A video game. An honest-to-god video game!
That was my initial reaction after a mere hour of playing Pokémon Legends: Arceus. I cannot express to you what a refreshing surprise this game was, especially coming off the heels of having played the latest phoned-in generation. What's this, a Pokémon game with an open environment that actually has things to do in it? A game that gives your character agency in the world? Fucking SIDE QUESTS?! My expectations were undoubtedly low but my enjoyment of this game had nothing to do with that; it's a genuinely GOOD video game, something I had long given up hope for in this series.
PLA does a lot of great things but they're all (mostly) the result of the domino effect induced by its setup. This game serves as a prequel, of sorts, to Pokémon Diamond and Pearl, where you're a time-displaced trainer sent back to a era where Pokémon training isn't even a thing yet. Honestly, I could have easily done without the faux-isekai framing device, but I can't deny how much I absolutely adored the feudal-Japan inspired setting. It finally allowed for an exploration of the Pokémon world where everything isn't just candy and rainbows with these things. These are feral, dangerous creatures, and the game continually makes you aware of that. I've never seen the words "die" and "kill" used so many times in a Pokémon story, and Legends: Arceus doesn't shy away from the reality of the time period its based on. You really are exploring a new frontier here, and in so doing allowed for the freshest interpretation of Pokémon in 20 years.
The world of Pokémon Legends: Arceus is one that feels like it lives up to the fantasy these games try to pander to. It's a living, breathing world full of exploration and opportunity. Seeing the little village of Jublife grow as the game progressed was a genuine joy. Having each zone actually possess varied and interesting geography made wanting to seek out every little corner a meaningful affair. I wish varying species of Pokémon interacted with each other more, but how they interact with YOU is what ultimately sells the immersive experience this game offers. They'll run, or hide, or attack you, or just stare at you dumbfoundedly, depending on the species. It's all simple in its variety but incredibly fresh in its execution. And that all bleeds into the gameplay loop, which is where I found the most enjoyment.
All Pokémon games, really after the first generation, became less about catching all these little critters, and more about simply battling them with others. PLA flips the script, instead making the catching and documentation of them the real meat of the experience. Not since Gen 1 did I feel motivated in this pursuit, and while there are battles here, they're kept to a minimum, and the real focus becomes on completing your Pokedex. This is done in a variety of ways, such as catching Pokémon, defeating them a certain number of times, witnessing them using specific moves, fighting alpha variants, etc. Given this is a world where people are still afraid of Pokémon and lack understanding of them, it perfectly ties into the setting and forms a charming basis for your adventure. I felt extra strongly about this after playing Pokémon Violet, where it really hit me how trivial and inconsequential catching Pokémon had become. Legends: Arceus finally gives meaning and purpose to that side of the franchise again.
You can really tell how much they thought about how the setting influenced everything else around it too. It wasn't just something slapped on to differentiate the game, like the school setting in Scarlet and Violet. For example, it wouldn't make sense for random items to be strew about in these lands where people have barely settled, so instead it offers up a crafting system where the items to gather are natural and you construct your Poke Balls and medicines out of them. It's really simple but it's another way to make you feel immersed in this game's world, not to mention actively giving you other things to seek out beside just Pokémon. Hell even the presentation goes the extra mile, with bold Japanese calligraphy highlighting text and UI elements, and a healthy dose of classical Japanese instruments and sound effects to help remix beloved Diamond and Pearl music. As someone really into that sort of thing, it goes a long way.
Legends: Arceus also features a revamped battle system, another element of the game that seeks to add a new perspective. Instead of a simple turn-based system, an action order is introduced alongside it to help move things along, complete with strong and agile versions of existing moves to influence it. The end result are battles that don't feel hindered by the same sluggish systems the mainline games have traditionally used, and the simplification of a lot of moves and effects also contribute to that. Normal stat calculations have also seemingly been thrown out the window, so matchups between Pokémon can still be intense and hard-hitting even with a vast difference in level. It never broaches the level of what I'd call "difficult" but I certainly did have Pokémon fainting a lot more than usual, so there's that.
I also can't tell you how much just adding simple side quests benefits a game like this. Even for the older generation Pokémon games, I always felt this aspect was something missing from the series, and I'm so glad to finally find one that leans into its JRPG origins. Not only does it offer more content to engage with, but allows the characters of this world to shine in their personalities, which they absolutely do. This has one of the best cast of characters any Pokémon game has ever had, and it was cute to see the little twists and nods they gave to them (many of them referencing future characters from the Diamond and Pearl games). Charm has seriously been lacking from the past couple of generations but I suppose it all went here instead.
Honestly, I'm just baffled. It's hard to believe Game Freak made something like this. Not from a technical perspective, of course; while I do like how a lot of this game looks, it's still rather simple overall, and some of the pop-in and draw distance problems can become genuinely annoying at times. But this game has vision! It has ideas! It has ambition! It has EFFORT! These are all things recent Pokémon games have lacked, but if they can make a game like this, it's obvious those traits exist within the people who make them. It's even more of a head-scratcher here, as Pokémon Legends: Arceus was made concurrently with the 9th generation Scarlet and Violet games, and yet this one answers every criticism I had following my playthrough of Violet! Did the two teams working on these titles never talk to each other? No one develops games like that anymore, and it shows why here.
Either way, this game rocks, and even someone as thoroughly jaded with this franchise as I am came around to it after initially discounting it when it first released. Pokémon Legends: Arceus feels like an extremely well-made GameCube game, and I say that with the highest respect. In fact, it feels like the kind of game Nintendo would have refused to localize 20 years ago. You almost don't feel like it's real when you're playing it. Whatever minor nitpicks I might have about my time with it (like the laborious inventory management), they ultimately don't amount to much. I can safely say I enjoyed this game and don't need to put some kind of caveat on that. Pokémon Legends: Arceus is proof that this series might still have some magic left in it after all.
That was my initial reaction after a mere hour of playing Pokémon Legends: Arceus. I cannot express to you what a refreshing surprise this game was, especially coming off the heels of having played the latest phoned-in generation. What's this, a Pokémon game with an open environment that actually has things to do in it? A game that gives your character agency in the world? Fucking SIDE QUESTS?! My expectations were undoubtedly low but my enjoyment of this game had nothing to do with that; it's a genuinely GOOD video game, something I had long given up hope for in this series.
PLA does a lot of great things but they're all (mostly) the result of the domino effect induced by its setup. This game serves as a prequel, of sorts, to Pokémon Diamond and Pearl, where you're a time-displaced trainer sent back to a era where Pokémon training isn't even a thing yet. Honestly, I could have easily done without the faux-isekai framing device, but I can't deny how much I absolutely adored the feudal-Japan inspired setting. It finally allowed for an exploration of the Pokémon world where everything isn't just candy and rainbows with these things. These are feral, dangerous creatures, and the game continually makes you aware of that. I've never seen the words "die" and "kill" used so many times in a Pokémon story, and Legends: Arceus doesn't shy away from the reality of the time period its based on. You really are exploring a new frontier here, and in so doing allowed for the freshest interpretation of Pokémon in 20 years.
The world of Pokémon Legends: Arceus is one that feels like it lives up to the fantasy these games try to pander to. It's a living, breathing world full of exploration and opportunity. Seeing the little village of Jublife grow as the game progressed was a genuine joy. Having each zone actually possess varied and interesting geography made wanting to seek out every little corner a meaningful affair. I wish varying species of Pokémon interacted with each other more, but how they interact with YOU is what ultimately sells the immersive experience this game offers. They'll run, or hide, or attack you, or just stare at you dumbfoundedly, depending on the species. It's all simple in its variety but incredibly fresh in its execution. And that all bleeds into the gameplay loop, which is where I found the most enjoyment.
All Pokémon games, really after the first generation, became less about catching all these little critters, and more about simply battling them with others. PLA flips the script, instead making the catching and documentation of them the real meat of the experience. Not since Gen 1 did I feel motivated in this pursuit, and while there are battles here, they're kept to a minimum, and the real focus becomes on completing your Pokedex. This is done in a variety of ways, such as catching Pokémon, defeating them a certain number of times, witnessing them using specific moves, fighting alpha variants, etc. Given this is a world where people are still afraid of Pokémon and lack understanding of them, it perfectly ties into the setting and forms a charming basis for your adventure. I felt extra strongly about this after playing Pokémon Violet, where it really hit me how trivial and inconsequential catching Pokémon had become. Legends: Arceus finally gives meaning and purpose to that side of the franchise again.
You can really tell how much they thought about how the setting influenced everything else around it too. It wasn't just something slapped on to differentiate the game, like the school setting in Scarlet and Violet. For example, it wouldn't make sense for random items to be strew about in these lands where people have barely settled, so instead it offers up a crafting system where the items to gather are natural and you construct your Poke Balls and medicines out of them. It's really simple but it's another way to make you feel immersed in this game's world, not to mention actively giving you other things to seek out beside just Pokémon. Hell even the presentation goes the extra mile, with bold Japanese calligraphy highlighting text and UI elements, and a healthy dose of classical Japanese instruments and sound effects to help remix beloved Diamond and Pearl music. As someone really into that sort of thing, it goes a long way.
Legends: Arceus also features a revamped battle system, another element of the game that seeks to add a new perspective. Instead of a simple turn-based system, an action order is introduced alongside it to help move things along, complete with strong and agile versions of existing moves to influence it. The end result are battles that don't feel hindered by the same sluggish systems the mainline games have traditionally used, and the simplification of a lot of moves and effects also contribute to that. Normal stat calculations have also seemingly been thrown out the window, so matchups between Pokémon can still be intense and hard-hitting even with a vast difference in level. It never broaches the level of what I'd call "difficult" but I certainly did have Pokémon fainting a lot more than usual, so there's that.
I also can't tell you how much just adding simple side quests benefits a game like this. Even for the older generation Pokémon games, I always felt this aspect was something missing from the series, and I'm so glad to finally find one that leans into its JRPG origins. Not only does it offer more content to engage with, but allows the characters of this world to shine in their personalities, which they absolutely do. This has one of the best cast of characters any Pokémon game has ever had, and it was cute to see the little twists and nods they gave to them (many of them referencing future characters from the Diamond and Pearl games). Charm has seriously been lacking from the past couple of generations but I suppose it all went here instead.
Honestly, I'm just baffled. It's hard to believe Game Freak made something like this. Not from a technical perspective, of course; while I do like how a lot of this game looks, it's still rather simple overall, and some of the pop-in and draw distance problems can become genuinely annoying at times. But this game has vision! It has ideas! It has ambition! It has EFFORT! These are all things recent Pokémon games have lacked, but if they can make a game like this, it's obvious those traits exist within the people who make them. It's even more of a head-scratcher here, as Pokémon Legends: Arceus was made concurrently with the 9th generation Scarlet and Violet games, and yet this one answers every criticism I had following my playthrough of Violet! Did the two teams working on these titles never talk to each other? No one develops games like that anymore, and it shows why here.
Either way, this game rocks, and even someone as thoroughly jaded with this franchise as I am came around to it after initially discounting it when it first released. Pokémon Legends: Arceus feels like an extremely well-made GameCube game, and I say that with the highest respect. In fact, it feels like the kind of game Nintendo would have refused to localize 20 years ago. You almost don't feel like it's real when you're playing it. Whatever minor nitpicks I might have about my time with it (like the laborious inventory management), they ultimately don't amount to much. I can safely say I enjoyed this game and don't need to put some kind of caveat on that. Pokémon Legends: Arceus is proof that this series might still have some magic left in it after all.
Reviewed on Dec 19, 2022