Another day of enjoying Pokémon Legends Arceus, another inaccurate take on the game (and the broader franchise as a whole) to debunk. Though the game has been incredibly well-received thus far, with even the mixed reviews admitting the game does make a good case for the blueprint of Generation IX; one in particular is a bit more dismissive. This one is from Wired; and it's far less open-minded than a previous one I responded to. The review is entitled, "Pokémon Legends Arceus isn't great: It doesn't matter." It is because of that review that I am once again issuing a response instead of addressing the writer over their social feeds. I will be referring to said individual as Wilson Fisk; so let's get to it: Pokemon Legends Arceus IS great. Here's why it matters.
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| Courtesy- Nintendo/Game Freak/The Pokémon Company |
As per usual, I will be including quotes from the review when necessary to offer my counterpoints. I've been playing the game for well over 40 hours; so I have more than enough knowledge to dispute errors when I see them. So, let's open this up.
Quote: "Game Freak once again gets away with not nailing an open-world Pokémon game. And we are powerless to stop it happening again and again."
Oh dear- just reading the header and we're already in trouble. Not only is starting a sentence with "and" typically not good form; these are exactly the kind of weasel words that I've been working to dispel for about 10 years now. Buckle up guys- going to be a rough ride.
Quote: "Barring some Jurassic Park-esque miracle, we will never share our world with Pokémon. So is it too much to ask for a truly open-world Pokémon game? There was that weird GameCube effort, Pokémon Colosseum, released back in 2003. At the time, one reviewer wrote that it was "certainly a step in the right direction to a good 3D Pokémon game." That was nineteen years ago."
Again, this whole discourse of a "truly open-world" title didn't really stick this time around; and that mentality typically isn't how game design works. Even ones that fit that descriptor still need to find ways to make sure the player doesn't go beyond the map's boundaries; and a hub to set off from to go on missions is a common one. Likewise, Pokémon Colosseum was indeed a worthwhile title that proved a game on console level processing power can work; and has been built upon. This isn't the only time this mindset comes up in this article; and we're going to talk about it more as we continue.
Quote: "In 2019, we thought that salvation might lie in the sunlit uplands of Britain, or Galar, as Nintendo renamed it in Pokémon Sword and Shield. It gave us an intriguing insight into Britain's image abroad; alas, it did not give us a true open world."
That was never the case, and this also comes off a slight against Pokémon Go that I'm sparing you; as it's not relevant to this discussion. What is relevant is how the writer seems to have an expectation in mind that is clearly at odds with what the dev team has set out; and it's only going to get worse from here.
Quote: "We know what we want. In the image above, taken from the original Game Boy Color games, a trainer stands before the blue right angles of a flat sea. His eye surveys the horizon. One observer juxtaposed this image to the Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog, by German Romantic artist Caspar David Friedrich. It is only half a joke: Nintendo achieved this with Breath of the Wild. We waited. We suffered. Then, in February 2021, a trailer. A vista mirroring that image. Perhaps, as the general badness of the world increased, our karmic debt had built up to such a level as to finally require the release of this game. So is this Pokémon open world? Sort of. Is it the game we had dreamed of? Not really."
All right, Wilson; I'm going to presume by "we" you're referring to the royal "we;" as in I, as with everything else you just mentioned. Whether or not this game has met your expectations on opinion; that is fully within your grasp to decide. It's presenting them as fact that is a problem that's seen way too often for my tastes as of late. It's a key reason why my thought process is not based on romantic period art in viral tweets; it's based on actual information from the developers being told publicly about the actual development of the game. Let's continue, not including several spoilers Fisk made about the story.
Quote: "What is immediately great about Legends is the sheer number of changes Game Freak has introduced that take a step toward the kind of Pokémon game that fans have been waiting for. Catching is the biggest revelation: the fundamentals are now close to perfect. Catching a doughy-cheeked Bidoof, for instance, is as simple as hurling a Poké Ball. Other skittish Pokémon, like Starly, will flee, so you have to sneak, Snake Plissken-style, through the tall grass to bag them. As in old games, some Pokémon will require you to fight and lower their hit points; you can chuck berries into the water to lure in others, like Magikarp."
This is actually quite a reasonable take on the redesigned mechanics; though I'm going to presume Fisk is referring to Solid Snake here; Plissken was the character from the cult classic "Escape From New York;" both of which were major influences on Kojima's work on the "Metal Gear" series. Side note: I'm actually kind of glad the remake isn't happening right now, think it's okay to let it be and move on.
Quote: "Game Freak evidently knows that the catching is the game's strongest aspect, because it has tied progression to it: Your whole team gains experience when you catch a new Pokémon. You won’t be catching them once either: Professor Laventon's demands are relentless; his thirst for knowledge insatiable. He wants 10 Bidoofs; he wants you to defeat 40 Drifloons. Fulfilling these tasks, along with simpler “requests” like bringing a guard a Wurmple in exchange for dazzling honey, gets you a cash reward and points that help you progress through the game and command higher levels of Pokémon. It sounds like a grind; it only feels like one at the real push toward completionism."
Again, that is fully within your grasp to decide; and as someone who's spent considerable time playing other games with similar progression even before all that's happened, I know it's not for everyone. All the same, I think they did a good job with making the quests feel engaging, whether it's getting some Bidoof out of the village food stores or completing the very first Pokédex in history. Basically, imagine a Ubisoft title if it wasn't made in a toxic workplace and you should have a solid idea of what to expect. I will touch on this more in future writings on this game; but I'm getting ahead of myself.
Quote: "For those who have always thought of the idea of capturing every Pokémon as a kind of in-game taunt that no one really attempts, battling is a more mixed bag. Immediately battling wild Pokémon without a screen wipe is as simple as flicking between your team and chucking the relevant ball. It’s a joy, as is the introduction of the new agile and strong battle styles. Yet there are some steps backward: Pokémon abilities and held items are gone, and there are far fewer trainer battles than before, and no gyms. Later in the game you meet more Elite Four-ish foes, and red-eyed, high-leveled Alpha Pokémon roam the land to challenge you (a level 40 Rapidash fire blasted my entire team in the first hour). Battles with Noble Pokémon, however, where you must barrel roll around and chuck balms to “calm” these beasts, make up a large chunk of the game's boss fights. These felt weak: The combat in Pokémon has been honed over many generations; these parts felt akin to stopping a game of Halo to play whack-a-mole. Why does Pokémon need Dark Souls–like invincibility frames?"
Okay, I'm going to have to correct a few points that Wilson is making here. First of all, the game's story takes place centuries before the bonds between Pokémon and their partners were cemented; so of course it would only make sense that it predates gyms and structures battles differently. Second, the way this part is written gives the impression he didn't understand how the game's encounters worked, and he was playing them like previous installments. Lastly, there's a few contradictions that don't make a whole lot of sense. Personally, I'd also ask the same question about why you're complaining about the difficulty as "Dark Souls-like" while also bemoaning no abilities or held items as a "step backward." Also, I don't think the Halo analogy works either; given how sharp the player base of Infinite is dropping and how contentious the new progression system is.
Quote: "The game's main quest is relatively easy: By Pokémon’s standards, this makes it a harder entry in the series, as previous titles required players over the age of 7 to concoct their own harder rules; even the more difficult Red was completed by a Twitch hive mind. Yet the pace of the game is bogged down by the sheer amount of story. The premise is cheese-string-thin: I found myself bashing through reams of dialog with interchangeable anime characters sporting gravity-defying hair styles. Yes, Game Freak needs to add some context about why it's all right for us to capture wild animals inside of palm-sized balls; no, I don't think this context needs to be novel-length."
None of this is entirely accurate, and once again contradicts the whole "Dark Souls-like" complaint about the difficulty Fisk just mentioned. I also have trouble finding truth in his claims about the story; and he's once again attempting to present his opinions about the main quest as fact. The characters are by no means "interchangeable," and in many cases are the ancestors of other ones in the series; not to mention how popular they've been with fans (Arezu being a big example). While I'm no stranger to string cheese analogies in this franchise, I vehemently disagree with Fisk about the perceived thinness of the premise. I would like to point out that Animal Crossing: New Horizons is second only to Mario Kart 8 Deluxe on the Switch bestseller list; and its premise is essentially living your life each day in paradise. So you might have an issue with the premise, Wilson; but Game Freak clearly has no problem structuring the game like this.
Quote: "But the worst thing about Legends is the world itself. That it is not truly open, in that you have to access the areas via an overworld map, is not a crime. The crime is that expanses of it feel lifeless. When Pokéboy [sic] debouches to the top of Aspiration Hill, his mouth falls open, as Game Freak pats itself on the back. Yet take out the glorious sight of Pokémon roaming wild, and you're really looking at a stretch of textureless hills and low-res lakes (and, later, an obligatory snowy biome), an ugliness that cannot be explained by the Switch’s hardware. The player doesn't so much inhabit the land as skate over it, a disconnect intensified by janky leaps off of hills when riding a Pokémon mount. The game tries to bridge this gap by tacking on a crafting system, so trees and rocks become something more than pixelated props. I’m not totally against collecting like this, but I don't want to turn acorns into Poké Balls, I've spent 20 years buying them at the Mart for 200 yen."
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| Akari, circa Jubilife Village, Hisui 17th century, retrieved January 28, 2022. |
Now comes the part where the entire article's argument is effectively undermined in just a couple paragraphs. The crafting system isn't "tacked on," Wilson; you clearly just don't know how to use it and are openly refusing to learn how. I just came off disputing an article about the environments; and I know given how long I've played this title that you definitely don't "skate" off the environments with Wyrdeer like it's the Pokémon version of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater.
I'm also going to overlook how you just started another sentence with "but," Wilson, and instead very carefully break down the complaints you're making to dispute them. One of the most basic things in this field is the difference between critiques that are reductive (such as saying "this movie sucks, it was too long") and ones that are constructive (including saying "this movie was a disappointment, it needed to be edited down a bit"). The ones Fisk is making are more reductive; and the subjective complaints about the hardware on top of dismissing it all as "lifeless" aren't really that helpful at all. The lakes in particular aren't entirely accurate; since they're bodies of water that are include rivers and oceans as well. However, unlike Fisk; I'm not going to spoil why. I will however point out that the visuals haven't been "pixelated" in years, and even the best-looking games on and off the console have areas that don't always come together. The fruit in Fire Emblem: Three Houses is a notable example of being one element that looks "off" in an otherwise gorgeous game. I'm not saying this is as bad as clickbait videos that try to extrapolate minor inconveniences into major game-breaking problems (people claiming this is the worst the series has to offer have clearly never played Pokémon Channel); but I've played the title long enough to know when someone isn't being entirely truthful about it. The hills are not "textureless" (I've seen scads of games in the eShop that fit that bill more; that terrible Popeye game being a recent offender), and the whole discourse about the "true" openness of the world didn't really stick the way the one about Galar did. There is not a blessed thing wrong with the world; in fact, the game itself has another observation about how quickly this Wired piece became a laughingstock.
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| "My name isn't Pokéboy, and it's not Buddy either." |
Quote: "Legends is a step in the right direction, yet we are still not there yet. And, in the words of Professor Laventon (and Hamlet, Prince of Denmark), “there’s the rub.” Pokémon’s recent history has been defined by the knowledge that Game Freak could do better—that with a bit of time and effort, the stewards of the most valuable game franchise of all time could fulfill our childhood dreams. But Game Freak doesn’t—and it likely doesn’t because it knows we will lap up an average game anyway. Because I cannot not highly recommend Legends to Pokémon fans. I am incapable of reviewing the game fairly: As I write this, I am clock-watching so I can get back to finding a naive-natured Electivire. The dream now is as strong as it was then, when you first realized that the world would be a better place with Pokémon in it. We still want to tell mom we're done with school, flip our cap backward on our heads, and hit the road with trusty Weedle. We want to be Pokémon Masters; or, at least, get rich enough to pay $1 million for a Charizard card."
Now I can officially offer my counterargument: this game isn't merely average; and it is great. Here's why it matters; no "buts" about it; especially not the one you started another sentence with. Even with Generation IX details being scarce beyond being in development; it's inherently clear that considerable time and effort have been expended in this game. Also, Fisk; if you're incapable of reviewing the game fairly; why bother doing it at all? I would suggest that they have fulfilled the dream and more with what's been presented. I will get into this in my full review later this year; but what's on tap is far above average, it would not surprise me if this became the blueprint for the future of the franchise going forward. It's already potentially my favorite Switch game of the year, if not for all 2022; and that's even factoring in the year just started. I fully admit my own history of having yet to have played a single main series game I've disliked; but I'm still capable of being impartial as a critic. I don't feel a need to make up praises or complaints on elements that aren't there; I can usually find plenty to enjoy (or critique) based on what is. I do agree about the cards, especially good to make sure you don't get a bunch of old GI Joe merchandise by mistake.
Bottom line: while it may be a bit early to accept for some people, it's clear that Pokémon Legends Arceus could very well be the template for the main series going forward. It is great, and it matters. My full review of the game will be later this year; but it won't be the last time I address the game before then by a long shot. I will see you all again soon, take care.
