Pokémon is one of the most profitable and popular gaming series of all time, and people have loved the games for decades. The property does have millions of loyal fans around the world. Still, many of them have steadily become more discontent over the years due to the similarities between each new Pokémon release. However, these complaints were soon to be met with the announcement of Pokémon Legends: Arceus on February 26, 2021. 

Legends: Arceus is the newest game in the series and is the Pokémon Company’s way of changing their formula and finally giving fans the new experience they have been craving. Legends: Arceus is an open-world game where you can run around and find Pokémon roaming around in the open landscape. 

Upon the reveal, fans were beyond excited. Even to someone who had never played a Pokémon game before and had no connection to the series thought it looked good. So after waiting to see the very positive critical reception, I bought Pokémon Legends: Arceus three days after release. And my opinions are … mixed. 

Upon starting, I quickly found myself bored. I began writing this article mere hours into my first day playing the game two weeks ago because I was frustrated. I felt like the game was holding me back from the fun that I could be having. I did really enjoy finding Pokémon and updating my Pokédex, but something just felt so off.

I know there are jokes about how “The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild ruined game criticism” because people compare every open-world 3D game to it like I am about to do now. But Breath of the Wild is a masterpiece, and I do have a genuine point. Hear me out.

The greatest feat of Breath of the Wild is that it manages to make exploration the only thing on the player’s mind. The world feels so lived in, and I could imagine Hyrule being a real place. I remember when I got the game, and within a couple of weeks, I had 80 hours on the game by simply living in the world. There is genuine magic to playing that game that Legends: Arceus doesn’t have. 

Legends: Arceus wants to be about exploration as well, but the world just feels so barren. There are no Pokémon interactions, non-player characters are lifeless, and the landscape has incredibly poor art direction. Art direction is exponentially more important than the average player thinks it is. For a relatively underpowered console like the Switch, games need good art direction to look good overall. Bad art direction will make your assets and environments look more basic than they should. To clarify, Legends: Arceus did not look bad, but the world feels so baron that it does negatively impact the gameplay.

Speaking of which, I did find the gameplay to be the best part of the game by far. Trying to sneak up to Pokémon to catch them, fighting, and organizing your team is fun. A majority of the gameplay elements are definitely positives, and since the gameplay is always the most important part of a game, good gameplay is a huge benefit. 

So would I recommend Pokémon Legends: Arceus? Probably not. If you have never played a Pokémon game before, you’ll probably find yourself somewhat bored of the exploration. And if you are a Pokémon fan, you probably already own the game. Although I didn’t dislike my time with Legends: Arceus, I truly do believe that my $60 could have been better spent on different games. – 6/10 –