While a main series Pokémon title has never been introduced for home console, every new Nintendo release offers some sort of Pokémon battle simulator with more impressive graphics while maintaining the same familiar rock-paper-scissors style of fighting present in all Pokémon titles. Pokkén Tournament takes a new approach joining the ranks of other fast-paced fighting games, offering a unique experience for fans of the Pokémon series and fighting games alike.
A new challenger approaches!
Pokkén boasts a 16 fighter roster, the same as Street Fighter V at launch, with fan favorites such as Charizard, Pikachu, Lucario, Blaziken, and Mewtwo. Also included are some Pokémon that are a little obscure like Chandelure and Suicune. There are four types of fighters: standard, speed, technical, and power, with each type bringing different strengths to the battlefield. There are definitely more standard and power fighters, presumably until DLC evens those numbers out a bit more.
The goal of Pokkén is fairly simple; rise through the ranks with your partner Pokémon to become the ultimate fighter. The game format is similar to Pokémon Stadium or Pokémon Colosseum for Wii. In order to progress you must face challengers to face the Champion of the league you’re in all the while hearing rumors about Shadow Mewtwo until being confronted by it. Once you enter each league, you must play a few matches to increase your rank to the point where you qualify for the tournament. Sometimes there are over 80 trainers competing in each league. This is where the bulk of the single player is spent: grinding away until your rank is increased. The focus on Pokkén is on the fighting, not plot, so the appearance of Shadow Mewtwo and the explanation surrounding it seems a bit strange, but overall it serves as a refreshing, if not odd, break from the monotonous tournament style of gameplay.
Vexing visits to My Town
The game immediately presents you with Nia, an advisor who assists you in battle. After starting my first match, it became apparent that I needed to mute her. Her voice is extremely annoying and interrupts each fight with awkward phrases and encouragement. It’s not just the writing that makes Nia annoying, more so it’s the amateur performance. Luckily, she can be turned off completely or switched to a much better Japanese voice actress when accessing the game’s version of a settings menu, My Town. I had initially figured this would be my only journey to My Town, but it was only the beginning.
Most fighting games allow the player to choose a fighter right before battle, but this isn’t the case in Pokkén. When first starting the game the player chooses from a roster of Pokémon to be their partner Pokémon. While this Pokémon can be changed in My Town, you cannot change Pokémon in-between matches. This is extremely tedious and often disrupted my gameplay experience. Multiple times I had to exit from the tournament screen in order to experiment with new Pokémon.
Aside from fixing the voice acting and character selection, visiting the settings screen is necessary for customizing the player’s avatar, choosing sets of support Pokémon, and changing battle slogans. That still doesn’t help the feeling that multiple sections of the game were randomly shoved into the settings menu in place of a more accessible location.
All new Ferrum Battles
Whether playing alone or online with others, Pokkén Tournament handles smoothly and has controls simple enough for anyone to immediately pick up and play. Attacks come in three types in Pokkén: basic attacks, counter attacks, and throws. Basic attacks beat throws; throws beat counter attacks; and counter attacks beat basic attacks. Once this triangle of attack is internalized, the game really opens up for deeper play. While combos and a few more complicated moves are present, nothing requires too much memorization or practice to execute. Matches tend not to play out longer than a minute adding to the fast-paced nature of the game.
Pokkén introduces the concept of Synergy which allows players to build up a meter for executing powerful and strategic moves. Multiple Pokémon characters appear as supports giving Pokkén a fair amount of playstyle diversity. With 15 pairs of support Pokémon available, various attacks and effects give this seemingly simple fighting game a more individualized approach. Only one support Pokémon can be used during a match, so the player must determine which effects are more useful on their opponent.
Pokkén succeeds at given a traditional “special attack meter” a new spin while throwing in familiar characters that would otherwise be absent from the game.
Many fighting titles require a ton of practice in order to pull off more ambitious moves, but Pokkén allows the player to immediately play the game without being demolished by challengers in the single player. The ease of the game, while inviting to new players, does become tedious after a while. When going through the first few leagues I found myself mindlessly mashing the “A” button and constantly looking away from the screen and still winning every single match. Going through the beginning of the game seems more like a chore than an engaging fight because of this. There is a grade system in place to discourage players from utilizing repetitive techniques, but ultimately, this has little affect other than how much money you receive and only serves as a gauge to determine how well you fought.
Online Battle
Single Player mode may be a bit of a bore, but playing online with other players offers far more in terms of difficulty and is where the real test of skill comes in. Playing online is also far less tedious than playing in the leagues simply because you can change fighters without being forced on a quest to the settings menu. Everything flows much better in the online matches and is ultimately the reason for purchasing the game.
Online you have the option of playing a ranked battle, where you are matched with fighters of similar skill levels or playing a friendly match, where you can battle other friends of yours who own the game as well as anyone from anywhere in the world that has an internet connection.
TL;DR
Pokkén Tournament has something to offer for just about everyone. Fans of the Pokémon series will be glad to see familiar faces while those who love fighting games will enjoy the originality and function of the game. While simple enough to play casually, Pokkén allows for more strategic gameplay to compliment various gamestyles. So whether you are a seasoned Pokémon master or if this is your first experience with pocket monsters, get ready to master your reflexes, because Pokkén Tournament puts up one heck of a fight.
+Beautiful graphics
+Easy-to-learn controls
+ Multiple strategies can be utilized
+Great online gameplay
-Characters can only be changed in settings menu
-Beginning of the game extremely tedious
All images from PokkénTournament's official website
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