A common complaint about Pokémon is that most of the games seem the same, that it needs a breath of fresh air while also retaining all the past Pokémon. Legends started to remedy that but for me, it was this.
This was my first Pokémon game so it's nice to come back to my roots, a good bit of nostalgia.
You get Umbreon and Espeon at the beginning so I just figured that you buy more Pokémon at the store, I mean the Pokéballs are right there. And since they came in a lot, I expected them to be a surprise. My child mind came up with the gacha system.
But those aren't even Pokéballs, I just thought they were. There's a lore reason as to why they don't have any Pokéballs there though…ITS THE DESERT. Apparently there just aren't any Pokémon to catch around there so there's only one place in the game that actually sells them.
The plot revolves around the Snagems, which have the power to steal Pokémon. One of those…is you. So yes, instead of random encounters, you choose to fight trainers and you can steal their Pokemon. You automatically turn Pokéballs into Snagballs.
They used things like FF7 as inspo to create a more edgy protagonist (that doesn't talk) and shake the game since players were getting older (and they weren't experts on Pokemon in general). There's even a Sephiroth looking fellow.
But the Snatchers can lock away a Pokémon's heart so they can't feel and are just a fighting machine. These are the ones that you can catch but you can also just choose to take them out the old fashioned way. But I felt the catch rate was absurdly lower than any normal Pokémon game. But the story is really good, better than your average "Team whatever is at it again in the quest to be the best" it has some break aways from the formula.
There's no normal build up like gyms, there are stadiums and colosseums, one is fixed fights that you can gain exp from, you can choose to do those one at a time. And the other is a gauntlet of battles between different trainers, (everything is double battles in this game BTW). You also raid bases though too like your average Team Rocket. This makes it seem like battles more or less happen one right after the other in a straight line, leaving me wanting a little more variety but that may just be Pokémon in general and just be more noticeable here.
And because of the no random encounters, being in the desert and all, you don't have to trek from place to place, you just choose on the map as if you had fly, but instead you ride a bike. You don't actually get to control the bike (it had a short development schedule or I'm sure you could have).
I'd mainly play the straight battle mode as a kid because I understood that a little more with both teams getting random Pokémon. Pretty sure the back of the box said 2 players, so I just assumed you plug in another controller and the other player plays as the opposing trainer so I tricked my cousins into thinking they were actually doing something but in reality, it was the AI making all the decisions. I mean they didn't play Pokémon either, they knew what it was but they were Playstation kids. I remember one of them particularly hated Sentret because of how easy he was to beat.
For a 2004 game, it has some pretty good and unique animations like Duskull's light being snuffed out and just the grey sheet falling to the floor. Or Spoink getting all spiral eyed and fainting as the orb rolls from its head. Even some of the trainers. I think that's part of why having Umbreon and Espeon as the main party members was so enjoyable. As a kid, you want to catch them all and don't really get to appreciate it as much but I really felt for Espeon every time she got hit because in my head, these two have personality. Espeon barely got hit but when she did, it just seems to make Umbreon want to hit back more "You can't do that to my girl!" And the way Umbreon's lights flicker, when he gets thrown back, you wonder if his light will come back. It makes you feel for them which I suppose is the lesson here. Also, there's a manga based on it and it uses the exact same idea so I imagine it was deliberate.
Also Espy and Umbry (who I named Noctis and Lunafreya) are both in their 20s level wise at the start so there's no real need to start from scratch but when you catch more Pokémon, they're more or less good until that level cap is surpassed because they don't level up until they're purified. You can stick them in daycare but that's one at a time. Purifying them isn't that bad, I actually find the experience to be enjoyable because you have to get them to listen to you so it's not an immediate trainer and pet relationship so you'll have to rely on Espy and Umbry more than anything. But there are a good variety of ways to get the shadow meter down. Also, the battles more or less always aimed for Espeon over Umbreon which I thought was the level difference but then I got Espeon to surpass Umbreon so I have no clue what the AI was thinking.
There are certain things that slow the game down like walk speed and the time it takes for the animations, especially throwing your Pokémon out to begin but I'm going to chalk that up to age. Also, there's no reason Rui couldn't be the one to carry the second Pokémon in team battles, it'd give her a little more to do than just follow you around but again, an all around great story for a Pokémon game, would really like to see it represented in the anime similar to Chronicles and Origins.
This was my first Pokémon game so it's nice to come back to my roots, a good bit of nostalgia.
You get Umbreon and Espeon at the beginning so I just figured that you buy more Pokémon at the store, I mean the Pokéballs are right there. And since they came in a lot, I expected them to be a surprise. My child mind came up with the gacha system.
But those aren't even Pokéballs, I just thought they were. There's a lore reason as to why they don't have any Pokéballs there though…ITS THE DESERT. Apparently there just aren't any Pokémon to catch around there so there's only one place in the game that actually sells them.
The plot revolves around the Snagems, which have the power to steal Pokémon. One of those…is you. So yes, instead of random encounters, you choose to fight trainers and you can steal their Pokemon. You automatically turn Pokéballs into Snagballs.
They used things like FF7 as inspo to create a more edgy protagonist (that doesn't talk) and shake the game since players were getting older (and they weren't experts on Pokemon in general). There's even a Sephiroth looking fellow.
But the Snatchers can lock away a Pokémon's heart so they can't feel and are just a fighting machine. These are the ones that you can catch but you can also just choose to take them out the old fashioned way. But I felt the catch rate was absurdly lower than any normal Pokémon game. But the story is really good, better than your average "Team whatever is at it again in the quest to be the best" it has some break aways from the formula.
There's no normal build up like gyms, there are stadiums and colosseums, one is fixed fights that you can gain exp from, you can choose to do those one at a time. And the other is a gauntlet of battles between different trainers, (everything is double battles in this game BTW). You also raid bases though too like your average Team Rocket. This makes it seem like battles more or less happen one right after the other in a straight line, leaving me wanting a little more variety but that may just be Pokémon in general and just be more noticeable here.
And because of the no random encounters, being in the desert and all, you don't have to trek from place to place, you just choose on the map as if you had fly, but instead you ride a bike. You don't actually get to control the bike (it had a short development schedule or I'm sure you could have).
I'd mainly play the straight battle mode as a kid because I understood that a little more with both teams getting random Pokémon. Pretty sure the back of the box said 2 players, so I just assumed you plug in another controller and the other player plays as the opposing trainer so I tricked my cousins into thinking they were actually doing something but in reality, it was the AI making all the decisions. I mean they didn't play Pokémon either, they knew what it was but they were Playstation kids. I remember one of them particularly hated Sentret because of how easy he was to beat.
For a 2004 game, it has some pretty good and unique animations like Duskull's light being snuffed out and just the grey sheet falling to the floor. Or Spoink getting all spiral eyed and fainting as the orb rolls from its head. Even some of the trainers. I think that's part of why having Umbreon and Espeon as the main party members was so enjoyable. As a kid, you want to catch them all and don't really get to appreciate it as much but I really felt for Espeon every time she got hit because in my head, these two have personality. Espeon barely got hit but when she did, it just seems to make Umbreon want to hit back more "You can't do that to my girl!" And the way Umbreon's lights flicker, when he gets thrown back, you wonder if his light will come back. It makes you feel for them which I suppose is the lesson here. Also, there's a manga based on it and it uses the exact same idea so I imagine it was deliberate.
Also Espy and Umbry (who I named Noctis and Lunafreya) are both in their 20s level wise at the start so there's no real need to start from scratch but when you catch more Pokémon, they're more or less good until that level cap is surpassed because they don't level up until they're purified. You can stick them in daycare but that's one at a time. Purifying them isn't that bad, I actually find the experience to be enjoyable because you have to get them to listen to you so it's not an immediate trainer and pet relationship so you'll have to rely on Espy and Umbry more than anything. But there are a good variety of ways to get the shadow meter down. Also, the battles more or less always aimed for Espeon over Umbreon which I thought was the level difference but then I got Espeon to surpass Umbreon so I have no clue what the AI was thinking.
There are certain things that slow the game down like walk speed and the time it takes for the animations, especially throwing your Pokémon out to begin but I'm going to chalk that up to age. Also, there's no reason Rui couldn't be the one to carry the second Pokémon in team battles, it'd give her a little more to do than just follow you around but again, an all around great story for a Pokémon game, would really like to see it represented in the anime similar to Chronicles and Origins.