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Thursday 6 March, 2008
Gameplay 2:
During the second day I played pokemon, I didn't have an opportunity to get sidetracked playing with my friends, and instead got to play through more of the game. Catching various pokemon was fairly easy, but choosing which ones to take with me everywhere I went was harder. With many options involving what type of pokemon to use, I found my favorites to be of the psychic type. I think it was well though out to allow the player to be able to progress through the game using whatever pokemon he or she pleases.
I enjoyed the amount of computer controlled trainers lurking around the world, and the high amount of experience and money defeating them granted. They make the game world feel much more alive ( although when I went back to old zones where I had already beaten trainers, and there were no more fights around, the zones felt very barren). I also found the frequent and numerous encounters with wild pokemon to not bother me, because my pokemon could just steamroll them and get experience, and they always leave the opportunity for capture open. There are no rules in pokemon red saying you can't use six pidgies!
Another part of pokemon that I enjoyed was being able to move around the game world very quickly. Before my pokemon were past level 24 I already had a bicycle, and the ability to teleport or escape rope back to the last pokemon center I visited. Beyond that, I also liked how interactive the game world felt for an rpg on a handheld game system. Having to cut down trees to advance into new zones, or use flash to light up a cave force players to obtain these techniques, but also add an incentive to track such skills down and ultimately make the new areas more exciting, as being granted access to new zones brings forth new pokemon and new enemies to defeat.
Design:
Compared to most slow paced, more serious rpgs, pokemon provides the player an opportunity to enter a comical world lending itself to bringing out the inner child in the player. For me, the fast pace alone was enough of a breath of fresh air to keep me playing this rpg, as opposed to others. Although the game is intended for children, with shorter attention spans than adults, I still found the game to be very rewarding for myself. I found battling lots of little creatures against one another for money, and to unlock new areas with many more and new pokemon enough reward to keep me interested.
However, I believe what set this game apart from other rpgs, and games in general, was the design placed in the pokemon themselves. Pokemon, by nature, I believe lend themselves to being adorable. Humans love keeping animals as pets, and pokemon just took a real world trend and turned it into a game. I found that raising virtual critters, and watching them change and evolve by your hand, ultimately becoming very powerful forces to reckoned with, to feel like a worthy accomplishment for a days work.
The only part of the game that I would change would be to make the game centered less around having to play with other people. Although a wise marketing scheme for Nintendo to strongly push players towards having access to two gameboys, two different versions of the same game, and link cable in order to be able to collect all the pokemon, I found this very frustrating at times (for example, I wanted a caterpie, and to evolve my kadabra, but I had to wait until my friend could play with me). Other than that, I found the game overall to be a very satisfying experience.
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