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If this is a sign of things in store for Pokemon in 3D, count me out.
March 23, 2004 | 10:00 PM PSTby: Seth Walker
Whether you like Pokémon or not, one of Nintendo’s biggest franchise is back again. Though it has had its number of ups and down during its life, its very apparent that the once fad is truly a franchise with the recent release of Pokémon Fire Red and Leaf Green in Japan that has already sold way over a million. And now with the recent release of Pokémon Colosseum, Pikachu and his friends are back, but this time in full fledged 3D on the Nintendo GameCube.
Features:
Story Mode – 30 Hour RPG (sort of)
Battle Mode – Up to 4 Players
Connectivity with Pokémon: Ruby & Sapphire
Connectivity with Pokémon: Fire Red & Leaf Green
Shadow Pokémon
Snagging
During the N64 days, Nintendo first showed off connectivity with Pokémon Stadium and Pokémon Game Boy games. The idea was to have gamers transfer their Pokémon from the Game Boy games onto the Pokémon Stadium to battle it out in 3D with players in a more impressive arena than what there were use to. While Pokémon Stadium didn’t truly do anything for the series, it was apparent that as of then, Nintendo wanted Pokémon to be handheld only. Yet with the recent release of Pokémon Colosseum, Nintendo has finally given Pokémon fans the treat of finally for the first time ever to play a real Pokémon RPG in full fledged 3D. Not only in the RPG included in Colosseum, but Nintendo has also included an updated version of Stadium simply dubbed Battle Mode.
In Pokémon Colosseum, players assume the role of a once evil trainer who literally destroys an entire unknown structure at the beginning of the game, which sets the pace for the entire adventure to come. And since the main character of the game is already an established Pokémon trainer the game already assumes you know what you are doing as you start out on your adventure with two level 25 Pokémon. Like all Pokémon games, the essential part of the game is to build the best Pokémon team. This requires a lot of strategy as there are many different types of Pokémon. These include Fire, Ground, Psychic, Grass, Electric, and many more, seventeen different types in all.
The Story Mode follows the same exact gameplay in the already established Pokémon series, but introduces Shadow Pokémon and the Snag feature. Shadow Pokémon as the game describes are “Pokémon with the doors to the heart artificially closed.” Players will use the Snag feature on these Shadow Pokémon to steal them from trainers in the game to purify the Pokémon and to become apart of your team. The storyline and the foundation of Colosseum revolves around these Shadow Pokémon and the ability to Snag. Not every trainer you encounter with will have Shadow Pokémon, but you should keep your eye out for them as you might only get one chance to ever catch these Pokémon. And with the ability to connect with Ruby & Sapphire and Fire Red & Leaf Green, it is in your best interest to Snag all the Shadow Pokémon, or you might be hard pressed to find some friends to trade with. Everyone wants their Pokedex 100% complete right?
When a Shadow Pokémon is caught, players will want to unlock the door to its heart to convert it to a normal Pokémon. To do this you must have it participate in a slew of battles. While at first the Shadow Pokémon are almost useless with only one special move called Shadow Rush, they will become a big part of your Pokémon team with some devastating moves.
However with these new features, Pokémon Colosseum falls quite short of the handheld adventures of Pokémon. Nintendo has reassured many of times the RPG is around 30 hours. While it may actually take somewhere around that time to complete, if you literally take out all of the dazzling special effects that become so annoying in the end, the actual RPG is very, very short and linear. It got very old watching all of the special effects from the Pokémon moves. The worst part is when a Sandshrew performed his Sand Attack. Before each turn a blast of sand would affect each Pokémon. Needless to say, that got very old very fast. Throughout the entire game I kept trying to find in the Options Menu on how to take out all of the special effects, yet sadly the best feature in the handheld adventures isn’t included in the console version.
The Story Mode does feature puzzle elements of some sort, they are however extremely basic. The item, which the players require to complete the puzzle, is literally already on the screen they are on. Though sometimes the item can be found by defeating a more powerful trainer. I truly was very disappointed by the Story Mode on Colosseum. Nintendo went with a more “mature” theme on the console rendition of Pokémon and made it the worst Pokémon RPG to date. I am not saying the “mature” theme was what made the RPG bad, the storyline was somewhat interesting, but the very simplicity of this game was absolutely uncalled for. Pokémon has been called “kiddyish” many of times, and I will be the first in line to say that Pokémon is a deep and involving RPG to play and far from the “kiddyish” perception it has surrounding it. Though I will be the first to stay that Pokémon Colosseum was truly designed for kids, because all you do is walk from Point A to Point B throughout the entire game. The “exploration” of Pokémon is gone, and I hope it comes back in future renditions of Pokémon.
Features:
During the N64 days, Nintendo first showed off connectivity with Pokémon Stadium and Pokémon Game Boy games. The idea was to have gamers transfer their Pokémon from the Game Boy games onto the Pokémon Stadium to battle it out in 3D with players in a more impressive arena than what there were use to. While Pokémon Stadium didn’t truly do anything for the series, it was apparent that as of then, Nintendo wanted Pokémon to be handheld only. Yet with the recent release of Pokémon Colosseum, Nintendo has finally given Pokémon fans the treat of finally for the first time ever to play a real Pokémon RPG in full fledged 3D. Not only in the RPG included in Colosseum, but Nintendo has also included an updated version of Stadium simply dubbed Battle Mode.
In Pokémon Colosseum, players assume the role of a once evil trainer who literally destroys an entire unknown structure at the beginning of the game, which sets the pace for the entire adventure to come. And since the main character of the game is already an established Pokémon trainer the game already assumes you know what you are doing as you start out on your adventure with two level 25 Pokémon. Like all Pokémon games, the essential part of the game is to build the best Pokémon team. This requires a lot of strategy as there are many different types of Pokémon. These include Fire, Ground, Psychic, Grass, Electric, and many more, seventeen different types in all.
The Story Mode follows the same exact gameplay in the already established Pokémon series, but introduces Shadow Pokémon and the Snag feature. Shadow Pokémon as the game describes are “Pokémon with the doors to the heart artificially closed.” Players will use the Snag feature on these Shadow Pokémon to steal them from trainers in the game to purify the Pokémon and to become apart of your team. The storyline and the foundation of Colosseum revolves around these Shadow Pokémon and the ability to Snag. Not every trainer you encounter with will have Shadow Pokémon, but you should keep your eye out for them as you might only get one chance to ever catch these Pokémon. And with the ability to connect with Ruby & Sapphire and Fire Red & Leaf Green, it is in your best interest to Snag all the Shadow Pokémon, or you might be hard pressed to find some friends to trade with. Everyone wants their Pokedex 100% complete right?
When a Shadow Pokémon is caught, players will want to unlock the door to its heart to convert it to a normal Pokémon. To do this you must have it participate in a slew of battles. While at first the Shadow Pokémon are almost useless with only one special move called Shadow Rush, they will become a big part of your Pokémon team with some devastating moves.
However with these new features, Pokémon Colosseum falls quite short of the handheld adventures of Pokémon. Nintendo has reassured many of times the RPG is around 30 hours. While it may actually take somewhere around that time to complete, if you literally take out all of the dazzling special effects that become so annoying in the end, the actual RPG is very, very short and linear. It got very old watching all of the special effects from the Pokémon moves. The worst part is when a Sandshrew performed his Sand Attack. Before each turn a blast of sand would affect each Pokémon. Needless to say, that got very old very fast. Throughout the entire game I kept trying to find in the Options Menu on how to take out all of the special effects, yet sadly the best feature in the handheld adventures isn’t included in the console version.
The Story Mode does feature puzzle elements of some sort, they are however extremely basic. The item, which the players require to complete the puzzle, is literally already on the screen they are on. Though sometimes the item can be found by defeating a more powerful trainer. I truly was very disappointed by the Story Mode on Colosseum. Nintendo went with a more “mature” theme on the console rendition of Pokémon and made it the worst Pokémon RPG to date. I am not saying the “mature” theme was what made the RPG bad, the storyline was somewhat interesting, but the very simplicity of this game was absolutely uncalled for. Pokémon has been called “kiddyish” many of times, and I will be the first in line to say that Pokémon is a deep and involving RPG to play and far from the “kiddyish” perception it has surrounding it. Though I will be the first to stay that Pokémon Colosseum was truly designed for kids, because all you do is walk from Point A to Point B throughout the entire game. The “exploration” of Pokémon is gone, and I hope it comes back in future renditions of Pokémon.
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