Pokémon Legends: Z-A - A Budget Game At A Premium Price (Review)
I reviewed Pokémon Legends: Z-A, a game that honestly rather disgusts me. A cheaply produced minimum viable product with a pricing system that borders on a grift, this is Game Freak's complacency on full display.
Pokémon Legends: Z-A - A Budget Game At A Premium Price (Review) (The Jimquisition)
Comments (9)
I'm kind of in Laura's camp, I can see why people hate it, and...can't really disagree with them, but I also...really kind of like it anyways. Still, gamefreak could do so SO much better. I'd kill for a pokemon game with a proper budget that played like a modern high quality rpg. Something like time stranger or smt/persona with pokemon rather than this half assed slop. ZA is fun, but it should be $30 max, the pokemon fanbase deserves better.
I’ve been a lot more skeptical about this one
I understand why people are upset about prices, but for me it exceeded expectations otherwise. It doesn't take a lot to make me happy when it comes to Pokémon games though, and I'm sympathetic to gamefreak's commitment to using existing staff rather than replacing them all with AAA standard folk who don't have the connection with the franchise. It's Pokémon, it's fun, the new designs are amusing, writing is funny, and the legends games are great lore dumps from a franchise that's usually pretty cryptic about lore. I think fans will be pleased generally. I personally would like gamefreak to go back to their roots and let the developers make high fidelity 2D Pokémon games, but 3D is cheaper and it sells I guess. Sorry JSS, I know Nintendo fans annoy you but when you're engrossed in a fandom for decades you can't just play something else. Love you and fingers crossed that outer worlds 2 is as good as the first one
that's really what I'd like, gamefreak is a handheld studio, just embrace it, and make something in the old style. A pokemon game in the vein of the DQ 1-3 remakes, or something with highly stylized pixel art like octopath or sea of stars could be great. This...low budget 3d thing they have going just isn't working. I know people didn't like bdsp, but that wasn't about them playing like the old games, so much as it was about them being extremely bland remakes that redid the visuals and literally nothing else, not even bothering to add the extra content from platinum.
This was a spot on, clear take and well written.
I was already kind of boycotting pokémon since Sword and Shield, so i didn't need more convincing of this series' decline. (I even made a joke at the time about how Gamefreak has a "Bethesda" problem; in reference to just how barely acceptable the games are and how much they have gotten away with simply because its Pokémon. I'm glad to see you make the comparison here too because this really isnt THAT much better than Fallout 76...) However, the recent Airriders direct really put into context just how gross this game is as a product. I'll happily save my money on something cheaper and better like the several indie games that exist that were inspired by Pokémon. If other fans want to continue spending their money this way, they're cheating themselves and I won't bother trying to stop them.
Yep. I'm done getting annoyed about how mediocre all the Pokemon games are. If the fans want to keep buying low quality slop then let them. I refuse to hear any complaints from them if they do however since they continue supporting this garbage.
Yet another AAA(A?) game making the argument to support indie developers better than I ever could.
While i may not agree with your full review stephanie, im happy you at least gave it a fair shake compared to other people who just throw zeros out and scream about the textures. I agree that they need to do better on that front as well as the lack of voice acting is just dumb in this day in age. I myself enjoyed the writing and characters and battling, and that puts this at a 7/10, maybe 8 for me. I mostly play the pokemon games for that parts and never cared about the graphics as long as it runs smoothly(which past games havent lol).