Pikmin 3 was the first Pikmin I played and that always bothered me. I'm one of those stingy stubborn assholes who hates playing games out of order. The primary reason for this is I believe there is value in playing a series from start to finish to experience and appreciate how it evolves over time. Obviously going from GTA V to GTA 1 would be like going from the automobile to a coal-powered horse but you can only appreciate the luxuries of the automobile once you've had something to contrast it and see how far we've come. There is literally nothing stopping me from dropping ~$30 on a copy of Red Dead Redemption 2, a game I've heard so many differing opinions on that I'm dying to know where I stand... but I haven't played Red Dead 1 yet. And I don't wanna start with 2 and then play 1 and be spoiled by all the quality of life improvements and gameplay changes. I want to play 1 before 2 to see how much the series has evolved between installments.

Pikmin 1 did have an advantage over Pikmin 3 going in: controls. I was able to cope with the Switch version's normal controller mode but having played so much multiplayer on the Wii U, Wiimote + Nunchuk is the only way to play Pikmin 3. Having my beloved pointer controls back for the Wii version of Pikmin was a pleasant thought... then I started playing. And I realized there was a key component missing: lock-on. The pointer controls aren't for accuracy, they're for speed and ease of movement. Pikmin 3's lock-on helped guarantee you'd actually be getting your little guys to your target. Honestly, between the Wii version of 1 and the Switch version of 3, I prefer 3's stick controls. The lock-on was way more valuable in retrospect. Controlling Olimar in every other aspect felt perfect... but not the Pikmin. Jesus fucking Christ, the Pikmin...

My boy Yahtzee of Zero Punctuation fame described the little plant bois from the third game as too retarded and defenseless and I didn't know what he was talking about. I adored controlling the Pikmin in 3. But then I played 1 and thought maybe he had played the wrong game. The Pikmin in 1 are so fucking aggravating. They fall off ledges easier, are slower, organize into groups worse, and I swear to God they're either deaf or the game glitches out because the whistle would occasionally decide to not work. A little git would catch fire, I'd get it clear within my whistle at least three times, and then it dies. The swarm feature is also for shit. Half the time my squad would just circle me without getting the thing I'm pointing at. Even the act of switching between Pikmin is a hassle. In 3, you press a button on the fly to swap Pikmin types. In 1, you have to hold A, get a Pikmin cocked, and then hit B to swap between types. Super clunky. Also yellow Pikmin being the only ones able to carry bombs when they all have hands and carry stuff all game is incredibly retarded.

The game is also super buggy. Many times I would take a squad of 100 bois out, only to see that several of them had mysteriously disappeared. Then I saw a couple of them clip through bridges and walls and it made perfect sense.

The bosses were very mixed. Either it dies in ten seconds or you have hundreds of your men flattened into the void. Smoky Progg and Bulblax... bastards...

I ended up 100%-ing the game despite my increasing disliking but I do adore the Pikmin gameplay loop. Pikmin 3 is way better but 1 serves as an acceptable way to introduce yourself to the world of Pikmin.

While there's definitely a valid debate to be had over Pikmin 1's static time limit and Pikmin 2's more relaxed approach, I personally prefer the time limit. It adds that extra weight and importance to your actions on a given day. Yeah, once you're familiar with the game you'll never really be at risk of running out of time ever again, but it's still an effective element and adds the fun layer of seeing how few days you need to escape. I'm still not entirely sure whether I prefer 1 or 2, but the added intensity to survival and the more focused design of each level are definitely points in favor for 1. Just an all around excellent and fun strategy game.

I haven't really delved into real time strategy games that much (Spore is probably the only game that is even close to this among my played games), so I figured that Pikmin would be a great start. Also, I love playing Olimar in Brawl, so I figured I should find out how his game is to play. And I honestly had a blast. It was super easy to get in to, and pretty addictive while I was playing it. It was very fun to control all the pikmins and to make them do different things. It was cool how every area was almost like an open world where you could collect things in whichever order you wanted, and it felt natural after a while to just bring a whole lot of pikmins into the field and structuring their duties difficulties. I made some of them collect other pikmins so that my pikmin count would increase, and others would just follow me along to battle all of the different enemies that this planet offered. It was pretty hard to find all the ship parts, but I managed to get every one of them, even though some seemed to not even be required. The music and the atmosphere were other huge pluses, especially the music. The sliding guitar chords played in the third area was such a cool song, and I immensely enjoyed my time there. But probably my favourite aspect of the game was that it made you learn through trial and error in a way that didn't feel unfair or unfun. You simply had to test what would work. I remember seeing the enemies that breathed fire in the third area, and thinking "I wonder if the red pikmins are immune to fire", and they absolutely were.A related story is that the first time I got near water, I actually lost half of my pikmins through drowning, but it didn't take that long to get them back fortunately. Olimar's narration made the game feel more immersive, and made me love the day system, because I could always look forward to Olimar's funny comments at the end of the day. There were of course some things that I enjoyed less, like how it could take a long time for pikmins to react to my commands sometimes, but I feel like it would have made the game worse if that was absent, because it would make the pikmins feel less like living creatures and more like mindslaves. I wish it could have been done a bit differently, but as it is, it is not the worst thing in the world, and it was not really something I thought a lot about when playing through this game. I recommend this game to everyone, because it is very accessible, cute, sort of sad, and fun!

It's pretty good, but definitely has a lot of annoyances with managing pikmin (like not being able to just throw the pikmin type you want if you have multiple types in your party) that were sorted out in later pikmin games, and it makes it feel like a hassle to do simple tasks at times. Features introduced in later games to help you manage pikmin better are more quality of life changes than anything else, but when most of this game revolves around managing them it makes a huge difference. Something I don't see many people talk about is that the game just has this very beta feel; I don't know if its what they were going for, but areas can feel kind of eerie sometimes and graphics can feel unfinished, but I wouldn't say they're really bad things about the game as it adds to the feeling that you're stranded on a weird foreign planet. Overall this game is solid, and the combat, while simple, is very satisfying. Despite being able to have up to 100 pikmin on the field at a time, the tougher enemies never feel like a joke (with some being able to wipe out all 100 in seconds), making the factor which determines battles how well you can command your pikmin and not how much you've grinded. The only thing that stops me from giving this an 8/10 instead of a 7 is that I just wish the game went on longer; it's pretty short, especially compared to other games on the console like sunshine. I honestly didn't expect to like this game too much, but it was a fun time.

The wonderful start of a unique series in a super edgy and artistic way. It's super short but there are multiple endings all with their own cutscene for replayability with a challenge mode. Each game in this series all coexist in the same storyline but basically in terms of plot they are related by the thinnest bit of string so I don't really care about how much it adds rather how much it stands alone. It's honestly really nice, not as much as the later ones where every single thing has a journal entry WITH the added character development and world-building via diary entries/e-mail at the end of every day, but it's all right in the game and you read it as you play. In terms of gameplay its unique and really fun and relaxing, with newcomers considering it stressing but its genuinely really fun even with all its major flaws in its direct foundation. Its artistic style, concepts, and design really carries this game for what it is and I love every bit of it.

Just replayed the game 100% completion and you don't realize how much you hate the controls and AI until you replay the game it was an awful experience in the present and i removed half a star now that i have a very vivid experience of them.

Cons:
>Yellow pikmin are actually genuinely useless
>AI was the most janky here
>Other than challenge mode, its replayability consists of beating it faster or skipping through days to see the bad endings (didn't dock points for this since the short replayability is considered good to some and speedrunners)
>Alot of very much-needed features that appear in the literal next game were just not in this game and it made a game about micro-management really annoying, it makes it have this alpha/beta game feel to it.
>non wii controls SUCKKKKK

Oh, Pikmin... You're the one game I wish I could play again for the first time.

Growing attached to my small group of Pikmin, really feeling the loss of each individual Pikmin, only to grow into a horde where each death is merely a statistic, a necessary evil to optimize progress... it's a little chilling, and I think the team intended that, with Olimar even finding a certain peace in his position of power over the limited environment he finds himself in despite the deaths of the Pikmin, assuming you're actually good at the game.

But replaying the game is always an interesting experience, even if I won't get those exact same impacts again, or at least as strongly. When I started replaying this game for this playthrough, I'd actually played through half of the entire game in a single night, only realizing at that point that the sun was rising and this game had captivated me like few other games do.

It's eternally compelling, much like Super Mario 64. It's static and unchanging - but how you interact with it is a constantly evolving game that offers something new every single time.

Ignoring my Mario biases for a second, if I were to consider one Nintendo game as their magnum opus, this would be it. From beginning to end, in narrative to gameplay to themes, I think this is the most completely realized in a self-contained work.

It's such a shame the series is kept hostage by its sales. Pikmin deserves better.