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I'm flabbergasted at how fundamentally broken this IP is and how Nintendo keeps trying to make it work without addressing the root problems.

It's all maidwork. The amount of little plant folk that you can have following you around seems impressive at first until you hit the unit cap before you know it and suddenly it seems like this oppressively limited amount. There can be red pills lying around every freakin where and thats when it becomes apparent that those are essentially health pickups and that the unit cap is essentially a health bar. The game ceases to seem unique or interesting at that point. It's about trading health to achieve tasks and then replenishing said health, and taking note of the locations of unneeded red pills so you know where to find them later, like it's a 90s PC FPS.

By tasks of course I mean gathering collectibles and killing enemies. (Very original!) How do you gather collectibles? Throw the plant folk at them until the gauge is filled. You're simply filling gauges in Pikmin. It's a gauge filling simulator. You defeat enemies the same way. It's not really clear how the plant folk actually attack the enemies since they have no teeth or claws or any visible means to damage enemies much larger than them, but you're not really paying attention to that. You're just looking at the gauge that appears onscreen to show how many plant folk to put in the cup to make the big bad go bye bye. Filling gauges. So quirky. Pure Nintendo. Brilliant.

And the sundown timer. That reminds me of when it was time for bed and my dad would count to 10 slowly before he would shut the console off, and that's how much time we had to reach a save point. That's literally what playing Pikmin is.

When night falls in game you know you're done playing Pikmin because instead of being able to start the next day immediately you have to read the main character monologue for like twenty minutes. ("Make 'em reeeead!!" -Miyamoto, probably) I think the final screen in the game occurrs when you have a choice between two levels to land into, which is a fantastic way of introducing that generation to the concept of choice paralysis. Either way you use up one of your remaining days of oxygen or whatever you have left to finish the game in. So BETTER NOT SQUANDER IT, IDIOT. Better make sure to play each day 100% optimally, not just stumble through. Definitely don't start this level or that one if you're just playing for fun. But it's not as if you're playing games for fun?? I mean who does that.

Maybe I'm just not well versed in how Pokémon releases work. I assumed this was a sequel to Moon. But upon playing it, I could not tell you what is different between this and regular Moon. Aside from the in game title card having Ultra in the name, there is nothing I could point to that would definitively prove that this is a new version, and which couldn't simply be explained by me misremembering whether it was in the original Moon or not. (Aside from maybe the Nintendo Switch in your trainer's house, which was obviously patched in- it's the only explanation seeing as the 3DS was discontinued in like 2011 and they obviously didn't know about the Switch back then) From my standpoint I've essentially purchased a second copy of Moon and arbitrarily began to play it as though it were a different game.

For the record I like Moon. I mean, it was alright. I liked it at least enough to beat it, and enough to end up taking a chance on Shield. But after playing Shield, I realized I have zero enthusiasm for Alola region or its characters anymore. Now that I've been to superior Galar there is no going back. Hau might as well be a napkin scribble of a character that would go on to become Hop. And so on. Furthermore the Lillie subplot is also incredibly bland. That said if you have never played og Sun/Moon then this might be perfectly fine for you. It's playable, which is a pretty high bar to clear, especially for a 3DS game, and especially for a game with random encounters.

People rate this game on vibes alone. I won't lie the vibes are strong with this one, but it's overall marred by the corniest and most cringely executed story in a racing game ever, nonsensical replay value structure, and the fact that, as a Ridge Racer title, this one is pretty mid. The game omits out the upgrade system of Rage Racer or really any freedom to choose what to do next, you're simply dragged from race to race w some dialogue scenes sprinkled in, until it's over. The game is extremely short so, as if to compensate for this, four story arcs are included, but you're taken on the exact same courses each time. You're essentially tricked into playing through the game four times. There's little sense of speed and the drifting also seems to be worse, feels.. stuttery somehow. Honestly it felt like the drifting became slightly worse with each PS1 installment, I didn't mind this in Rage Racer since I felt I was getting something in exchange, but not so with "R4."

Another thing I was hung up on was that the courses weren't connected, which to me was like, it defeats the point of calling it a Ridge Racer title! It's too much just like any other racing game at that point. Granted, this would go on to become the norm for Ridge Racer games (Ridge Racer V would be the last one to do it) but that feels like Namco retconning this game to seem less bad by making future games unremarkable.

I always felt as though there should one day be a remake of this game that addresses the issues, and a better story. But it's admittedly futile seeing as everyone likes this game already, and a game already exists called R Racing Evolution which I've only played briefly but is uncomfortably close to being a spiritual remake of R4, but with even more Ridge Racer elements removed, and still cringey. Any future effort is unlikely to fare better.