SEGA's response to the Zelda series. It's quite charming in its own ways, and while the gameplay has it's similarities to A Link to the Past, it expands on it in ways that differentiates itself greatly from the SNES' masterpiece. Thank you Nintendo for putting it on Switch's Genesis online!!

The gameplay never got dull, with a much higher difficulty curve (imo) than A Link to the Past thanks to the enemies being on the more aggressive and elusive side. The puzzles had me genuinely stumped, although some solutions were a lot more tedious than others (single tiles to jump on, mashing A/jump at every corner) and required you to dissect an NPC's dialogue to the highest degree. Though the more simple puzzles were a treat - thanks to the game's engine upping the typical rate these kind of games would play at. A faster run speed (and upgrades!) coupled with a jump really helps put more inputs, decisions, and optimizations that help you speed up the gameplay to a degree other top-down games wish they could. I felt really engaged the whole time while controlling my character, compared to Link starting his boot/sword dash every time he entered a new loading zone whenever he wanted to be a bit speedy.
The dungeons were ok. It felt like the whole world itself was more of a dungeon, since the overworld is pretty well designed and heavily connected. There were puzzles at every step of the game, with combat being usually solved by the animal buddies you pick up (which were this game's equivalent to Zelda equipment). The combat itself was smooth, with the sword having decent range and cooldown, and a really cool charge attack similar to Mega Man X's charge buster... but for every direction. Had a lot of cool puzzle applications as well! The bosses could usually be cheesed, but that didn't make them a pain to avoid whenever they started to move. Overall had fun with the gameplay aspect.

Presentation was phenomenal. The sprite work was crisp and detailed, showing the full power of the Genesis near it's end, while having really cool sprite rotations to wow the player. I could make out everything the game was trying to describe to me, and the colors popped. It suited the game's aesthetic with the light-hearted adventure that was starting. And the music? Incredible jams all over the place. While it has an OST of under 20 tracks, many of them were so catchy and fitting to the game's atmosphere. I definitely copped around 10 or so of the songs haha. When I first booted up the game, I found myself chilling at the save select screen for a solid 10 minutes, jamming to that 20ish second loop. So raw

Story was interesting. It's pretty standard at the start, then near the end of it it starts to unravel what the theme of the game was. It somewhat makes you question why you're doing any of it and if what you're doing is really the right thing to do. I hear the English translation that I played (NSO) is a bit wonky, but I think I got the message. It's an interesting thought to leave the players with, but in the end it only goes as far as to give you that thought and that's it. Imo I don't really feel the impact as much as I would like to. Good idea tho

cool game glad I played it

I have been in love with the Pikmin series since day one, being absolutely glued to the screen trying to help Olimar find all his ship pieces, which turned into finding treasure pieces for the Boss, and eventually into various fruits for a dying Koppai planet. I was pretty satisfied with the Pikmin series ending at 3, but I know the online community was especially loud about wanting a 4th one, and to be honest, I was a little curious where they would go with the series after 3, so hey, why not check it out?

I went in fully knowing that this era of Nintendo is no longer what I loved growing up with, but I still wanted to go in with an open mind, and hopefully be happy to find it keeping to its core. But after finishing the game, I couldn’t help but feel unsatisfied and just very… odd about the whole experience. Pikmin 4 isn’t bad, especially compared to other games on the Switch, Pikmin 4 is actually quite good in comparison! But after thinking about it for a little bit, I think I can sum up why I wasn’t quite as happy with Pikmin 4 as I was in the past Pikmin games.

Assistance

Pikmin 4 is too kind to you, so kind in fact, that it takes away the original enjoyment I had with the game. Pikmin 1 & 2, and Pikmin 3 on the Wii U all are games that create an environment with a mission that you need to complete, sounds easy enough, right? Well, no. The whole point of Pikmin is to complete your goal with literally EVERYTHING in the world out against you. It’s you, this tiny little man not even the height of a GameCube disc, and your funny little fellas, out against literally EVERYTHING. Pikmin started as a series called Adam & Eve where you had to control an eventual 100-person tribe of people with their own freewill and get them to complete tasks for you. You were essentially supposed to play God, with your little people as your followers.

I see SO many people complain about how it seems like the pikmin in Pikmin 1 are completely braindead or go against your wishes in order to jump into the water, fall off bridges/ledges, or run right into fire walls, and I can not stress this enough; That. Is. The. Goddamn. POINT. The Pikmin are supposed to be annoying, they’re supposed to go against your wishes, because to put it bluntly, Olimar is finding these creatures and making them into his blooming slaves. They follow Olimar because of the light on his helmet, but in the end, they still have their own wants and desires, and THAT is what makes Pikmin an incredibly amazing and insanely unique game never before seen. It’s a game where you have to fight against nature WITH nature in order to complete your goal.

What Pikmin 4 does that ended up taking the enjoyment away from me was that instead of making it a game of nature fighting AGAINST you, it’s now a game of puzzles that helps GIVE you that push towards completing your goal. Gone is that challenge. Gone is that struggle. Instead, you can rest easy in knowing the game will help you in any way it possibly can. The base is too far, making carrying items back difficult from environmental aspects (water, walls, unbuilt bridges, etc) or there being too many enemies no longer an issue, you can just move the base now. The fear of losing your Pikmin and being low on a certain type is gone, as Oatchi, as undeniably cute as he is, can be trained to withstand any elemental obstacle (minus poison), and can be trained to be as strong as 100 Pikmin to boot! He is a built-in, mandatory handicap to the entire game’s mechanic.

There are other things to critique and there are lots of things to admire, but this review is already long enough, and it’s really not that important. Overall, I would say Pikmin 4 is a good game in the sense that it does what it set out to do, and also seems to have fixed certain aspects that made the game more playable for a wider ranged audience, which I can’t have any serious vendetta against. It’s no longer the game series that I originally fell in love with, but that doesn’t mean I’m upset at people who could never get into the old games and find joy in Pikmin 4, in fact, I feel the exact opposite. I’m very happy to see so many people so passionate and happy about it in a way I felt about the original game, and ultimately, that’s what is most important to me.

P.S. If I was Olimar, I would just kill Louie at this point.