A Pokémon Utopia
Pokémon is currently on one of its biggest historic highs, straight off the back of its 30th birthday. Re-releases of the classics “Fire Red” & “Leaf Green”. The Gamecube 3D adventures of “Coliseum” & “Gale Of Darkness” coming to Switch 2, the later of which releasing very soon. Announcing generation ten which already has me thinking about which starter to pick. It feels like a true resurgence for Pokémon, being on the hot topic of conversation even amongst causal fans.
Towards the end of this quite frankly brilliant 30th anniversary is the release of Pokopia. Announced in one of the earlier Switch 2 directs. It looked like a strange mix of Animal Crossing and Pokémon, with a dash of Minecraft for good measure. Playing as what on my first impression was a mega creepy Ditto human. The current hype train of Pokémon got a vice grip on me and I suddenly became incredibly interested in Pokopia. I even started to find Ditto quite cute. So with my induced Pokémania, lets transform and dive head first into Pokopia.
Developed by ‘Game Freak’ and ‘Omega Force’ Pokopia is a Pokémon life simulator. It’s dangerously easy to draw comparisons to Animal Crossing with it being a first party Nintendo game. Controlling a Ditto to build a utopia for Pokémon, it is essentially the ultimate cozy game pitch for Pokémon fans.
Pokopia starts with a lone Ditto who is asleep. Upon awakening the Ditto attempts to transform into the memory of it’s previous trainer. At first it’s a rather pink and varying result transformation. After a cheeky little character creator screen our playable Ditto gets a grip on the transformation. Meeting a new variant of Tangrowth, Professor Tangrowth, you both venture into a post-apocalyptic wasteland. Ditto has two objectives cultivate the wastes into a Pokémon Utopia and find out what happened to the humans.
This leads me nicely into the dark undertone of Pokopia’s narrative. Where exactly are the humans? What caused this world to seemingly end? Pokémon theory crafters will have a ball with this I’m sure. While playing you find notes that give you a flavour of what the humans were like in this world. Slightly darker you also get a sense that they know its all about to end. Pokémon is no stranger to dark lore but some of themes on display push that darkness a few extra inches. I found it captivating! Every note I found I discovered hints of those who came before. Desperation, acceptance, relationships, struggles, all can be found within these notes. Interesting little lore dumps about known characters and places also crop up for long time fans. I find it bonkers that one of the most interesting tales I’ve experienced in Pokémon is being told through missable collectable notes. Saying that it’s probably a good thing the narrative is almost entirely missable. We are here for the cute and cozy gameplay rather than a dark provoking story.
Moment to moment gameplay has you in full cultivation mode as Ditto. Turning an empty wasteland into the perfect habitat for Pokémon. Using Ditto’s signature transform to emulate other Pokémon’s moves act as your tools. For example Squirtle’s water gun is a very handy watercan alternative. Through your cultivation of the world traces of Pokémon begin to appear. Traces hint at habitats that Pokémon would want to move into, giving you an idea of what to build. More habitats gives you increased opportunity for Pokémon to appear. The core loop of regenerating the world is incredibly addictive.
During your progression there is a brilliant quest system. As you progress various Pokémon request small tasks of you. They either lead you towards or reward you with new mechanics or skills. With most requests also teaching you part of a mechanic or gameplay system. The quest chains feel very rewarding both in skills and education. It’s necessary that Pokopia pulls this off, which it does seamlessly. With the lingering Animal Crossing comparison this game could quickly become overwhelming. As Pokopia throws considerably more mechanics at you than anyone could have feasibly predicted. Thankfully, the onboarding process is well paced and informative.
Upon learning new mechanics and skills the temptation to play with them overpowers any reason to continue with requests. Further solidifying the players ability and easing a real potential learning curve.
While playing with rewards from requests its impossible not to explore the world around you. Starting in the Withering Wastelands as you venture further out you find relic of this world’s past. Twinging the temptation of do I rebuild what I find or bulldoze and start a fresh. As the game progresses Ditto can go to more areas with differing biomes, Pokémon and cultivation challenges. Some of this areas have nostalgia inducing features too.
As well as the main areas there are blank canvas styled areas for your creativity to run wild. Cloud islands are perpetually online environments that can be explored by anyone but edited by select players of your choice. Best way to explain this is a similarity to the Minecraft Realms system. Palette Town (Great name, I get it) acts as your personal canvas place in game. It is also the area you can use Gameshare to play with other people who have a Switch but don’t own the game. Building your dream Pokéhome with friends and family is a pure joyous experience.
Graphically Pokopia is nothing that will break technological boundaries. That said cozy games have never pushed the envelope. Pokopia in my opinion is one of the best looking games in this genre. The art style while playful and very cartoony is so well fit to this world. It all feels very cohesive both from a game type and how Pokémon should and has looked. Pokopia is cute and has so many varying assets that you just have to stop and marvel. Be it your own creations or the world the developers have lovingly crafted, stopping and smelling the roses is a must.
While on your quest to crafting utopia the soundtrack keeps you locked in. Typical of games of this nature you have a smattering of soft relaxing background tunes. Then occasionally a rearrangement of well known Pokémon music enters the mix. Sometimes in scripted ways like when first coming into the world. Other times it can just be part of the songs that play. The music just feels so fresh and fitting for the game, yet so familiar for long term Pokémon fans. Fanfare stings from completing various tasks are all plucked from older titles. It all works incredibly well in cementing this is a Pokémon game and not just a life sim where Pikachu might appear. Typically in a cozy game after my first few hours of the game I tend to put a podcast or my own music on. Pokopia I found myself so absorbed in the sound I couldn’t bring myself to deprive myself of it.
Pokopia offers players two different style of control. You have your standard gamepad input as well as utilising the joy con’s mouse control. Both have their advantages and both very good. With mouse control fine tuning your building and ability use is far easier. It appears that you can also build and use abilities with additional range while using the mouse. The more standard gamepad makes exploring and movement a lot easier though. Holding the left trigger allows fine tuning in the form of focus mode. Focus mode doesn’t have the range of mouse mode but allows me to build nicely in a game control I kind of prefer.
It’s hard not to cover performance when talking about a game released on the Switch 2. It brings me immense joy to say Pokopia performs stunningly. Frame rates are a buttery smooth running at a delicious 60FPS. The frame rate is also rock solid with no noticeable dips, well not in my experience anyway. Pokopia also looks great regardless if your a dock or handheld player. While not knowing the specification of resolution it looks sharp and pretty in either mode.
After spending considerable time with Pokopia it has dug it’s claws into me. Going from being unsure in the initial announcement to thinking of it as a essential Pokémon game. The longer I spent with Pokopia the more original it felt. The comparisons of Animal Crossing and Minecraft start to sound like lazy inaccurate descriptions. Pokopia also draws inspiration from cult classics such as Viva Piñata and Dragon Quest Builders too. It mixes together to create an incredibly well rounded and unique package. Pokopia stands out as the gold standard of Pokémon spin off games, I think its better than some of the mainline offerings in all honesty.
Game Code Was Kindly Provided By Nintendo
