Hey! This sucks.
Alright, that's mean, but I couldn't resist. Unfortunately, it encapsulates my thoughts on this game. This is another game by Arzest, who I best know for bastardizing Yoshi's Island (as "Artoon", originally) and who most people best know for Balan Wonderworld. Insofar as I'm concerned, Arzest understands Pikmin about as well as they understand Yoshi.
Adapting Pikmin to a 2D platformer is an interesting idea. I'm not necessarily opposed to this, much as it reminded me of the ill-fated Chibi-Robo: Zip Lash, because there are a lot of interesting ways Pikmin's puzzle RTS mechanics could adapt into a platformer setting. I'm not fond of Olimar's Smash Bros. interpretation, but Brawl has the start of an idea with the Pikmin Chain - theoretically you can do things with that, Bomb Rock puzzles, elemental affinities, weight and flight, etc etc etc. problem is, Hey! Pikmin rarely goes for any of that. Most puzzles in the game are of the lock-and-key variety; bring X Pikmin [of Y type] here to solve the puzzle. This wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing - lock-and-key puzzles are your bread and butter in video games - except that the game has little interest in iterating upon its own mechanical challenges. By way of example, there are these optional challenge rooms throughout the game. I wasn't really challenged by the first few of these, but I figured the game would ramp up the difficulty once it established what it was going for. But in fact, I found the final challenge room exactly as difficult as the first one had been.
Pikmin is a series I love for its quiet touches and moments. Especially in the first game, everything is so understated: you aren't on a big, bombastic adventure, but rather a fight for survival on a hostile world. Later games step away from this, but there's always a sense of trying to hold onto little things in a bigger universe. The Piklopedia in 2, the team chatter in 3, and I haven't played 4 as of this writing.
Hey! Pikmin doesn't seem to understand this. It has the shape of these ideas with things like Olimar's monster/treasure notes, but it doesn't really get them. It doesn't get Olimar. There's the understanding that Olimar is a salaryman who does everything he can to support his family, but... like, he sounds whiny about it here. The game knows that Olimar should fundamentally misunderstand the Earth treasures he comes across, but then the game lets him understand what humans are (for goodness' sake, he comes across a snowglobe with Santa Claus, and he recognizes that that's what a person looks like. That feels like that breaks so many rules. To say nothing about Donkey Kong Land, specifically, being canon to this game).
Then there are the little skits with the Pikmin. Every so often, you'll be treated to a little scene of the Pikmin doing something cute in the level. I really don't like this. There's an increased emphasis on Pikmin domesticity throughout side material that rubs me the wrong way. They are a hunter-gatherer people who must be accustomed to the hardships of their way of life. I'm fine seeing them as a curious child-like people in the context of something like the Piklopedia treasures, where it's clear that the Pikmin are leveraging the free time they have under Olimar's leadership and exploring the elements of their world with their newly-afforded freetime. Not like how it's done here, when in the middle of every level, there are scenes - sometimes multiple per level - of the Pikmin tripping or pushing each other around or waving at each other or SOMEthing like that. Stuff clearly engineered to make the player go "awwwww lookit em". It's such a blatant, cloying attempt to turn the Pikmin into Minions that I just got annoyed seeing the little guys do their thing (this coming from someone who's generally tolerant of the Minions).
Two things I like to this game, or at least one I like and one I am at an understanding with. To start with the latter, I don't love any of the bosses, and in point of fact I rather hate how over-the-top dramatic the final boss is (they've been hinting at him the whole game!!!!! Guys this is the ultimate pimpkin fight!!!!!!!!!!!) - but I do think the first boss fight, against an ordinary Red Bulborb, is an interesting concession. There was no real way to communicate the feeling of fighting an enemy like a Bulborb in the normal gameplay of a 2D platformer, so as weird as it sounds, I'm okay with it as an early game boss. Makes for a decent enough chiasm with Emperor Bulblax being one of the late game bosses, too.
The one level I really like is "The Lonely Tower", which comes about halfway into the game. As a change of pace, Olimar starts the level completely alone. You don't get any Pikmin until a decent way through the level, after you've already had to do some platforming to scale the titular tower. It's the one time I feel like the game gets Pikmin's tone, and I honestly think that'd be fascinating design to explore in the context of a mainline Pikmin game. As essential as the Pikmin mechanics are to series identity, there's something to be said for the moods a player can experience by their absence.
If more of Hey! Pikmin had this level of thought, it'd have the potential to be an understated entry in such an understated series. As it is? Stay away unless you're a die-hard fan, and even then, don't expect much.
Alright, that's mean, but I couldn't resist. Unfortunately, it encapsulates my thoughts on this game. This is another game by Arzest, who I best know for bastardizing Yoshi's Island (as "Artoon", originally) and who most people best know for Balan Wonderworld. Insofar as I'm concerned, Arzest understands Pikmin about as well as they understand Yoshi.
Adapting Pikmin to a 2D platformer is an interesting idea. I'm not necessarily opposed to this, much as it reminded me of the ill-fated Chibi-Robo: Zip Lash, because there are a lot of interesting ways Pikmin's puzzle RTS mechanics could adapt into a platformer setting. I'm not fond of Olimar's Smash Bros. interpretation, but Brawl has the start of an idea with the Pikmin Chain - theoretically you can do things with that, Bomb Rock puzzles, elemental affinities, weight and flight, etc etc etc. problem is, Hey! Pikmin rarely goes for any of that. Most puzzles in the game are of the lock-and-key variety; bring X Pikmin [of Y type] here to solve the puzzle. This wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing - lock-and-key puzzles are your bread and butter in video games - except that the game has little interest in iterating upon its own mechanical challenges. By way of example, there are these optional challenge rooms throughout the game. I wasn't really challenged by the first few of these, but I figured the game would ramp up the difficulty once it established what it was going for. But in fact, I found the final challenge room exactly as difficult as the first one had been.
Pikmin is a series I love for its quiet touches and moments. Especially in the first game, everything is so understated: you aren't on a big, bombastic adventure, but rather a fight for survival on a hostile world. Later games step away from this, but there's always a sense of trying to hold onto little things in a bigger universe. The Piklopedia in 2, the team chatter in 3, and I haven't played 4 as of this writing.
Hey! Pikmin doesn't seem to understand this. It has the shape of these ideas with things like Olimar's monster/treasure notes, but it doesn't really get them. It doesn't get Olimar. There's the understanding that Olimar is a salaryman who does everything he can to support his family, but... like, he sounds whiny about it here. The game knows that Olimar should fundamentally misunderstand the Earth treasures he comes across, but then the game lets him understand what humans are (for goodness' sake, he comes across a snowglobe with Santa Claus, and he recognizes that that's what a person looks like. That feels like that breaks so many rules. To say nothing about Donkey Kong Land, specifically, being canon to this game).
Then there are the little skits with the Pikmin. Every so often, you'll be treated to a little scene of the Pikmin doing something cute in the level. I really don't like this. There's an increased emphasis on Pikmin domesticity throughout side material that rubs me the wrong way. They are a hunter-gatherer people who must be accustomed to the hardships of their way of life. I'm fine seeing them as a curious child-like people in the context of something like the Piklopedia treasures, where it's clear that the Pikmin are leveraging the free time they have under Olimar's leadership and exploring the elements of their world with their newly-afforded freetime. Not like how it's done here, when in the middle of every level, there are scenes - sometimes multiple per level - of the Pikmin tripping or pushing each other around or waving at each other or SOMEthing like that. Stuff clearly engineered to make the player go "awwwww lookit em". It's such a blatant, cloying attempt to turn the Pikmin into Minions that I just got annoyed seeing the little guys do their thing (this coming from someone who's generally tolerant of the Minions).
Two things I like to this game, or at least one I like and one I am at an understanding with. To start with the latter, I don't love any of the bosses, and in point of fact I rather hate how over-the-top dramatic the final boss is (they've been hinting at him the whole game!!!!! Guys this is the ultimate pimpkin fight!!!!!!!!!!!) - but I do think the first boss fight, against an ordinary Red Bulborb, is an interesting concession. There was no real way to communicate the feeling of fighting an enemy like a Bulborb in the normal gameplay of a 2D platformer, so as weird as it sounds, I'm okay with it as an early game boss. Makes for a decent enough chiasm with Emperor Bulblax being one of the late game bosses, too.
The one level I really like is "The Lonely Tower", which comes about halfway into the game. As a change of pace, Olimar starts the level completely alone. You don't get any Pikmin until a decent way through the level, after you've already had to do some platforming to scale the titular tower. It's the one time I feel like the game gets Pikmin's tone, and I honestly think that'd be fascinating design to explore in the context of a mainline Pikmin game. As essential as the Pikmin mechanics are to series identity, there's something to be said for the moods a player can experience by their absence.
If more of Hey! Pikmin had this level of thought, it'd have the potential to be an understated entry in such an understated series. As it is? Stay away unless you're a die-hard fan, and even then, don't expect much.