Written Review.
Pokémon, it’s a game series that has been massively popular for decades, but while it’s continued to be the biggest franchise on the planet, it’s been pretty stagnant on its own evolution in terms of its gameplay.
With the newest game in the franchise that’s changed. Not entirely, but there’s a lot different here and for my money, it’s for the better. Pokémon Legends Arceus is heading in the direction of what we imagined Pokémon would be like when it finally became 3D, a big open world with Pokémon wondering about for you to see. Let’s go Pikachu and Eevee did the Pokemon being in the open world, the Sword and Shield started to give us its open spaces with the Wild area, and more so in the Isle of Armour and Crown Tundra DLCs. Arceus has moved further forward and giving you several large areas to explore, it’s not a fully open-world game, but more of a semi-open world, with you travelling to various regions via a map, and then exploring those regions on foot, or on various Pokémon like a Wydeer or Basculegion and more. The semi-open World structure is closest to another game series called Monster Hunter.
The mechanics of catching Pokemon are also, different in this too. Well, sort of. You can go about battling wild pokemon and whittling them down to low health before throwing Pokéballs at them like in previous games, but, you also have the option of walking around and just throwing Pokéballs at the Pokémon, though that will rarely work. If you are spotted by a Pokemon there are a few ways they will react to your presence. Firstly, some actually are fine with you and just walk up to you and just stick by you for a little bit, then you have Pokemon that simply run away, and lastly, you have the ones that see you and think, you know what? I’ll have a piece of him and start attacking you with various attacks. The best way to catch the Pokemon before anything happens is to sneak up behind them, preferably in tall grass, then throw some food for them to eat, and chuck a Pokeball at the back of the pokemon you want to catch. The good thing is you get a good estimate on the catch success as you can lock onto a pokemon and get a little icon that changes when it is more likely. The icon can also become a cross which means the pokemon cannot be caught outside of a battle. You need to be wary of Pokemon attacking you though, in this game if your team get knocked out you are still fine, ut Pokemon attacking you will eventually knock you out, and the screen will get darker around the edges as you take damage, and will go red and beep when you are down to your last hit, so be wary out in the fields.
When it comes to battling I have had 3 wild Pokemon attack me at once, which can be rather tricky as you are only able to use one Pokemon at a time, which is surprising as double and triple battles have been in the game for several generations. On top of the abilities seem to have been removed from this game. I also believe the weather doesn’t have the same effects as in previous games also. Speaking of battles, this game has changed the way Pokémon turns happen, it’s not a straight-up you attack they attack and rinse repeat. Pokemon now can have more than one attack in a row if their speed and the moves speed is much higher than the opponent. It doesn’t happen a lot if you use normal-style attacks, but the game introduces Agile attacks, these attacks do lower damage, but increase the speed of the attack, there are times that Pokémon had 3 attacks in a row. There were times when an opposing seemed to attack more than it seemed like it should, more so when the order of attacks shown on-screen shows them with 1 attack and they hit 3 times, though that didn’t happen often to me. Along with Agile Attacks this game introduces Strong Style Attacks, this increases the power of the attack, but reduces speed, it’ll mean you’ll do more damage, but at the risk of the opponent getting more attacks. It’s more strategic than previous games, as getting agile attacks in may give you a second turn and allow you to lower a Pokémons health so you can try and catch it, or you could use a strong attack, give the enemy a massive whack, but, it doesn’t faint giving it a chance to take out your pokemon, you have to be more careful. More so when fighting Alpha Pokémon.
Alpha Pokémon are Pokémon that are bigger and tougher than other Pokémon of the same species. An Alpha Bidoof will hit much harder than a normal Bidoof. Battling them and catching them is more of a challenge, when you do catch them, they keep their size, but aren’t as tough as they were in the wild, though they do have slightly increased EV stats to regular Pokemon. While it’s a little disappointing they aren’t total beasts when caught having a Giant Pokemon on the team is great, more so if it’s a cute one, like, Eevee. Alphas aren’t the toughest Pokemon in the game, that title belongs to the Noble Pokémon. These Pokémon are the bosses of the game and are tough, to fight them you throw balms at them, which losers their health meter, at certain points you will be able to battle them with your Pokemon, if you do this and win each battle then the pokemon will become stunned and you have more time to throw balms at them. These fights are generally good fun and are a nice addition to the game.
The game is set when Pokéballs first became an item, so they are made from Apricorns and various other ingredients. I mention it as this game has ‘crafting’. The crafting is nice a simple and you can do it when out exploring, the only downside to doing it when exploring is you can only use materials you have in your satchel***, if you craft something at the designated crafting tables, at the camps, or in your home, you can craft things using things that are in your storage chest. The crafting is a nice way of keeping ou pokéballs up, just throw one of your pokemon at a tree to get various fruits, you won’t just get Apricorns for making Pokéballs though, you’ll get other fruit that you can use to feed wild pokemon, making them easier to catch, well sometimes. There are Also ores that give you other items to make better balls and various herbs and plants which can be used to make other items including revives.
The game is the most focused on completing the Pokédex than any other Pokémon game, in this, you are in fact compiling the very first Pokedex. For starters, you need to catch every Pokémon to get the full ending of the game, but it’s not just that, you don’t just catch a Pokémon and get the Pokedex entry completed, no, in this you catch a pokémon and then you see exactly what requirements are needed to complete that species Pokedex entry. For example, you need to get the entry to level 10 and to get it there you may catch several of the same Pokémon whilst also seeing it use a specific move, or catching them without being spotted. There are various requirements and it’s a nice change than simply bagging your first Pikachu and knowing everything about it.
Now there are some issues with the game, as I previously said I think the removal of double and triple battles is odd, not necessarily bad, but odd and makes the wild fights more difficult. Same with Abilities and Weather it’s an odd decision. The biggest issue for me though is the technical aspects of the game. It runs fine, better than Sword and Shield, but while the art difference is nice the pop-in for trees, Pokémon, items mountains, and most things are shockingly bad. You would think that one of, if not the biggest money makers on the planet could put in more money to invest in more employees to help out on the technical side, seeing all the things pop in at a fairly close distance to the player is poor.
I really enjoyed the game, I am disappointed with how the technical side is lacking, whether that’s due to money not being poured into the project so more staff and time can be afforded or other reasons I do not know, but they are moving in the right direction with how the game plays and I hope the next generation of Pokémon will build on this games successes.
I am going to award this game 8 Pugsleys out of 10.