This has to be one of the best new RPGs I've ever played. Many people tried to call this the "Pokemon Killer" when it came out, but that was never supposed to be its title.

In fact, this is so different from Pokemon that if it wasn't coined the "Pokemon Killer" by the community, this game might've had more of a chance. People probably picked it up expecting Pokemon gameplay, realized it was nothing like it, then put it down and never played it again. But those that made it to the end had such a special treat.

I 100%'d this game. Collected every single Yo-Kai because it was just that fun. I don't want to compare this game to Pokemon, because it's not. But what I get out of this series that Pokemon no longer gives me is this unique Japanese charm.

I can't describe it. But this game is so odd in such a good way. It's so refreshing to just see a company take a monster taming game in such a silly route. Some of these designs are WILD and I know Game Freak would never do, but that's why I love Yo-Kai Watch. If Pokemon is fine dining with wine and cheese, then Yo-Kai Watch is pizza and beer.

But I don't want to dump on this game. I'm not saying it's bad by any means. It's just completely different than any other monster taming game I've played, and that's a good thing. I love that it uses Japanese lore and culture as an integral aspect of the game. Pokemon uses Japanese lore as inspiration and mixes it with other kinds of lore in the world. But Yo-Kai Watch makes Japanese lore an integral part to its story.

And I love it.

I am so sad this series didn't get the love it deserved in the West. I still remember collecting all the toys, the plushies, the figures, because I was just so obsessed.

Many players said that the battle mechanics were way too easy because your Yo-Kai auto attacks. I thought this was actually very unique. I had never played a game where you didn't directly control the action of your party members.

And honestly? It made for some pretty tough fights, especially later on in the game. I eventually got used to it and had no problems with it, in fact, I grew to love it.

But for those people, I'd say they completely overhauled the battle system on the Switch games. It's incredibly fun and would probably appeal to most players. So if those games ever get localized, let's please all support them so Level 5 can see that there's still an audience here for the series in the West!!

Overall, incredible game. I can't give this anything less than 5 stars, despite my minor gripes with the game. If you're even remotely interested in this series, I highly recommend you just play this one from beginning to end and see where it takes you from there.

Happy hunting!

Good game to be the first, it is very good, the story is nothing out of this world but the graphics are very good and the cinematics too, although sometimes I would like a little more difficulty and a little better plot of the story.
History:6
Gameplay:6
Levels:7
Bosses:7
Music:8
Rhythm:7
Final grade:7

For a game I only picked up because it was $13 on Play Asia at one point and time, I enjoyed this game IMMENSELY. It is by FAR the most competent and fun Pokemon-like I have ever played, and I can completely see why it is SO popular here and abroad (but mostly abroad ;p). I'm not sure if I'm ready to say that I enjoy Youkai Watch more than Pokemon, but I enjoyed it a lot. I'm not sure how much of that is just having something so technically competant but so different from Pokemon when Pokemon has been so similar for so long, though, however.

First things first out of the way: For those of you who might've guessed otherwise (as I did), not being a Layton game does not mean that Level-5 can suddenly write well. The story is a total pacing cluster-fuck, with new, VERY plot significant characters being introduced right up until the very last chapter, characters whom you've never even met up to that point except perhaps in passing (literally, like on the street). The story comes to the last chapter really suddenly, and even though the game tries to do things like introduce mystery characters who seem all mysterious, it doesn't use them to any noteworth effect. HOWEVER, being as this is FAR more silly and mechanically-oriented (at least in terms of its presentation) than something like Layton, I felt that the bad pacing didn't really hurt the game too much. The characters themselves are very fun and silly, especially Whisper and your main character, so you never really feel like you just hate everyone, just that you're not that involved in the overarching plot of things.

The gameplay itself is certainly not without its problems, but it's the most fun spin on the Pokemon formula I've encountered. First up is the good stuff. The game plays like a real-time Pokemon where your whole team battles at once. You have three active and three inactive Youkai at a time on a wheel-system, and you can literally rotate the wheel to rotate them in and out as they become hurt or incapacitated. Your Youkai fight completely on their own, and other than giving them items to affect their "personality" (i.e. battle move-priorities), there's not a whole lot you can do about it. Granted, different Youkai do have different moves, you don't really have an easy way of viewing all of these moves in a UI of some kind, so it works best just to try different Youkai configurations to see what works. Although, just because your Youkai move by themselves, that doesn't mean that you don't have any way of keeping occupied yourself.

In battle, the things you, the player, can do will usually keep you occupied enough that you rarely have down time. First off, each Youkai has a super-move that can be used by playing one of a random series of mini-games. The top-screen action doesn't stop while you're doing these mini-games, so getting fast at them is a real strategy tactic. Additionally, when your guys get status effects (burn, slow, paralyze, etc.) you can rotate (literally) them out to do a different set of mini-games to get them back to tip-top shape. You also get extra EXP for doing those mini-games, so it's well worth it. You do need to have your Youkai's special-meter full before you can do special moves though, which is good, because some are VASTLY better than others (depending on the Youkai). You can also equip one item on each Youkai which will shuffle their stats in some way (almost every item with a stat benefit has some negative effect on some other stat, to keep them from being straight up "why the fuck wouldn't you use it"-buffs). On top of the above, you can literally 'pin' a target for your Youkai to focus on (and you can also use that pin to pop bubbles that float past the top screen for power-ups and items, no joke), as well as use items to feed to your Youkai or the enemy, which brings me to how you even catch these guys.

There is no such thing as a Youkai-Pokeball. Instead, this is much more like the awful Ni No Kuni method of catching monsters: You beat them up and then just hope to god that they decide to join you after the battle. You can give them their favorite type of food (of which there is no record or indication of in the game. You've gotta figure it out with trial and error and then just remember who likes which specific category of food) to up your chances, but it's usually never by any significant feeling margin. Especially because there are some Youkai which are legitimately very rare (like Noko) who appear very rarely, sometimes EXTREMELY rarely (there was one that will appear randomly in place of another Youkai, and I saw but two of in my fifty hours of play), this makes it a SUUUUUPER pain in the ass to actually get Youkai you really want reliably or in any meaningfully quick fashion. You can also only feed enemy Youkai (even a food they don't like) once during battle, so there's no food-spam option. This is, in my opinion, what Youkai Watch gets the most wrong about the Pokemon formula, and is my biggest hesitation with recommending the game to another fan of the genre.

That said, the above method of forcing you to fight tons of Youkai does have some useful side-effects. First off, this game has no trainers. Even though you have a party of six Youkai which you can rotate, you will never fight another Youkai Watch-kateer, so you'll only ever fight up to three other Youkai at a time. Additionally, becasue there are no trianers, the wild Youkai you fight are just far tougher than wild Pokemon tend to be. Because you have to fight Youkai very repetedly to catch them, this led to me accidentally doing a TON of grinding I hadn't intended to do, just because I wanted to catch all of dem Youkai. Wild Youkai also drop money, so I also never had any remote money problem despite all of the Youkai food I had to keep buying. It's basically the equivalent of if there were unlimited Pokemon trainers to fight, and the only way to catch Pokemon was to hope that the trainer gave you them once you beat them in battle. It's an interesting and somewhat useful side-effect, but I don't think that it outweighs the more significant problem posed in Youkai befriending (You don't capture, you befriend (with violence)!).

The last most notable thing about Youkai is that not only do they have specific ranks (six different ranks, E through S), but they also rarely evolve. Out of 220-ish Youkai, only about 15 or so evolve through levels, and another 15 or so evolve through being combined with other Youkai, and then another 15 or so by being combined with special items. This makes it so that you are quite often switching out Youkai completely to make different or sometimes completely new team configurations just because the stats on higher ranked Youkai are just so much objectively better (although it can take a little while to find a move-set that gels well with your team and personal style). If you've ever played Dragon Quest Monsters/Joker, this will seem fairly famliar to you, but I believe that Youkai watch does that system not just better, but correctly.

The REALLY (really) annoying thing about DQM series is that you need to combine ALL monsters together to make stronger ones, and you really don't have much concept at all of just how strong or spellfully teched out this new monster will be. That process CONSUMES both parents, and you're only left with a child, so you can seriously fuck yourself over and have to do a ton of grinding for a whole new team if you get some unlucky breeds with your main team members. In Youkai watch, it's just straight up replacements, so if a new team member isn't working out, you can just swap the old guy back in, no problems. Additionally, because higher ranked guys might be a bit better, lower ranked guys can still level just as high as anyone else, and since your main team will likely be higher level than most enemies you encounter, there's an incentive to keep lower ranked veterans in your team whom you like, even though they're lower rank. For example, I had a C-rank in my team all the way up to the end of the game, just because he was such high level and a very reliable damage-dealer. Additionally, there are some REALLY good items near the end of the game that can ONLY be equpped on D-rank or lower Youkai, so the game even give you a means of making somewhat squishier, beloved lower-rank Youkai a part of the team even into the late game :)

Verdict: Highly recommended. If you like Pokemon, I think you will like Youkai Watch. My general rule I've noticed with these reviews is that the bigger and impression a game has left on me, the more I wanna tell you about it, so this giant wall of text should probably give you some indication of that x3 . Granted, Sun and Moon did just come out, and if you're still playing that, I'd agree that there's not much reason to invite Youkai into your life atm. However, perhaps when you get bored with Sun/Moon, Youkai Watch would be an excellent way to fill that Poke-void, methinks :)

THIS GAME IS SO GOOD!! If you have a 3ds and like fun, charming, games, GET THIS IMMEDIATELY!!! Also if you like japanese folklore creatures and/or want to learn more about them this is perfect for you. The teambuilding is easy to learn but hard to master and picking out the best yo kai for the job and placing them on the wheel is engaging and fun. Battles are fast paced and require you to keep your team healthy, tell them what to target, and activate their special moves. There's a ton of side activities to complete alongside the main quest so you'll never be bored. Exploring Springdale to find yo-kai and complete quests is very engaging and you will quickly memorize the layout of the big city as you play. I do think that you should unlock the ability to warp a little earlier than you do, but it's not that bad. This game is excellent and probably my favorite 3ds game. A must play for any monster game enjoyer.

It’s been a while since I played a Yo-Kai Watch game but with my longing for a new entry and all the signs of the series making a comeback I thought I would replay the original. This series will forever be special to me so this review may be slightly biased but I can acknowledge Yo-Kai Watch left a lot to be desired in the initial game. First of all I did play this on the 3ds version because for one the remaster isn’t in English but more importantly I feel the 3ds is where the battle system shines the most but as a consequence I will be having very few compliments about the graphics. I want to start by talking about the story. Yo-Kai Watch story has never been a strong point but to make up for this it has never taken its plot seriously, however compared to future entries and other games this games story just felt super empty. It’s not too long and isn’t the worst thing ever but as an introduction to some characters it’s not very good especially when some backstory and plot points are redone in the sequels and are just straight up so much better there. This plot leaves a lot of things unexplained and honestly not too impressed with it especially since none of the characters really felt as alive as they do in future games. Moving on I want to talk about something I think Yo-Kai Watch is almost unrivaled in and that’s exploration and side content. It feels almost impossible to talk about the story by itself with how much is usually in these side missions and extra areas. The problem is the first installation in the series feels like a beta for this idea. While there is lots of rewards for exploring and some side missions that affect huge parts of the game it’s just isn’t as vast as future entries. There are quite a lot of quests for a monster collecting rpg don’t get me wrong but not enough to feel like I’m not delaying progression. I think the main factor holding the side quests in the game back is the fact that the characters are so dry. It’s hard to feel like Mr. Barton is more than a npc with a name in this game compared to future games. While the exploration in this game is definitely worthy of yo-Kai watch quality, it isn’t the same without the train system or disconnected locations. The battle system though is still very much fun. A system where you don’t need to worry about directly controlling your yo Kai but instead about trying to manage all parts of the fight so your team can do what they do best. While it’s super bear bones in this installment it’s still got the most important parts. I will say the befriending system is a little unfair in this version with little ways to increase befriending odds but it wasn’t too bad. Very few broken items in this game with most of them being locked behind end game shop purchases or passwords. The difficulty of the game isn’t too bad with how easy it is to get shogunyan and how available talismans are (a little harder than I remembered though). The only problem I think the battle system really has is all the creative battles are locked in post game. I love this battle system and am sad yo Kai watch 4 doesn’t have it. It’s very unique and no game I have played has made something similar to it. I think this is a solid game and was a base for future entries in the game. It suffers from being over shadowed by yo Kai watch 2 in every way but has the first piece to the story of the series so feels like it needs to be played first. This game gets a 7/10 for me because yo Kai watch 2 exists but in the genre of monster collecting RPGs I would say 7.5-8/10 but still just play yo Kai watch 2 or 3. Fun to have completed it again and please give yo Kai watch a chance, it didn’t deserve this fate.

I enjoyed my time with Yo-kai Watch for its presentation, the quirky monsters and its charm. The core gameplay and story feel veeeery underbaked though. I don't think that it gives you enough skill expression in combat and in turn, it feels more like a stat and ability check rather than actual combat. Bosses felt more like a chore than a challenge because they are untargetable until you destroy their weak spot. The story is basically non-existent until the final hours of gameplay, where the big bad appears out of nowhere. Up to that part, it's more like little self-contained short stories that have mostly nothing to do with each other. Hopefully, later entries improve on these aspects.

The original Yo-Kai Watch was a rather jarring game to come back to as my last in the western-released trilogy. Many mechanics were obviously absent, though I never expected Jibanyan would only become a main character in the second game, and most of all I noticed a massive difference in the game's structure. Instead of having chapters follow a connected storyline, Yo-Kai Watch 1 instead goes for a slice-of-life format similar to its corresponding anime.

While not nearly as long as its successors, therefore not putting its mark on me the same way the second installment did, I still found myself having a wonderful time with this game. It did exactly what it set out to do, and then it ended. I love that it doesn't just feel like a lesser version of its sequels, it simply feels like its own thing. It's still as cozy and charming as I had hoped, and set a sublime groundwork for the future of the series. Would highly recommend.