Pikmin 4 has that nice feeling of a series that has been dormant for some time, and then comes back with a slew of new additions and reinventions that makes it feel like it was never away to begin with. Quite a nice feeling really.
Obviously the caveat of this being that niche series + dormant + drastic gameplay changes/additions = tutorializing everything and bringing down the game's pace to a crawl. If anything whenever a massive amount of explanation is thrown at the player, it tends to overwhelm and makes them feel under prepared. Tutorials are at their best when they aren't being presented as one.
Once the game gets going, it REALLY gets going. If there's one benefit that the tutorials bring to the table, it's hammering down to the player the concept and execution of dandori. Once a player understands dandori, every other gameplay mechanic falls into place so naturally. One of the biggest additions is with your pet dog(?) Oatchi, which essentially works as your co-captain for the adventure. A ludicrously powerful, destructive co-captain. With Oatchi, the possibilities of dandori open up tremendously, and its up to the player's own observation and discretion to figure how to efficiently tackle each task. You can split yourself up and cover more tasks, or maybe you should focus on teaming up and focusing in on tasks together. Totally up to you.
And if that wasn't enough we also get to finally see what was so scary about these "nocturnal creatures" that we've been hearing about. In night expeditions, the dynamic changes to a more tower defense style of gameplay. It's quite simple, but the addition of glow pikmin does help stand out more, and it works as a nice change of pace.
Caves are also back, which was the worst news to hear since September 29, 2008. Thankfully, their implementation was very tasteful, since each one is individually hand-crafted. Which means that they offer bite-sized levels that can challenge players in a controlled environment. Like, imagine if these levels were randomly generated. It'd almost defeat the whole purpose of them!
tl;dr This game is Pikmin 2 but good
Obviously the caveat of this being that niche series + dormant + drastic gameplay changes/additions = tutorializing everything and bringing down the game's pace to a crawl. If anything whenever a massive amount of explanation is thrown at the player, it tends to overwhelm and makes them feel under prepared. Tutorials are at their best when they aren't being presented as one.
Once the game gets going, it REALLY gets going. If there's one benefit that the tutorials bring to the table, it's hammering down to the player the concept and execution of dandori. Once a player understands dandori, every other gameplay mechanic falls into place so naturally. One of the biggest additions is with your pet dog(?) Oatchi, which essentially works as your co-captain for the adventure. A ludicrously powerful, destructive co-captain. With Oatchi, the possibilities of dandori open up tremendously, and its up to the player's own observation and discretion to figure how to efficiently tackle each task. You can split yourself up and cover more tasks, or maybe you should focus on teaming up and focusing in on tasks together. Totally up to you.
And if that wasn't enough we also get to finally see what was so scary about these "nocturnal creatures" that we've been hearing about. In night expeditions, the dynamic changes to a more tower defense style of gameplay. It's quite simple, but the addition of glow pikmin does help stand out more, and it works as a nice change of pace.
Caves are also back, which was the worst news to hear since September 29, 2008. Thankfully, their implementation was very tasteful, since each one is individually hand-crafted. Which means that they offer bite-sized levels that can challenge players in a controlled environment. Like, imagine if these levels were randomly generated. It'd almost defeat the whole purpose of them!
tl;dr This game is Pikmin 2 but good