Pokémon: Arceus Review

Game Freak’s latest installment finally has Pokémon fans excited again. Will they continue in this bold new direction or is it back to polished up re-skins every few years?

I feel like I need to start this review with an admission. I have been an aspiring Pokémon master since I could hold a Gameboy. Started with Pokémon red surfing up and down Cinnabar for infinite rare candies and have played every iteration since(except rangers do they count?). So you can safely say I have been around the regions, from Kanto to Galor, from a modest 150 to over 800 Pokemon , so I do not say what I’m about to say lightly.

This is the game most fans have dreamed of since they were handed their first Dex by professor Oak and set off with their Pokémon. Not only can you bring your whole team out at once and chill in a hot spa or get a team photo. You see Pokémon in their natural habitat rather than playing “grass roulette” and you get to choose your approach.

You want to sneak through the tall grass, distract your target with a berry before sneaking up on it and hitting it in the back with a heavy ball like you’re the Hisuian Sam Fisher. Maybe you want to run (or fly or surf) in on the back of a huge mon, all guns blazing and have a good old-fashioned turn-based battle? The choice is yours.

 The change in mechanics was exactly what the combat system needed, adding something as simple as “move mastery” allowing to you switch between strong and agile attacks adds a whole new layer to the tried and tested formula.

However, it’s not all Skiddos and rainbows. Being Game Freak’s first real throw of the dice at this level of open-world game (sword and shield was practice) you may be feeling generous and give it a pass but it needs a mention. The environmental graphics are bad. Like Mario 64 bad.

In some cases when you are inside a cave your character and Pokémon has whole sharp white outlines, giving off a real Casper the friendly ghost vibe. Not to mention as much as, for the most part, Pokémon are placed well and really fit their habitats, the world outside Jubilife Village is BARREN.

Barely any points of interest, sure you have a shipwreck here, a small frosty cave there, a tent every 1000 square miles but there is really no excuse for a map as vast as it is to have so little life in it aside from the Pokémon.

Side quests and filling the dex keep you moving through it but you can’t help but feel a little more effort would have went a long way here. Especially jumping on this right after Breath of the Wild, it is literally night and day from a graphics standpoint.

Having such glaring and widely criticized errors yet still amassing 6.5 million players by the end of its second week should tell a story though. If that doesn’t, my 35 hours logged before even polishing off the main story should . The new mechanics along with tweaks to how the pokedex works can have you running around one section for hours as the fun factor just doesn’t seem to wear off.

You want to level up that dex entry, to get a better survey report, to get more money, to get more ingredients, to craft poke balls, to catch more Pokémon to keep leveling up your rank and dex. This circle just goes and goes and before you know it you have spent two hours catching 60 Buizel trying to find a tall one for some guy at back at the village!

Now like any Pokémon game the story isn’t The Last of Us, nor does every decision you make change the world like Mass Effect but you do see some subtle changes. Quests completed in the village will see you leave people with Pokémon who will evolve and grow as the game on making the village feel alive at least. It’s not Shakespeare but the story does a good enough job of making the time travel work while giving the story some real history by showing people’s first encounters with Pokémon.

Now, good guys and bad guys all look ridiculous ( I still don’t know what was on the new professor’s head) but that’s what we love. The music is also excellent really adding to the sense of wonder when you’re seeing the Pokémon in their natural habitat and picking up or giving you helpful sound queues when an alpha spots you or a Paras is about to go John Wick on your unsuspecting ass.

Long story short, it’s been a long time since a game that looked so rough around the edges has kept me wanting more and more. Lifelong fan or not that means something. Even complete newcomers may see the move away from Gameboy era combat to a more modern feel as a reason to pick it up for the first time and if you do, good luck putting it down.

Time will tell if Game Freak continues down this road but if they learn the lessons from this and take the positives into say a Pokémon: Legends Mewtwo, the possibilities are endless.

VERDICT: would recommend