By all accounts, I should love this game, but it didn't quite do it for me. Pikmin is one of my favorites franchises of Nintendo's, and Pikmin 2 is easily one of my favorite games. So I should adore Pikmin 4, being the biggest, most AAA feeling Pikmin game to date, with much of it's design being borrowed from Pikmin 2. Don't get me wrong, I did enjoy Pikmin 4, but I struggled a bit to get through the whole thing.
So why is that? Well I think it comes down to what so many other people have said; the games too easy. This game so frequently just feels like you are going through the motions to the point where the game can feel a bit like a chore rather than a game. It's a lot of just getting to a particularly part of the map so your pikmin can carry back a Watermelon or whatever back to the ship.
The enemies just don't feel that threatening in this game in comparison to others in large part do to your dog companion Oatchie. See, all you have to do is level up Oatchie's charge ability to the max ASAP, spam it repeatedly, and just about every enemy's health bar will be disintegrated almost immediately. It is quite satisfying to do, and overall I do enjoy the addition of Oatchies, it just gets extremely repetitive by the end. I feel this game could've potentially benefited from a hard mode which just increased the health bar of every enemy to make this not quite as OP as it is.
That said, this game is just charming as every other Pikmin game, and it does have some of the best level design of the franchise. They really make use of the new camera angle and added mobility from Oatchie to make some large levels with lots of verticality, which is really great to see. I also LOVE the addition of being able to explore at night, as well as all the Dandori battles. I was never too challenged by these, but they do add a bit of challenge, and really help to break the monotony of the game. Adding these multiplayer/time challenge missions into the main campaign is a genius move. Do wish they had some difficult time challenge missions outside of the main game though like in Pikmin 3.
So why is that? Well I think it comes down to what so many other people have said; the games too easy. This game so frequently just feels like you are going through the motions to the point where the game can feel a bit like a chore rather than a game. It's a lot of just getting to a particularly part of the map so your pikmin can carry back a Watermelon or whatever back to the ship.
The enemies just don't feel that threatening in this game in comparison to others in large part do to your dog companion Oatchie. See, all you have to do is level up Oatchie's charge ability to the max ASAP, spam it repeatedly, and just about every enemy's health bar will be disintegrated almost immediately. It is quite satisfying to do, and overall I do enjoy the addition of Oatchies, it just gets extremely repetitive by the end. I feel this game could've potentially benefited from a hard mode which just increased the health bar of every enemy to make this not quite as OP as it is.
That said, this game is just charming as every other Pikmin game, and it does have some of the best level design of the franchise. They really make use of the new camera angle and added mobility from Oatchie to make some large levels with lots of verticality, which is really great to see. I also LOVE the addition of being able to explore at night, as well as all the Dandori battles. I was never too challenged by these, but they do add a bit of challenge, and really help to break the monotony of the game. Adding these multiplayer/time challenge missions into the main campaign is a genius move. Do wish they had some difficult time challenge missions outside of the main game though like in Pikmin 3.