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Platform:
GameBoy Advance Genre:
Role-Playing Strategy Publisher:
Nintendo Developer:
Game Freak ESRB:
E (Everyone) Released: April 30, 2005
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Pokémon
Emerald
Score: 8.3 / 10
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Pros: -
Seemingly simple strategy proves to be quite deep -
Easy to get into if you’ve played the other Pokémon games -
Straightforward presentation - VS. mode fits right in
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Cons: -
Battles sometimes feel a little protracted -
Not too engrossing for anyone looking for deep, deep RPG - A lot of trial and error as you figure out the strengths and weaknesses of each Pokémon |
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"Pokémon Emerald is a great
strategy RPG.
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If
you’re unfamiliar with the Pokémon concept – all three of you –
here it is in a nutshell. In
your role a as Pokémon trainer you wander the gameworld battling wild
Pokémon and challenging other trainers to earn more experience for your
roster of Pokémon creatures that can conveniently be stored in Pokéballs.
As you battle your way through the turn-based combat you’ll
collect and discover a wide variety of power-ups and useful tools to
help win battles on your way to being the Ultimate Pokémon Champ.
And as a serious game reviewer, I’m not supposed to like Pokémon
games but Pokémon Emerald, the latest in the long-running series, but
for some reason I got suckered in. (After three days of playing video
games at E3, I spent almost six straight hours with Emerald while
waiting for my flight and in the air on the way home.)
Emerald’s story is pretty threadbare, but it’s mostly about the combat. There are wild Pokémon all over the place and there’s never a shortage of challengers so you’ll constantly be tripping into battle. Surprisingly (for me, at least), the combat is relatively complex. There is a massive roster of Pokémon that come into play (but only six in your backpack at any one time) and each of them typically has a point/counter-point, which means that a specific Pokémon can be really effective against another type of Pokémon but completely useless against another type. At the same time there are a variety of attacks that have varying degrees of effectiveness depending on the Pokémon you’re battling. Besides levelling up and increasing your Pokémon stats, Pokémon can also evolve and until I really started to |
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know
more about the abilities of each Pokémon and their evolutionary stages,
I always held my breath – just a little – when a Pokémon started to
evolve.
Because
the game is mostly turn-based – the exploration is all real time –
you don’t have to do a lot of button mashing but when a Pokémon
starts to evolve one can actually prevents it from evolving by wailing
on the A-button. It’s the
only time that Emerald demands a fast and furious reaction.
Emerald definitely leans to the thinking side of things, with
just enough in the way of role-playing elements to make it more than
just a strategy game. |
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In
comparison to the other handheld Pokémon games, the general layout of
the combat should be entirely familiar to fans of the series.
Actually, hardly anything has changed – so it is also with the
presentation. No fancy,
far-out 3D here! Simple
animations without a lot of razzle-dazzle to confuse things.
The same can also be said of music and audio in general.
Besides
the single-player game, which can be extended quite a bit if you want to
“catch ‘em all!” Emerald
comes equipped with a VS. mode so you can play human opponents (as long
as they have a cartridge too) via the link cable or the wireless
adapter. To set-up a
multiplayer game just visit a Pokémon healing centre, head upstairs and
talk to one of two “hostesses” to set-up or join a game.
It’s a neat feature that let’s you seamlessly move from
single-player to VS. mode – it creates a feeling of the whole thing
being part of the single-player experience even though you’re battling
human opponents.
I
know I didn’t play Pokémon games for the simple fact it looked so
kiddie-oriented and sweet
I’d wind up being sick. Now
I’m going back to play the other iterations.
Don’t be fooled as I was – Pokémon Emerald is a great
strategy RPG.
- Omni (June 6, 2005) Search for Related Topics: ...More GameBoy Advance Game Reviews... ...More Role-Playing Game Reviews... |
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