving. Talking about never seen before pokemon. The potential was mind boggling. Instead we move from area to area only to discover people do infact know and understand all these pokemon already. And instead of "discovering" and "researching" we are instead given a checklist to pointlessly grind. It literally tells us what we must do, instead of being blind we're guided the while way. There is no reward n playing because there is no discovery.

The childish level this game has stuck with for decades is unfathomable. I can imagine why it started as a simple children's game. But its fanbase have long since grown up. We live in nostalgia and the best way to exploit that is to, like a pokemon, evolve. Zelda understood this. Which is why they mixed up the games. Creating different feel games for different audiences. Pokemon finally says they're gonna break free and ... well, I guess they broke one chain. Still many more caging them to a mediocre formula.

A lot of haters of critics jumped on me for saying this when I first agonised my way through the worst tutorial I've seen in years. But when you set the bar so low of course you're going to be impressed.... perhaps it's time to raise it a bit. Then maybe we won't get mediocre but an actual interesting game for once. If you're angrily shouting "but its open world!" Then sorry, if that's all it takes for you to declare this an exciting new direction that's never seen before then you're probably part of the reason why pokemon has been the same stale game it has been since those early days. Other franchises worked this s*** out yonks ago.

Dont get me wrong. It IS a step in the right direction. This is better than the more recent stuff, but also falls way short of the potential many of us dreamed of all those decades ago.

If I was to make one request. That would be to go all out. Take a real risk for once and give us something we can really get lost in. You can still make your boring kids versions. But actually step out for once and really build something great.

Pokemon is and has always been made to include Nintendo's target demographic: children. This is not a typical RPG, this is an introduction to RPGs using Pokemon. Stop having unrealistic expectations from a children's game and go play an RPG geared towards young adults or adults if that's your complaint. End rant.

What a breath of fresh air for Pokémon! The gameplay feels new, the blending of different gens of Pokémon is fun, and the era difference makes it fascinating to explore. That being said, this is definitely Gamefreak's first attempt at a game like this. The graphics are not great by any means, but it looks like they sacrificed those to save frame rates. The open world concept is also a bit cautiously done; like a dog getting into water for the first time. That's to be expected, however, considering how much of a departure it is.

All in all, I would absolutely recommend it, if only to encourage Gamefreak to continue exploring this new path!

The game has a lot of dialogue and a repetitive gameplay. At some level it reminded me of a Visual Novel and something that would make a huge difference would be introducing voice actors to the franchise - which would also be a major risk considering other games aren't as dialogue heavy as this one. However, they would still need to revise the dialogue because there are a lot of uncalled for repetition. You can't even skip the dialogue and cut scenes, you have to sit through the whole thing.

I reckon they tried something new with the open world approach, but the gameplay itself is so repetitive and I find hard to believe that a majority of players of the franchise play Pokémon as developers wrote this game, for instance to complete the Pokédex it isn't enough to capture one pokémon, some times you have to capture 25 of the same pokémon and there are other "challenges" as well.

I must say however that most of the Hisuian forms are really cool.