Hello everyone. I know I just finished my look at the Giratina movie, but I've been meaning to address this for a while. It seems that Yo-Kai Watch 2: Psychic Specters (known as "Shinuchi" in Japan) will be launching simultaneously in the US and Europe on September 29. Given how it's been 10 months since Bony Spirits and Fleshy Souls launched and the series hasn't "bloomed like a flower" like Level-5 hoped here, it will be interesting to see how this scenario plays out.
I mean, the games have barely sold a fraction of what they have in Japan (while they have been selling a bit faster in Europe than the have in America, admittedly), and the records still being shattered by the 3DS entries of the Pokémon series hasn't helped either. There's also Final Fantasy XV, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and the Nintendo Switch taking the wind out of their sails; eating up whatever audience there might have been for this alleged "Pokémon killer."
The anime and toys also haven't been the big hits many were expecting either. Disney XD has largely downplayed promotion of the show in favor of Milo Murphy's Law, the third season of Star VS The Forces of Evil and the new Duck Tales. Even though more merchandise was teased at Toy Fair this year, most of what's already on the market has remained a bunch of shelfwarmers in my area despite numerous markdowns. Meanwhile, other IPs Hasbro has a stake in such as Star Wars, Transformers, Marvel Comics and My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic are still doing quite well (especially with the movie coming out in October).
So, this post will be addressing two big pieces of subject matter for me: the first 48 hours of my experiences with my pre-owned copy of Fleshy Souls, and some thoughts on the future of the series. The idea was also somewhat inspired by a video from my associate Kohdok, and you can see it here.
While the game may not be in the same league as a Pokémon game or Ni No Kuni for me, I will agree with many people that it's a bit of an improvement over the first game. Even critical reception is still mixed in many regards, I can agree that while the game might not be on the same order of magnitude as Pokémon Sun and Moon (which ostensibly took influence from YKW, I don't see it); it's definitely not horrible.
Still, I submit that many of the problems I have are the opposite most detractors of the series do. Many have accused the mechanics of being too complex, while I have had the opposite problem: I was never confused by the controls or the tribes of yokai. I had no problem figuring things out, since they're much simpler than the type balances and movesets of the Pokémon games. Still, this is a double-edged sword: the autopilot nature of the battles can be deterrent for those who are more into RPGs with active combat systems. I routinely have guzzled Mountain Dew while listening to heavy metal music just to stay awake during the battles in the game, and even many of the bosses have put up less of a fight than I thought they would.
I also mentioned before the pacing can definitely feel glacial to many who played the first game; since in both files I have started, new material doesn't really take hold until about 7 hours in or so. This can understandably turn off any people who may have played the first game. I mean, what if you played Breath of the Wild and you found out the first few hours of gameplay were just a reskin of Twilight Princess? You'd be disappointed, wouldn't you?
The "soft reboot" argument also doesn't hold much water with me, since rehashing the same plot with only a few tweaks generally isn't how a soft reboot works. That would be a more accurate description for Dragon Ball Super, which is a direct sequel to the original Dragon Ball and DBZ that ignores the events of GT (which was made without Toriyama's direct involvement). I also find it hard to get invested in a conflict about donuts after seeing how Sun and Moon dealt with themes that were intense for someone like me, let alone the games' target audience (still not spoiling them, if you play them, you'll know what I'm talking about).
The side quests are also something I have mixed feelings towards, since I will be the first to admit that I'm not a big fan of them in video games in general. It also doesn't help that many of them are "story quests" that end up taking me out of the narrative to do random nonsense just to progress further. Granted, they're not so much a slog that I want to just stop, at least not right now; but they could have been better integrated into the gameplay and narrative instead of just abruptly telling me stuff I need to do just to "unlock" more story. Sun and Moon understand this, and so does Breath of the Wild. While many missions are necessary to advance the plot, many of the other tasks are entirely optional in the main story and don't require you to be running back and forth just to progress further. However, I do give the game credit for revamping the map system with clearer waypoints to each destination, which helps rectify a problem I had with the last game.
As for the train system: it's not quite in the same wheelhouse as the elevators in Mass Effect or the Metroid Prime trilogy, and it's actually not as irritating as I thought it would be. At times, it's almost as confusing as me on the subways in New York last year; but a lot of critics didn't seem to understand or realize you could skip the cutscenes just by tapping the touch screen on the 3DS. Admittedly, that's something I discovered by accident, but still.
Last, but not least: I can concede that as someone who's been raised on Pokémon, befriending Yo-Kai can be hit or miss. There is quite a bit of guesswork in determining what food certain kinds like, and it lacks the more straightforward notion of just lowering a Pokémon's HP and throwing a Poké Ball at the right moment.
Beyond all this, however, is something I have to wonder about the future of the series. I have questioned the idea that the Yo-Kai Watch series had that much sway over Generation VII, and I have started Digimon: Appli Monsters and am considering recapping some of it in the near future. In the case of the series itself, however; it could have easily been pitched as a niche item to cater to the fans it already had outside Japan. Instead, Hasbro, Disney and Nintendo tried to shotgun the series into "the next Pokémon," which was a mistake that I pointed out fairly early on. The fans believed it could cross over beyond what Level-5 and Viz had planned, which didn't happen. It also doesn't help the line between what's divisive and what isn't is so thin these days. If people had said, "this an interesting new Japanese series," that might not have been a problem; but they didn't. They said "this is the series that will take the western crown away from Pokémon," which resulted in many Pokémon fans making sure that didn't happen. Granted, the successes of Pokémon Go, Sun and Moon and the 20th anniversary definitely overshadowed the sequels; but the despite YKW fans trying to blame Pokémon for their series' disappointing reception, in many ways; the problems came from within the very companies that were trying to make the series a hit.
1. Hasbro
In my area, the most common advertising for the series was for the toys. While the company initially put out plenty of ads and got plenty of shipments in my area, as time went on; things slowly stopped coming in. It's been roughly 18 months since the merchandise came to the US; and the amount of advertising has been significantly reduced on all networks. The toys also never did reach the same level of scarcity they did in Japan, and once again; the kids, when given the choice, went with more popular IPs. Case in point: When I went to go preorder Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon earlier this year, I saw a young man who looked to be about 5 glancing at a Whisper toy; then pass it over in favor a Mario plush, a Minecraft keychain and a small figurine from Transformers: The Last Knight. While it may not be the best indicator, I certainly knew what I liked and what I didn't at that age. When a series that people expected to be the hot new trend gets passed over by a bright-eyed 5-year-old, you know something's gone wrong. Even though Hasbro did tease new merchandise at Toy Fair, I'm not entirely sure how actually releasing it will do at this point, especially since Hasbro is gearing up for more popular tie-ins to My Little Pony: The Movie, Thor Ragnarok and Star Wars: The Last Jedi, among others.
2. Disney
This was a key problem for the anime when the news broke that it was getting an English dub. While this wasn't the only reason the show didn't do as well as many hoped, the way the series was handled definitely didn't help matters. I have spoken at length in my recaps about how the dub seems to go out of its way to disregard everything that made the original a hit. Even as someone who's not the biggest fan of the franchise, I can understand why people were disappointed. I may not be entirely against the idea of changing things for a dub like some others, but they have to be changes that make sense. While some of this is the side result of the game's translation as well, it doesn't really help that barring Johnny Yong Bosch; much of the cast seems rather wooden. It also doesn't help that decisions over how certain scenes were handled divided many online, such as bowdlerizing the swimwear of NyaKB/Next HarMEOWny. Ironic, given how a lot more crap got past the radar in Star VS The Forces of Evil. Also, Disney XD doesn't really have the same reach as Nickelodeon or Cartoon Network, and the digital catalog of episodes hasn't been handled all that well in an age where Netflix and other digital streaming platforms are the norm. Whereas the whole of the dub of Yo-Kai Watch has not been officially put up for streaming on most platforms as of this writing, many other series have been more than willing to adapt to the digital age. Many content creators understand this and put their entire seasons up for streaming; which allows people to go at their own pace, whether they want to binge-watch the whole season or stretch it out (three ones I'm looking forward to are Marvel's Defenders, Stranger Things season 2; and I'm even getting into the new Voltron as well). Even though Viz has expressed interest in dubbing a third season, nothing has been confirmed as of this writing. It's a key reason I've been holding off on my backlog of subbed episodes for recaps until I know more.
3. Nintendo
Now don't get me wrong: Nintendo is a company I have immense respect for. Even if they're not always on top, and they have been facing more competition from Sony, Microsoft and mobile gaming in recent years, I have always been appreciative of how they've taken that as motivation to try harder. Even in the days of the GameCube, whenever a big title was announced, I was immediately interested. In their defense, they did do the best they could with what they were given. They were dealt this hand by the other companies I've mentioned, and they chose to play it. To be fair, the games are actually the part of the series which didn't seem that disappointing to me. They were no masterpieces by any means, and they certainly didn't seem like they were any threat to Pokémon's status as the big "mon" franchise. Unfortunately, the games' popularity in Japan made the very concept of bringing them stateside a double-edged sword. Putting them in direct competition with a murderer's row of anticipated titles from other franchises didn't help either. Notably, the first game launched against Call of Duty: Black Ops III, and despite my opinion on the series and Bobby Kotick; there was very little that the fans could do to change people's minds. Jibanyan had chocolate bars. The black ops soldiers had automatic weapons. It was no contest. By the time the sequels rolled around, the same fate befell the games, with Bony Spirits and Fleshy Souls getting overshadowed by not only Sun and Moon, but Final Fantasy XV.
So, this is how it is right now. I had my doubts about how the series would do here when I first heard about it two years ago, and it turns out that my skepticism was justified. I understand that while Pokémon is very much a fantasy counterpart to Japan and other real-world places; I could still get into the series on its own merit, despite the weirdness of the idea of a 10-year-old kid capturing strange creatures and having them battle. Heck, my favorite Pokémon is Lucario, a dog with a conflicted attitude and spikes coming out of its hands! Much easier sell than a perverted "Human-Face Dog" like Manjimutt, don't you think?
This is also left any potential for releasing the third game outside Japan hanging; especially since the game had more Western flourishes. Forget trying to modify the game to deal with the changes in previous entries: the lack of concrete details on a release in the US means that it might not happen. As for Misaho Inora: she makes Tingle look like Rambo! I also still have the same plan for the third movie: even though I have recently seen it and might be interested in talking about it, I won't do it unless there's official confirmation of Sushi, Tempura or Sukiyaki being released outside Japan.
If you were to ask me if the series will continue outside Japan for much longer, my answer is this: I don't know. Again, if Level-5 were to publish Yo-Kai Watch 3 on their own; it could happen. As for Psychic Specters somehow outselling Ultra Sun and Moon: for me at least, that's a bigger stretch for me than an arm-wrestling contest between Monkey D. Luffy and Mr. Fantastic. That will be all for now, I have some stuff to take care of and then I can start work on my next recaps for August. See you, space cowboy.
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