The Greatest Pokémon made to this day.
Pokemon Mystery dungeon manages to give me all the things I wanted into the series in 1 game but how?
The game starts of pretty intertesting you get this screen and mysterious voice that asks you questions about your intertest , choice of judgement and your personality. Result of it gives you a Pokémon starter that represents YOU. so no "damn the MC sucks" NO NIGGA IT'S YOU THAT SUCKS! (if you end up sucking.) but what this does is make the game much more personal compared to the mainline games.
The story while cheesy and really kind hearted early on the game story has some intertesting themes I'd never thought I'd see in a pokemon game. Such as finding meaning in life and should one strife for quanity in life or quality? As a kid the game story was just fun nothing special but playing it again as a adult made me truly realize how well crafted it's from good foreshadowing unfortunately sometimes too on the nose but most of the time really sneaky and masterful.
Now what also surpised of the game was the character cast. The game is about 2 you and your partner apart of a explorers guild so that were most of the cast stems from. While large being pokemon leading them to having really distinctive designs yet cohesive by their colors and roles at the guild. Most of them are decently to good characterized but some not so much. This wasn't particular a problem since they weren't setup to be but could've been done. Now the character that is my favourite in the franchise , made me love a favourite secondary evolution and strenghten my love for the game. To me he's ultimately the true protagonist of the game the way he carries the themes hardly and perfectly on his shoulder. The theme of meaning of life and companionship , humility and compassion are the main themes of the game and Grovyle carries all of those perfectly. He starts out as a mysterious outlaw ( criminal pokemon ) but when we learn his motive he learns he's actually the good. We learn that he is from the future trying to stop the current world from its demise but that would also end up leading to his own death since the time he came would be gone. Anyway that doesn't hurt his willpower , conviction and courage to save the world one bit. He learns the main duo the importance of trust in others and their comrades. Learns them how to be more sympathic and kinder person but ultimately learns them his philosophy on life. Now another character who felt really shallow in the main game but the True ending of the game recontextualized and made the usage of his character much better. Dusknoir is the parellel to Grovyle his character. Starts of as a helper but ends up betraying the duo? Why because he was working under Dialga. In the special episode (DLC) he reveals that he has the fear of dying. Not being there , not being alive was something he couldn't accept. During a convo in the episode Dusknoir asks grovyle how he could have such a strong resolve and conviction towards something that could lead to his own death. Here grovyle his philosophy on life comes to play. He believes Pokémon should strife for quality in life and not quanity. He believes if he truly makes a long lasting impact on the planet in the past. He will be remember in the future of the world. He knows that allot pokémon set foot on the planet yet few footprints remain in the world. By making a future possible where it isn't darkness and death but light and life. He believes he could truly die satisfied knowing he accomplished something he truly wanted and believed in. That makes me love him so much such great and cool character. Anyway throughout the episode Dusknoir and Grovyle turn into a duo and have to team up. While they are enemies of eachother they have no other choice "the enemy of my enemy is my friend." Basically we see Dusknoir grow as this pokemon desperately trying to stay alive thru any means possibile acting fully on his pride , selfish and heartless pokemon. ( funny because hes a ghost type lol ) anyway while his growth is rough and no where near static since we see him try and go back to his out habits. Ultimately he turns out to be a pokemon that can be selfless , display kindness and show humility. At the end of the episode where they die he asks grovyle if his existence had any meaning and grovyle tells him ofcourse and he passed away satisfyingly. a perfect end to his character arc.
Now onto music/gameplay/presentation
These 3 go from 10/10/8 for me. The music is easily the strongest in the series and used most effectively. The 2D pixel sprite art is fantastic to look at and made the game age really well. The gameplay is also a nice spin but sometimes too punishing which my only complaint with it. The gameplay starts out quite simple the dungeon designs aren't so complex and easy to go thru and the combat system seemed to be stale. but they develop so naturally where the rise in diffculty isn't too drastic. It's challenging decent amount of variety with items. IQ system leads to some cool custom strategies and the move/enemy variety also made the game not so stale for me the gameplay was really dungeon like so I was really immersed while playing.
While looking amazing the game presentation doesn't just stop there the usage of music at perfect times , sometimes drawing certain even more detailed and good cutscene direction.
I truly love this game as of date no Pokémon as topped this TIMELESS classic of a game to me. It's everything I wanted & expected from the series so I had a great experience with it. PLEASE PLAY THE GAME
Pokemon Mystery dungeon manages to give me all the things I wanted into the series in 1 game but how?
The game starts of pretty intertesting you get this screen and mysterious voice that asks you questions about your intertest , choice of judgement and your personality. Result of it gives you a Pokémon starter that represents YOU. so no "damn the MC sucks" NO NIGGA IT'S YOU THAT SUCKS! (if you end up sucking.) but what this does is make the game much more personal compared to the mainline games.
The story while cheesy and really kind hearted early on the game story has some intertesting themes I'd never thought I'd see in a pokemon game. Such as finding meaning in life and should one strife for quanity in life or quality? As a kid the game story was just fun nothing special but playing it again as a adult made me truly realize how well crafted it's from good foreshadowing unfortunately sometimes too on the nose but most of the time really sneaky and masterful.
Now what also surpised of the game was the character cast. The game is about 2 you and your partner apart of a explorers guild so that were most of the cast stems from. While large being pokemon leading them to having really distinctive designs yet cohesive by their colors and roles at the guild. Most of them are decently to good characterized but some not so much. This wasn't particular a problem since they weren't setup to be but could've been done. Now the character that is my favourite in the franchise , made me love a favourite secondary evolution and strenghten my love for the game. To me he's ultimately the true protagonist of the game the way he carries the themes hardly and perfectly on his shoulder. The theme of meaning of life and companionship , humility and compassion are the main themes of the game and Grovyle carries all of those perfectly. He starts out as a mysterious outlaw ( criminal pokemon ) but when we learn his motive he learns he's actually the good. We learn that he is from the future trying to stop the current world from its demise but that would also end up leading to his own death since the time he came would be gone. Anyway that doesn't hurt his willpower , conviction and courage to save the world one bit. He learns the main duo the importance of trust in others and their comrades. Learns them how to be more sympathic and kinder person but ultimately learns them his philosophy on life. Now another character who felt really shallow in the main game but the True ending of the game recontextualized and made the usage of his character much better. Dusknoir is the parellel to Grovyle his character. Starts of as a helper but ends up betraying the duo? Why because he was working under Dialga. In the special episode (DLC) he reveals that he has the fear of dying. Not being there , not being alive was something he couldn't accept. During a convo in the episode Dusknoir asks grovyle how he could have such a strong resolve and conviction towards something that could lead to his own death. Here grovyle his philosophy on life comes to play. He believes Pokémon should strife for quality in life and not quanity. He believes if he truly makes a long lasting impact on the planet in the past. He will be remember in the future of the world. He knows that allot pokémon set foot on the planet yet few footprints remain in the world. By making a future possible where it isn't darkness and death but light and life. He believes he could truly die satisfied knowing he accomplished something he truly wanted and believed in. That makes me love him so much such great and cool character. Anyway throughout the episode Dusknoir and Grovyle turn into a duo and have to team up. While they are enemies of eachother they have no other choice "the enemy of my enemy is my friend." Basically we see Dusknoir grow as this pokemon desperately trying to stay alive thru any means possibile acting fully on his pride , selfish and heartless pokemon. ( funny because hes a ghost type lol ) anyway while his growth is rough and no where near static since we see him try and go back to his out habits. Ultimately he turns out to be a pokemon that can be selfless , display kindness and show humility. At the end of the episode where they die he asks grovyle if his existence had any meaning and grovyle tells him ofcourse and he passed away satisfyingly. a perfect end to his character arc.
Now onto music/gameplay/presentation
These 3 go from 10/10/8 for me. The music is easily the strongest in the series and used most effectively. The 2D pixel sprite art is fantastic to look at and made the game age really well. The gameplay is also a nice spin but sometimes too punishing which my only complaint with it. The gameplay starts out quite simple the dungeon designs aren't so complex and easy to go thru and the combat system seemed to be stale. but they develop so naturally where the rise in diffculty isn't too drastic. It's challenging decent amount of variety with items. IQ system leads to some cool custom strategies and the move/enemy variety also made the game not so stale for me the gameplay was really dungeon like so I was really immersed while playing.
While looking amazing the game presentation doesn't just stop there the usage of music at perfect times , sometimes drawing certain even more detailed and good cutscene direction.
I truly love this game as of date no Pokémon as topped this TIMELESS classic of a game to me. It's everything I wanted & expected from the series so I had a great experience with it. PLEASE PLAY THE GAME