Tag Archives: Pokemon

Pokemon Legends: Z-A Review

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It’s time for the latest big Pokemon adventure. I was definitely hyped to get this one as soon as they announced it. At this point Pokemon is just one of those games that you have to get right away. It may not always have the life or death stakes that you will see from other big games but the pure gameplay and quality of life features are always on point. This game is incredibly smooth and while you may run into the occasional issue, I can recommend it without any reservations. It’s really just a lot of fun all the way through.

The game starts off with the main character getting off the train into a new town. His luggage is stolen but a girl helps him get it back and asks if he wants to join her team. She helps keep the city safe while working at a struggling hotel. The manager, AZ is a guy who is said to be 3000 years old and is rather mysterious. Still, this means the main character has a place to live and immediately has 3 friends so it’s a pretty good deal. He agrees to help and gradually rises up the ranks. Still, there is something mysterious about the tower in the middle of the city. Terry may be uncovering a mystery that leads to disaster!

Now to be clear, around 90% of the game is just happy slice of life adventures. If you’re looking for a super epic game, this isn’t really it. Although the climax does end up being pretty intense so I have to give it some credit there. The game also has a good amount of callbacks to the original XY games and the continuity is pretty strong. I wasn’t expecting much in that area so it was a pretty nice bonus. Also while the game isn’t particularly difficult, the climax did raise the level for the opponents quite a bit. I ended the game around level 80 and that felt right for an adventure like this.

The main campaign took me around 20 hours and there is a short post game that would probably add a few more. You’ve got a good amount of content for your dollar here. Completing the Pokedex and all of the challenges will probably take a little time as well although probably not a ton. The game keeps the recent addition to the games where every member of the party gets EXP at the same time which helps a lot. You can also earn screws to permanently increase the exp boost and other passive effects.

I ended up getting enough screws for most of the passive effects. There are also about 140 side missions, I beat maybe 20 of those. They’re mostly all really fast and easy so you can have fun going through those. The most important thing here is that the game is just a lot of fun to play. It’s why you can even go out of your way to play the bonus content because it’s very easy to access. I didn’t come close to 100% or anything like that but I certainly had more fun exploring and doing bonus content than in other games. It just ended up feeling natural.

Now when it comes to the gameplay, this is a full real time adventure. So when you call the Pokemon out, you can have it use any of the 4 moves. There is no PP or energy meter this time so you can spam the attacks after the cooldown is over. This is fun but it does mean that the game is way less strategic than usual. Just spam your attacks until you win. Potions and revives are dirt cheap so you can keep on healing your Pokemon until you win. It’s why you should rarely lose here. The only time you may lose is if you let your guard down and let the Pokemon attack you directly. You have a health bar of your own but you can’t see the progress of it so sometimes you will die when you thought you had more health.

Occasionally your Pokemon will attack a wall by mistake or something like that but otherwise I didn’t really encounter many glitches. At times if there are too many Pokemon, the game can’t load them all so they teleport out of nowhere but these instances are few and far between. While the game may not be the most strategic, I still had a lot of fun battling. That’s a good thing since you will have to defeat well over 200-300 opponents over the course of the story. Many fights are over in less than a minute though so I have to underscore how quick they are.

Meanwhile the graphics are pretty solid. The game looks good even if it’s not quite at 2025 level. It looks like a game you may have played on the PS3 at some point. Nintendo isn’t worried about graphics though, they’re here to hit you with intense gameplay and they succeed on that front. The soundtrack is also way better than you may have expected. The songs have a lot of pop to them and there is a large amount of variety. Various bosses have their own theme which is really nice since lately you are stuck with just a general boss theme.

As you play through the game, you will have more and more areas where you can engage in a little platforming. It’s pretty fun and a good way to get more items. The world has an abundance of rare candies and screws to trade for more power ups. They even seem to be unlimited but I could be wrong about that. Either way the game is set up so that it’s very easy to level up. This allows you to switch up your party if you want to. For the most part I didn’t do much switching as I get attached to my main fighters but it wouldn’t set you back much if you did. Of course I recommend saving your rare candies as long as possible since each one is a guaranteed level up so you get the best bang for your buck if you wait until near the end in order to snag it.

Overall, This was a great game. I do get the concerns about the company phoning in the effort to an extent. It’s clear that this wasn’t a super high budget game and the lack of voice acting is still disturbing. That being said, it’s a lot of fun to play and at the end of the day that is the most important part for any video game. It never felt like the story was dragging on for me and there was no point where I just wanted to put it down. I could easily keep on marathoning it for a long time and I have to give the company a lot of credit there. The gameplay itself is really tight and that makes up for having a smaller world/cheaping out on different areas. I’ll still be eagerly awaiting the next Pokemon game as soon as it comes out!

Overall 8/10

Pokemon Go Update

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The game had their big level realignment the other day and so I got to see my level transform into Level 70. The requirements didn’t look too bad for the next level though so I dashed and now I’m level 71!

The next level will take a little longer although I’m not expecting it to be too crazy so hopefully that update will be sooner than later. In general I don’t expect to be level 80 for quite a very long time though.

Pokémon the Movie: Secrets of the Jungle: Another Beginning Review

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Whenever you decide to do a Pokemon adventure that takes place in Ash’s world without a whole lot of screentime for the kid, you better be real sure that you have an absolutely spectacular plot at the ready. Why? Well because now you’re making fans think about the famous champion of Pallet Town and his replacement is going to have a hard time. That happens to poor Koko here. There’s nothing particularly bad about him but he just feels a bit average, maybe even a little boring here. The adventure isn’t one of the most interesting ones but it’s not bad.

The story takes place before the movie as we see Koko growing up. He was a kid who was raised by Zarude. Zarude’s tribe did not like this and so they were banished but Zarude refused to abandon the kid. So he did his best in a dangerous world to raise Koko and make sure that he was okay. The one mistake he made was telling Koko that they were both Zarude and now that the kid is 7, he’s wondering why he doesn’t have any powers. Koko and his friends are then attacked by some Pokemon. Can a mere human defeat them?

It is nice to see how well Koko communicated with the Pokemon at least. I’m glad that you can just pick up that language if you are familiar enough with it. It certainly can’t be an easy task but then you’d also think that one of the Pokemon would have also spoken up and said this couldn’t be true. I guess maybe the Pokemon generally aren’t super smart so none of them could be sure that Zarude was lying? Maybe they’re all basically like kids or I’m digging too deep into a mild plot element.

The main villains here are a bunch of fire type worm Pokemon which pick a fight with the heroes. They are no friends of the Zarude but they don’t mind being bullies against the Pokemon that can’t fight back. It’s one of those Pokemon that are more on the recent side so I can’t say that I’m too familiar with them but they have a pretty good design. I can say right now that you will be a little skeptical about the Pokemon and Koko doing so well against them and I can’t say that I blame you. These guys are huge and really pack a punch. One of them even plays dead to land a cheap shot but ultimately Koko shows why he has a lot of guts.

Then Zarude cleans things up from there. Zarude is not my favorite Pokemon but I will say that he looks pretty good here. He’s nice and loyal and constantly makes sure to look after Koko. I won’t say he did a perfect job as a parent but his heart’s always in the right place. Meanwhile Koko isn’t as annoying as the average kid. He is actually proactive and doesn’t just run away when the going gets tough. That automatically puts him well ahead of where my expectations would normally be.

Of course Ash doesn’t appear much but I do like how he looks very confident the whole time. Technically he’s more the humble sort nowadays but at least from the cameo you would definitely be thinking that he is ready for action. It makes you wish he could have gotten more screentime. Just one more chapter to adapt the beginning of the movie or something. Either way the manga achieves its goal of making you want to go and watch the movie to see how everything played out. It’s exactly what a prequel should always be aiming to do.

The art is okay. It’s what I would call a very basic style. It’s trying to be as easy to read as possible which is nice since you’re going to have a younger audience for this one. The battles look good enough, but it’s never going to be the kind of story where you pause to admire the art. It’s just not detailed or exhilarating enough for that.

It does mean that you will be able to read through the story exceptionally fast. Keep in mind that this is already a short manga so that really compounds the effect. There are no negatives to be found here so I’d say the story also succeeds on being an extremely safe one for kids. It could use a few more strengths but it does have that mass market appeal. If you enjoy Pokemon, then you will be able to appreciate this as something that stays on brand. It’s also rare to be seeing a whole lot of the Pokemon in their natural habitats as opposed to the cities.

The jungle may not be my favorite backdrop but it works well in that context. The story also works almost like a what if with the humans and Pokémon talking to each other like something out of a Digimon adventure. You just don’t see that a whole lot with Pokemon. If more Pokemon could completely talk like Zarude, I think that’d be a really cool thing. It’s probably too late in the franchise to make that a truly regular thing but it would certainly be awesome if that were to be the case.

Overall, This was a fun little story. There isn’t a ton of stakes or memorable moments compared to the average Pokemon adventure but I guess a prologue is going to be a little more limited in what it can do. On the whole it’s still interesting and you can’t have an end of the world plot every time. I would have just asked for more fights to help the story turn the corner into the next level. Now that would have really been perfect. Still, whether you’ve seen the movie or not, you should check this one out.

Overall 6/10

Pokemon Go Update

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This latest Platinum medal was way quicker than I thought! I managed to finally catch Keldeo through one of the event missions and that was enough to finally get this collection medal. Definitely continuing to make that solid progress in the game although this time I think it’ll be a lot longer to the next Platinum medal. At this point I’m over halfway to getting them all!

Pokémon Friends Review

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Some of the game design decisions here are so bad you would swear it was a mainline Nintendo title. From limiting content to relying on a real life time system, this game has it all. It’s the kind of game that makes you feel sad because it could have been really amazing and instead they completely messed up here. Hopefully the next Pokemon mobile game ends up being better but at least in the meantime I still have Pokemon Go to get me through.

The game is basically a puzzle anthology. You get to play through a series of extremely easy puzzles in order to unravel yarns and collect fun images. Unfortunately, you can only do a few of them a day and then you have to wait for new puzzles to show up the next day. So even if you really like the game, you probably won’t be playing more than 30 minutes a day. I believe you can shell out some cash to get around that but it would defeat the purpose of the free experience.

Now this is Pokemon so of course the game is aimed at kids but the puzzles are almost insultingly easy. You could beat them with your eyes closed so there isn’t a whole lot to be entertained by here. Instead you’re just going through the motions and trying to convince yourself that this was a good idea. Sometimes you have to hold your phone at different angles to navigate a maze, or clicking on the right object out of a set.

The puzzle concepts themselves are pretty good. They’re sort of like what you would see in a Professor Layton game. That said, they are just way too easy. I did see posts online that think they will eventually get harder, to age up with those who bought the game but I don’t have high hopes on that. I think if that was the plan, there would have been a way to increase the difficulty right from the start. That would have made a lot more sense right? Instead you just have to accept that this will be easy

Even then I don’t think this would be a problem if there was no time limit. The limit is the problem, I want to be able to play the game for hours on end, not only playing it on occasion when there are new puzzles. It’s rare to see a video game that actively makes it difficult for you to keep on playing. It’s just a super questionable approach and I wonder which company made that final decision. On a much more minor note, I also think the name isn’t great because it can be hard to google that. A proper name should really stick out.

I can at least say that the graphics are pretty good. They do make you want to smile because of how cheerful the game looks. It’s a fun art style and I would be cool with other Pokemon games using it. The soundtrack is less remarkable unfortunately so you will probably forget about that part really quickly. Definitely a shame, even if some may argue that a battle theme wouldn’t fit the gameplay. I’d argue that a battle theme fits everything.

Overall, Pokemon Friends doesn’t make me feel a whole lot of friendship. Instead I just feel like I’m on my own, trying to fight against the odds of dropping the game. I ultimately lost that fight and uninstalled the game shortly after this review. I just didn’t see the point in continuing on any longer. The game did not have a good run and I won’t be forgetting that. It’s just an empty experience and that’s why there isn’t much to say about it. If you want to play a Pokemon mobile game, I recommend one of the many other alternatives instead. Pokemon Masters, Unite, and Go all have hundreds of times more content than this one has. Honestly, this may be a hot take, but I would recommend Magikarp Splash over this one. That game could at least get addicting with gradually learning how to farm better and better catches.

Overall 4/10

Pokémon Concierge Part 2 Review

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Pokemon Concierge has returned for another hurrah. Now this may not be my favorite Pokemon title to put it mildly but I’m always glad to have more Pokemon content. In a sense, it’s admirable that this does not have a negative score since just about every factor is working against it. Concierge has a very short runtime and not a lot of episodes but still does its best to capture the spirit of the franchise here. It’s all about coexistence between Pokemon and humans.

Following up on part 1, Haru has become a tiny bit more confident in herself at the Pokemon resort. She helps the others out in taking care of the Pokemon and making sure they all had a good time. Unfortunately, this also means she has more responsibilities such as taking care of the place when everyone else is out. Additionally, an old man shows up who wants them to take care of his Sealeo and this will be difficult for the resort. Can Haru really hold her own?

I guess we should get the big stuff out of the way first. The main problem with the show is the animation style. It doesn’t really look good. It’s a super old claymation/stop motion kind of approach that was already getting outpaced back in the 60s. Nowadays it really can’t beat any of the mainstream styles. Even simple things like the characters sweating doesn’t look as convincing as in the other titles. Since TV shows are a visual medium, this is already presenting a rather massive hurdle to overcome.

The soundtrack tends to be nonexistent but at one point they do play a classic battle theme. The battle on screen is of course not much of a fight and ends up resolving in a comedic manner, but I was at least glad the show was going for some action there. This is ultimately aimed at a pretty young audience so you can’t be expecting too much here. That’s why I’ll take every breadcrumb that I can.

As the main character, Haru does suffer from this a little bit as she has to keep on learning things that she should already know by this point. The first episode had her getting nervous and feeling a lot of self doubt again. After the first part, she should not have any doubts anymore. I would have liked her to have been more consistently confident the whole time. Maybe glancing around and directing the others on what to do at some points. Instead, even near the end she is thinking that she isn’t ready for this. Even going as far as to storm into the meeting room and start apologizing because she assumed an old guy was complaining about her.

Haru needs to value her own abilities far more than she does currently. Alas, it feels like she is always taking a step back when the going gets tough. Hopefully she will change this if we get a part 3. The cast of characters is still fairly small here and that’s probably for the best since there isn’t a lot of time for them all to appear. The owner, Ms. Watanabe for example just shows up for a few key scenes. I like how she called out the new guy for running away from his Pokemon and generally runs a tight ship. You need to be decisive like that when you’re in this position.

Alisa really doesn’t do much here but she had a bit more of a focus in part 1 so that makes sense. Tyler gets what I would call the main subplot here when his uncle Dan shows up. Dan is a tough guy who used to be real intimidating back in the day. He has mellowed out but still has a tendency to just do his own thing without really talking to anybody else. This does result in some pretty big mistakes here.

I definitely lost a lot of respect for the guy when he just flat out abandoned his Sealeo. He tried to immediately walk this back and explain how that wasn’t what was going on but Ms. Watanabe definitely had him to rights on that. It’s a hard situation to really walk back from. Dan does his best to help out after that and is okay I guess but there isn’t anything really compelling about the guy.

In a sense, that’s the problem with the cast in general. They’re all pleasant enough characters but none of them are super interesting. You’ll end up forgetting about them almost immediately after you have finished the adventure. That’s the real problem here. Well, one of them anyway. I do want to underscore that the show doesn’t really have any strong negatives. I could recommend it to anyone to watch.

There just isn’t much of a hook to watching it. It can be a little boring in a sense which is why it’s good that these are not full length episodes or that it didn’t launch with 13. Now, there’s a chance that the long run time could end up making things more interesting so that might be a gamble that would be worth taking. At the very least, you could give more screentime to her ex boyfriend who shows up but mainly just seems like a nice dude. We could have had a whole character arc for the guy and a lot of build up to his big appearance. If you ask me, that would have been a really interesting direction to go in.

Overall, Pokemon Concierge just adds 4 new episodes to this saga and each one is short so it’s more like 2 episodes or a little shorter than that. I fear that it won’t be able to make much progress into being really strong unless it ends up switching the animation style. It’s not impossible to succeed with this method of animation but it certainly isn’t easy. With Pokemon you’re always used to a lot of vibrant colors and really expressive designs. You don’t end up getting any of that with this title and you don’t have the fight scenes to compensate for that. So as it stands, I’m going to need them to announce a new online Pokemon series soon.

Overall 5/10

Pokémon Reburst Review

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Pokemon Reburst is a series that I started many, many years ago. After all of those years it was great to finally be able to read it through to the end. This is a series that really had potential to be one of the all time greatest titles that would become a whole sub franchise in itself. Unfortunately for some reason it never made its way to America and so most people haven’t even heard of it. Let me tell you, that is a huge tragedy. This is a series that has amazing art, dynamic fights, great characters, etc. There is basically nothing to dislike about the series except the fact that it is all over in the blink of an eye. The ending is also a bit on the rushed side but the journey is a very epic one. Only Pokemon Adventures can say that it is a better Pokemon manga than this.

The series centers around a kid named Ryouga who is searching for his father who went missing a long time ago. Fortunately Ryouga quickly gets a lead as to where he is. To reach the destination, Ryouga will need to assemble several Burst Hearts to attach to a radar which will point out the location. He can get these through battling other Burst Hearters and also by winning tournaments. These are very rare though and so villainous fighters are also on the lookout. If Ryouga doesn’t keep his guard up he may end up losing his. Along the way he meets several allies to back him up but will they be enough?

Right away what will stand out to you here is that the fights are all involving the trainers. You don’t have them just stand back and watching the Pokemon fight. No, instead they merge with the Pokemon through the Burst Heart process to become a fusion warrior. Ryouga’s partner for example is Zekrom and together they are a real force to be reckoned with. The fights also become DBZ style as a result with everyone zipping around and firing off energy waves/punishing blows. I really like that style of combat and it helps that the art is really quite good.

You feel each of the impacts and the fights are always very clear. The artist does a good job of emphasizing the speed and force that they are all being hit with. These aren’t light blows that are being thrown around after all but heavy hits. The fights get more and more intense as the series goes on and stronger fighters are used. The series also shows how normal Pokemon can stand up to Legendary fighters through solid tactics. Even an obscure Pokemon will have something up its sleeve. The possibilities are endless with fusions which is why it is a shame that the series ended so quickly. They could have done a lot with this.

The story also jumps into a tournament right away which is always nice to see. Most of the fighters may not have had time to be introduced yet but a good battle is a good battle no matter how you slice it. It was a good way for Ryouga to really show off the fruits of his training as well. Once you get past that, then things have to hurry up a bit as we meet several new characters who have to all be crammed in. So the pacing is really fast at least, that’s probably the positive way of looking at it.

As a main character Ryouga is really solid. He does his best to make a difference and take out all of the villains in his way. Finding his father is a pretty good motivation for a hero and along the way he never takes shortcuts. If someone really wants their Burst Heart then naturally he’s not going to take it. Ryouga always fights with honor throughout the whole match and wouldn’t dream of cheating here. Additionally he loves a good fight so these are all good traits in my book.

The only weak member of the main cast is Yappy and you can tell what kind of character he is right away. The guy is very weak willed, distracted by girls, and dreams of being rich. He’s the kind of guy that you can’t really trust at all. Sure he gets some character development by the end of the series but it’s way too late by then. I just never ended up caring for this guy all that much even if he did have a fusion form. More often than not he was just causing trouble.

Karuta is a much better character and his character arc is similar which if anything just makes Yappy look even worse. Karuta starts off as being rather weak and clumsy but gradually gets really skilled. After a short time skip he even gets a huge growth spurt and can fight well with the rest of the characters. It was really nice to see him go so far and he’s easy to root for. He may still lose his share of battles but he was always doing his best to help out Ryouga in any way that he could. Now that’s team loyalty.

Miruto isn’t really the fighting sort but she is a fun enough heroine. I do wish that she could fight though as being powerless in this world really limits your overall screentime. There’s just not much that she can do against any of these fighters and that holds her back big time. I’ll give her points for being a nice character but that’s about all that I can do for her right now. If this ever did get a sequel I’d definitely like her role to be increased.

Rug starts off as an antagonist but joins up with the crew pretty quickly. Her combat skills aren’t bad although she gets most of her mileage out of tricks. She can use attraction as an ability to work sort of like mind control and take down opponents who don’t have a lot of replay value. Once you get down to the actual fights though, she tends to go down without too much trouble. It’s more due to the power creep than her actually being weak but as the audience that’s the way it looks I’d say. She’s fun and adds to the main cast’s dynamic though.

Rend is a solid training partner for the heroes and you could say he’s the first big mentor. His Pokemon to fuse with is Boldore which is pretty cool since that’s hardly one of the more popular Pokemon. He has good physical stats and is just a fun guy to have around. I suppose my only issue with him is the same for most older characters which is that there is no real reason for them to be hanging back instead of helping the heroes. He may not be s strong as Ryouga by the end but he’s till mega strong and would be able to contribute quite a whole lot.

Garyu is Ryouga’s father so we don’t get to see much of him during the series but eventually we get the flashback of what happened. I’m typically harsh on a lot of the fathers in these titles for just vanishing without a trace but he actually gets a pass since he didn’t have much of a say in it. Seriously the guy got the raw end of the deal no matter how you slice it so I can definitely sympathize with the guy. He did what he had to in order to save the world so he has my respect.

Pauline was a fun announcer which is why it’s a shame that she’s mainly used for fanservice. She had good knowledge of the events and kept on giving the live updates even while things were going crazy. You’ve definitely got to give her a lot of props there. After that we have Carola who is a solid villain even if she isn’t the strongest out there. She’s very young so it’s not like she really has as good an understanding on what’s going on compared to the other characters. Carola really just follows Hariru’s lead and could become a good guy real quickly.

I liked her well enough and she was a good friend for the guy. Hariru didn’t really have anyone else to have his back otherwise. He definitely exceled in the rival spot as well. I still remember the standout scene where he kicked a can so hard that it broke right through a boulder. Now that was crazy impressive, you just don’t see big moments like that often. It really sent a message early in in the series that the fights were going to get more and more out there. He gets several power ups as the series goes on and each form is more impressive than the last. He has the high levels of confidence that you like to see from a rival like this and also has a fairly intense backstory. This is a very complete character and definitely the best one in the whole series.

The main villain Fraud is cool as well though. He loves fighting which is a bit more of a rare trait for a hero compared to the MC and rival so that was nice. The name causes characters to underestimate him before they get absolutely rocked. His power level is also off the charts and the only thing that can stop him is a whole lot of plot armor. Without that then the heroes would have really been in trouble here. When a villain successfully out plans the heroes you know that he is a real one. Fraud is a character you will definitely remember.

Alas, most of the other villains are characters that you won’t remember. Most of Fraud’s 7 enemy commanders are so forgettable that the author got tired of them. He created a new group near the end of the series called the 3 generals that wipe out those guys in an instant. So no need to remember them. As to the commanders, they’re not bad. Amu is the most memorable for his good fight with Ryouga and the guy also seems like the strongest member. He’s got speed and strength on his side which is an absolutely brutal combo. Defeating him took a whole lot of skill.

Ganku and Rovy were strong too but they ultimately had to fight one of the strongest in the verse. So what happened to them was hardly their fault. They just could not handle this opponent but I still liked their characters. They all talk really tough the whole time. I should also note that it’s nice that the Pokemon aren’t mindless either. At one point Ryouga has to go inside a mind scape where he meets up with Zekrom and even gets to train. We get motivational speeches and everything. It’s why it’s always great when the Pokemon can full on talk like that, even if it’s through telepathy. In general the training was good and it was a great way to show Ryouga getting stronger since their bond was stronger now.

As a slight negative, the series does throw in some random fanservice from time to time. Nothing too crazy and considering how good the art was for the battles, I get the feeling that the artist didn’t care much about these scenes because they were not really given any special treatment. It can be a little obnoxious but nothing serious enough to present an actual problem. It certainly gets completely overwhelmed by the characters and the good fights. There are way more positives than negatives here so you will have a blast.

Overall, If you ever wanted to read a Pokemon series with a real heavy emphasis on action then this is definitely the title for you. The battles go really hard and there are a lot of stakes here. The characters are all taking a beating after all and death is not off the table. If they underestimate a character too hard then they will end up paying for it. Even though the series will likely not be getting a sequel, you should definitely check it out. It really is quite the unique experience and not a title that you want to miss.

Overall 8/10

Pokémon Café ReMix Review

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It’s time for another app game and so you already know this is gonna be good! Pokemon Cafe is one of those titles I remember hearing about a while ago but never really checked it out. There’s a whole lot of content here and you can tell they put some budget into it but unfortunately it ends up being a little too ambitious. It tries too hard to be new and different which ends up crippling the actual gameplay style. It’s a shame because this could have been a whole lot better. Still, if you get absorbed into the game I think you will have a good time.

The game starts off with the Pokemon cafe being opened and you are here to help. Basically you serve Pokemon their favorite foods and when they like you enough, they join the cafe as well. It means your cafe will eventually be a Pokemon master! So that’s pretty nice and that’s basically it for the story so think of it as more of a premise than an actual plot. It’s not too surprising though, Pokemon mobile titles rarely have much of a story.

The gameplay style is to match objects together. The main twist is that Pokemon have super powers that they can use as well. So you can blast away at things and use type advantages. Also instead of just matching 3 of a type, you are trying to match whole armies to each other. It’s really ambitious but also feels a bit more like RNG after a point and isn’t as engaging. I would much father prefer to be doing this with some matches at a time. Forcing us into doing all of them at once doesn’t really make for as captivating gameplay.

And that’s what the whole game boils down to. I actually like the matching style of gameplay ordinarily. It has been present in some of the most addicting mobile titles I’ve ever played. I just couldn’t get behind the idea of spinning everything in the whole level into one spot. Perhaps if I had stuck around long enough then it would work but I definitely have some doubts on this. You can tell early on if a game is your speed or not. For a mobile game that is especially important because there will really just be one style. So if you don’t love the gameplay then there isn’t much point in continuing the game right? At that point there is nothing else that it offers.

There is a ton of content but not more gameplay. For example there are several different modes for baking, you can recruit Pokemon, learn new recipes, etc. There are hundreds of levels and so far no energy system that I can really see so that means you can play as long as possible. That’s really fun if you liked the gameplay. I can say this is a high effort mobile game that didn’t really cut any corners. They clearly put a whole lot of thought into this one so I can appreciate that.

It’s a bit of a tricky dilemma for any mobile title. Typically you figure the more content the better for any game but when it comes to mobile titles, sometimes less is more. Sometimes there is just so much to do that it can be overwhelming or it feels like you aren’t moving forward and that can happen at times here. If it stuck with the normal kind of matching gameplay then it all would have worked out but all of the spinning didn’t work for me. A better story also could have helped but I wouldn’t have expected that from a Pokemon baking game anyway. So you could say that all balanced out either way.

The game’s graphic already looked real sharp and the soundtrack wasn’t bad. I imagine as I went through the game more and more I would be able to find even more tracks. So the technicals definitely hold their own here as well. I will also say that while the game is very busy with modes and such, the UI isn’t bad. I generally know where to go in order to get to the mode I want to play. I’ve definitely played games with UI that were considerably worse than this one.

Overall, Pokemon Cafe isn’t really my thing but I can definitely see there being an audience for it. The foods all look pretty good after all and the matching gameplay does have some depth to it. The fact that you have to account for all kinds of Pokemon types and special abilities is really something. You really can’t just dive in here and pick any random Pokemon. I mean you can try to do that but it’s definitely going to end really badly for you. You want to get the maximum amount of stars on your first attempt or you’re going to have to end up replaying the level anyway down the road. I doubt this game will be going anywhere any time soon so definitely feel free to jump in and see what you think.

Overall 6/10

Pokémon: Magikarp Jump Review

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Time for another one of those quick mobile titles. I figured I’d give this one a quick shot because of how absurd the whole concept was and it’s actually better than I thought it would be. It’s the kind of game that you would need to stick with for the long term to actually get to the end though. Raising a Magikarp is a whole lot of work and it’s set up in a way where you will go through many Magikarps before you actually get one that is strong enough to take you to victory.

The simplicity of the game is part of what makes it so addictive. At the same time, it is clear that they are hoping you will spend money on this game so the grind gets longer and longer as you go on. Before long you will either decide that you want to be in it for the long haul or not. For me, there are just too many hype games to stay with any one title for long but they still did a good job with the title. I made it up to level 25 before calling it a day here.

So the story is straight forward as you raise a Magikarp and work to obtain all 8 Gym badges. In this world, Magikarp is the only Pokemon that is used for battling and so every Gym Leader has one. Whichever Magikarp splashes the highest wins. You then have to fight through a few trainers before the next gym leader and repeat the process. Gym Leader may be the wrong word though, I think the game just refers to them as champions but it’s basically the same concept in the end. You don’t actually control Magikarp during the fights so you just watch it splash. Each fight only takes about 5-10 seconds which is fast and if you lose the first time then you can just skip the animation the second time. You do have to start the tournament from the beginning each time you lose but you don’t have to re-complete previous ones.

The actual gameplay comes into the picture between battles. To get your Magikarp stronger you have to feed it a bunch of berries. They spawn every few seconds and then you tap on them in the screen. Rinse and repeat as you go through the game. As you get stronger you will unlock different training equipment which the Magikarp can use every once in a while. You will also unlock Pokemon who appear in the background to help out. There s even a sub genre for this game, it’s known as an Idle mobile game. So the idea is you just play it for a few minutes here and there when you have time and your Pokemon will keep on getting stronger.

Of course Magikarp will eventually retire and then you start from scratch. Your next Magikarp will always be stronger though based on your trainer level going up as well as his motivation. There is no way around losing at least 100 Magikarp or so as you go through the journey but eventually you will have one that is strong enough to beat all of the leagues. The game itself is effectively dead at this point so once you beat the 8 leagues you would be all done. There is no post game so you can just keep on getting stronger forever. I called it a day after beating 4 of the tournaments.

There’s a lot more on the details side I could mention here but you get the general idea. You have coins and gems to buy upgrades and the game essentially runs on a loop. It may sound a bit overwhelming but once you are playing the game, you won’t think that is the case. It’s a game that has an incredibly good UI so you always know where to go next. They did an absolutely excellent job on this one. I definitely can’t emphasize that enough. There’s not really much of a soundtrack here but the whole thing is going for a really peaceful vibe.

The graphics are pretty solid. Nothing that will rock your world or anything like that but the game looks and feels nice. Naturally there is a ton of replay value here and beating the main campaign will take a long while either way. Pokemon has definitely had some really strong hits over the years and this one is no exception. Hopefully they continue to make more Pokemon mobile titles in the future.

Overall, Magikarp Splash is a lot of fun. Almost deceptively so I would say since the actual sessions are really fast but you want to keep going back in to play some more. You could easily get addicted if you aren’t careful so you should definitely watch out for that. At the end of the day though I tend to gravitate to more story based games in the end. Pokemon Go is really the big exception to that. If you are looking for a fun little game to play though, this is a nice one to have on your phone. There are also no ads at all which is really nice. I always give the developers credit for that on not being greedy.

Overall 7/10

Pokemon Go Update

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My Pokedex is back to being complete at 437/437! Technically I’m missing one or two evolutions but I haven’t seen them so at least the Pokedex doesn’t show an uneven number. Hopefully I finally hatch a Salandit that I can evolve soon.

Mega Lucario was a nice addition to the mega army! I think they’ve nearly released all of the Megas now so just a few left.


Finally got a Ceruledge! Now the battle resumes to hatch another one so I can get the other evolution. Probably gonna take a while tbh.