Pokemon Legends: Z-A
Developer: Game Freak
Publisher: Nintendo
Platforms: Switch (Reviewed), Switch 2
Release Date: Available Now
Price: $59.99 USD – Available Here $89.95 AUD – Available Here
Overview
For a long time Pokemon games have come in many forms, be they part of the mainline series or through one of the countless spin-offs that tackle all manner of genre. Then when the series started expanding into the 3D realm, Nintendo started taking Pokemon in a new direction and really started experimenting when it came to Pokemon Legends: Arceus. Offering an open world to explore with pokemon that could be caught just by a lucky throw of a ball, dodge attacks directed at the player in active combat, it brought a bit of fresh light to the series. Then things took a bit of a turn when the next mainline entry tried to work that open world into the mainline format. Now Game Freak has returned with a brand new take with Pokemon Legends: Z-A that looks to capitalize on many elements of what people liked in the Legends title while still offering something new. The question is, were they successful with this packed entry?
Story
The grand Lumiose City has been the talk of the Kalos Region, blending pokemon living amongst humans within a sprawling metropolis of a city and now that it is being expanded even further, with its grand Prism Tower standing at the heart of it all, the city has become a hot tourist spot. That is at least initially why the player happens to head to the city only to have their bag stolen by a pesky pokemon. With the help of Taunie (or Urbain if the player plays as a female) they will be given a choice either Chikorita, Tepig, or Totodile to get their first taste of how battles work in Lumiose City before bringing them back to Hotel Z as a reward for showing off their skills.
Owned by an extremely familiar face and accompanied by a highly unique Floette, players greet the owner and eventually join the Lumiose City Z-A Royale tournament where trainers battle at night in “Battle Zones” and rise from the rank of Z all the way to A in order to have their wish granted by the company that owns the city. With Taunie looking to bring Hotel Z to prominence, she quickly recruits the player to help join her team, Team MZ. The only thing is, not only are there strange events happening throughout Lumiose City such as a detective noticing the appearance of alpha pokemon outside of the boundaries but even some unknown forms of pokemon appearing in other areas as well, nevermind a familiar looking green slug that appears to be keeping a keen eye on the player. Between all of this and battling through the ranks at night, a quick shot up through the ranks places players right into the thick of things as more secrets of Lumiose City and the dangers it might be facing are laid bare.
It will be a little odd guessing what makes Nintendo and Game Freak decide to place a Legends title onto a Pokemon game. Is it simply because it features a more free catch and combat style? Or because it explores a different type of storyline? Few can know besides the developers themselves, because in many ways it feels like Pokemon Legends: Z-A actually fits perfectly fine as an actual sequel to Pokemon X and Y‘s storylines instead. Between literally walking face-first into a signature pokemon and character from the games within the first ten minutes of the game to walking around the city and talking to NPCs and hearing about how some characters from the original games have gone on to do other things or have vanished entirely to direct references themselves, there is a lot to be found here for fans of X and Y. Of course, even without that the story still holds up more than well enough on its own but those that are familiar with how the former games play out will certainly enjoy this much more, but we can’t explain why because doing so would obviously spoil the story. So, while in name it may come close to a sequel, slapping the Legends title on it feels a bit of a strange one.
One thing that is also nice to note is that, as mentioned before, there is a detective in the game and she is also where a large source of the game’s side-quests come from as players are given the task of being her “helper.” These side-quests actually have quite a bit of humor to them and can come in a variety of different tasks that range from simply delivering a certain pokemon type or showing one off, to gathering items from a location under certain conditions. The fun thing with these is not only the aforementioned humor since many of them come from the fact that people are living in a city where “Wild Zones” contain huge pokemon and some even break free and others wander the rooftops freely, they actually feel fitting with the world, giving the player a better look at how it would actually be to live in such a city. Ironically, players can even see NPCs complain about being trapped by a “battle zone” on their way home from work, unable to enter since they don’t have a pokemon to fight with should they run across another trainer. These little organic things help breathe life into the city and there is a rather dense amount of content spread throughout the city, making sure to never really feel like any area is too empty until players start clearing out tasks.
Gameplay
One of the clearest examples of what might “designate” a Legends game is how the basic capturing mechanics work in the game and how seamless things can feel. In Legends: Arceus players were introduced to the ability to just throw out a poke-ball of various types and try to catch it without even having to fight it and the same thing happens here now in Z-A, including a little “catch meter” indicated by arrows next to the pokemon’s stat screen when locked onto it. The higher the arrows, the better catch chance. That being said, some pokemon will flee when they see the player or fly into a rage when tried to be caught too many times, making them uncatchable for a while. It is here that the biggest change of all comes in with Pokemon Legends: Z-A, the combat.
It must be said that Pokemon Legends: Z-A has taken the game’s combat to an entirely new level and it is easily the best that battling in the games has ever been. While Arceus may have played with the feeling of some freedom in combat, Z-A goes far beyond that by making every battle, be it against a wild pokemon or a trainer, take place in real time. Every move that your pokemon and enemy pokemon can unleash is set around a cooldown, with various attacks having longer cooldowns depending on their power and things such as status-effects playing a role in either increasing these cooldowns or triggering things such as damage over time and standard confusion elements. What makes this part interesting is that, combined with the ability to re-use TMs an infinite number of times plus the ability to recall forgotten moves, players can build their pokemon in any way they see fit and kit its move-set out to their playstyle.
It also means that moves that may otherwise have been something easily forgotten, like tail whip or growl that wouldn’t be kept are far more useful as they can be used as in-between moves that come out fast and lower an opponents stats or pump up the player’s own pokemon’s stats while working with the cooldown for their actual attacking moves. Similarly, throwing out a poke-ball to try and catch a wild pokemon or alpha can knock it out of an attack animation or give the player a few extra seconds of cooldown time even if the catch does fail. Of course, positioning also plays a key factor here as players can dodge-roll out of the way of direct attacks but their pokemon can also move out of the way of incoming attacks as some are slower moving than others. This can lead to some strategic positioning when attacking both wild pokemon and trainers, as moving behind cover can block some long-range attacks and similarly using wide-spread attacks such as Surf can wipe out an entire pride of pyroars chasing you through a Wild Zone.
This even comes into play when swapping out pokemon that are either weak or are fainting since doing so will leave the player themselves open to attack or give the opponent a chance to let their cooldowns run off and prepare to automatically unleash on the player if they aren’t careful. The Mega Evolution mechanics have also been given significant improvement as they feel like dynamic and snappy transformations that can be triggered mid-battle to try and turn the tides of battle in your favor. Thankfully there is a wide range of Rogue Mega Evolution pokemon to battle against to get the hang of things throughout the story as well as those that will be unleashed by enemies in later parts of the storyline. Obtaining your own Mega Stones for pokemon is generally a mixed bag depending on the pokemon, some can be purchased outright with poke-dollars, others using mega-shards scattered throughout the world, or even by defeating the rogue version of a Mega Evolution of that same type. Others rely on the online only battles but more on that later.
Anyways, generally exploring Lumiose City during the day will have players taking on various side-tasks, exploring the roof tops through a wide-variety of ladders, scaffolding, and even a rolling glide of sorts using the Rotom Phone that can also prevent dying from a long fall. There is, somehow, still no ability to actually jump. During the day is also where players will often be able to venture into Wild Zones where various types of pokemon are located at any given time including eventual Alpha variants, though plenty of pokemon can also be found simply roaming the rooftops, waterways, and back alleys of the city. This is also where most shops will be open, allowing players to customize their look, pose with their pokemon, and take part in various other activities such as “shiny hunting” that is easier than ever thanks to the massive amount of notifications when one is nearby alongside their persistence and ways to regenerate them. Without even trying my first few shiny pokemon came just from completing side missions, not including one that straight up hands one to the player.
As time passes the title displays a “clock” of sorts that shows how much daytime is left before nighttime arrives. When night falls Lumiose City undergoes a small change by springing up a large Battle Zone that will now be filled with trainers that players will battle against throughout the night in order to earn enough “tickets” to try and raise their ranking through the royale. New pokemon will spawn at night as well, but players will likely want to battle in these zones as not only are they the primary way to progress through the storyline, they also reward players with money. As players travel through a battle zone they can pick up three Bonus Cards at a time that can boost the rewards earned in fights by completing certain actions. These range from putting enemies into certain status effects, knocking out an enemy with a single surprise attack, or even just using a certain type of move enough times.
The other aspect of the game comes from actually taking the player’s skills online and battling against other players. Here things can be a bit hit or miss but thankfully, for the most part, the online systems hold together well enough. What is hit or miss is the fact that there is any type of mega evolutions locked behind online play at all. While it is understandable that this was done to encourage fans to play online more, especially the ranked mode that is required to “rank up” and acquire the current Mega Greninja stone, it is unfortunate that it is the only actual way to do so. This isn’t the only unfortunate aspect about Pokemon Legends: Z-A, beyond the aforementioned inability to jump. For the most part a lot of the Wild Zones in the game are shockingly small, especially in later parts of the game that see them begin to start populating with larger or more elaborate Pokemon. This is especially true for some early game locations that get buffed up later on, seeing some wildly disproportionate encounters.
Audio & Visuals
Pokemon Legends: Z-A looks pretty solid on the Nintendo Switch with both character models and the pokemon models themselves looking impressive, perhaps the best they have looked yet on the handheld at this point. The city itself is a bit of a disappointment overall though, since while the design of the city feels okay and is dense with content, the overall appearance feels a bit flat and lifeless. Combine this with the fact that all shop interiors have been removed, with even poke-stops being little corner stops, and it feels like Game Freak cut a lot of corners trying to keep the game as fluid as possible while also not going into a lot of effort to actually make it work right. That being said, fighting is as impressive as ever with so many different attack animations now looking like fans have hoped they would look in ages something that, as mentioned before, is desperately needed in future entries.
There is no dub of any kind in Pokemon Legends: Z-A and honestly, it is actually getting rather distracting than excusable at this point. Sure, the signature pokemon noises all remain the same at least but thanks to how impressive the character models look and some solid framerate even on the Switch version of the game, watching cut-scenes play out with characters acting and reacting dynamically and “talking” to silence is bad. Sure, the title still features some great background music that works perfectly for the franchise, but there is only so much background noise can pull off on its own. At some point there needs to be voice work and that time has already come and gone.
Overall
Few would have expected that the best possible thing for the Pokemon series would be to make its combat more dynamic by making it actually happen in real-time. Players must properly and tactfully plan out their attacks and build their party around taking on a challenge, managing cooldowns effectively to avoid finding themselves being caught on the back-foot in a fight. Combine this with an interesting storyline and side-quests and the entire journey feels like a delight, albeit limited by no voice work and the fact that it happens within a rather restrictive feeling city. Lumiose City feels restrictive especially at the start and the small nature of Wild Zones feel limiting, even when battling against numerous pokemon at a time. That being said, Pokemon Legends: Z-A is certainly a step in the right direction especially as far as combat and story writing are concerned, let’s just hope Game Freak and Nintendo can decide to take the next few steps next time around to put out something with a bit more presentation.
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