One of the best examples of classic (stale) Japanese gameplay is Pokemon.
No matter what anyone says, Pokemon Black and White are the same games as Pokemon Red and Blue. Every Pokemon game is a re-imagining of the past games. I find this problematic. Playing a new Pokemon game, for those of us in our late teens and early twenties, is a nostalgia experience. We know we're not getting anything new. We just want to see the new Pokemon, catch the cool ones, grind for hours on Pokemon that we deem to be lesser, and wreck the tough trainers at the end of the game. The only reason that there are any changes is that it's now easy and economically feasible to make them. Think about how ridiculous it is that there are 'remakes' of Pokemon games. Fire Red? Soul Silver? What you're buying is more up to date gameplay mechanics paired with the classic creatures you love. I haven't played the Pokemon remakes, but I admit there is some significant, albeit illogical, appeal. Part of me wants to believe that I'll have an equally memorable experience as when i first played Gold. There's no chance of this since the 21 year old me has less time to get an Evvee happy enough at night time (and doesn't that sound sexual to the 21 year old me?) to evolve it into an Umbreon.
The most common opinion of Pokemon fans is that Generation I (that's when Pokemon exploded) had the best Pokemon. Generation II had a lot of great creatures and enough gameplay tweaks to warrant the purchase. Generations III, IV, and now V all have some decent designs but many are often lacking, and seldom is there ever a new Pokemon that replaces a classic creature in the eyes of long-time fans. Game Freak Inc. could have kept putting out games with monsters of deteriorating design quality without any complaints - if they kept the gameplay fresh. The release of Black and White saw an improvement in battle pacing and surprisingly, story line. I no longer have to turn off battle animations just to get through a fight in a reasonable amount of time. This is a huge improvement, as one spends about half of their gameplay time in fights with wild Pokemon and trainers, who have hilarious things to say to you both before and after battle. Team Plasma's "animal rights" approach is probably the most realistic aspect of any Pokemon game ever and made me finally care about the motives of the enemy.
Complaining about games is pretty widespread among all players. Sometimes they complain about things that are unreasonable or unchangeable, but my complaints against the Pokemon series are so elementary I feel completely justified in making them. All of my areas of complaint are intermingling. I want new controls that take advantage of every button on the DS (and now 3DS); I want better use of both screens; I want menus that are streamlined. Not being able to flip between sub-menus with the L and R buttons is pretty much unacceptable. Often there is a completely blank screen when one is in use. Getting on your bike isn't a one button affair. These are all negative aspects of the game. It's not that these ruin the experience, but little things add up. Pokemon fans could be having such a better time if they didn't have to back out of their "Deposit Pokemon" menu before choosing which Pokemon they wanted to take from their "Withdraw Pokemon" menu.
I've sometimes thought that getting an upgrade to carry 8 Pokemon at a time would be helpful, since there are so many more types of Pokemon than when the series started, but this isn't unforgivable and adds to the challenge significantly. I'm not so foolish as to really expect leaps and bounds in the graphics department from a Nintendo game, but lets hope the sprites aren't so pixelated on the Pokemon series' 3DS debut.
Despite the way this post probably reads, I really don't like to trash-talk the Pokemon games. Its probably the game series I've been playing the longest, and there's a chance the total hour count I've put into these games is among the highest of all the games I've played. Almost everyone I know has a lot of fond memories from this series and I think it's been good for gaming in general. Problematically, as I've aged, my tastes have changed. As Pokemon has aged, it's stayed for the most part the same. The formula works, and I don't foresee major gameplay changes happening in the main series (see unsuccessful Pokemon spin-off games) but sometimes I wonder how much better Pokemon could be if Game Freak Inc. had made the maximum amount of changes with each new release, instead of the minimum. I'm still playing (and often loving) Pokemon White, but what's a blog without rants?
I could be wrong in my assumtion, but in the second gym theres a dragonite skeleton, the sign on it reads "This is a skeletal specimen from a pokemon that flew around the world". It made me think that maybe the older pokemon had become extinct or evolved into the polemon we play today. For example blitzle learns Flame Charge, ponyta ancestors?
ReplyDeleteI might just be trying to protect the game I gave my childhood to.