Pokémon Pearl Version (DS) review " These games were overall really good. The style of game changed completely resulting in a better game than the eleven before. The graphics have changed, the look of the characters have changed, more pokemon have been added, the overall goal that you need to accomplish right away has completely changed, and most of the options that used to take forever to do, have been sped up by the use of the stylus. "

These games were overall really good. The style of game changed completely resulting in a better game than the eleven before. The graphics have changed, the look of the characters have changed, more pokemon have been added, the overall goal that you need to accomplish right away has completely changed, and most of the options that used to take forever to do, have been sped up by the use of the stylus.

The graphics on these new games has been changed completely so that when you move you can see that the buildings around you are in fact 3D. I enjoyed starting the games and finding the new looks of everything. So many differences could be noticed just as you leave the house in the beginning of the game.

The characters of the games were different looking than any that I had ever expected. My hopes were that the game designers would allow you to customize your own character. Maybe choose your hair color, maybe not choose a hat, perhaps different style of clothes. Maybe if they have another game they will allow this concept.

More pokemon were added to the games, if I’m not mistaken around 107 new pokemon were added. But something wasn’t right about these new creatures. Most looked awesome, others looked way to cartoony. For example, Combee. It’s three honey combs with wings and three smiley faces on them. Who would want this pokemon?! I found it to be a very wimpy creature with no real purpose other than to evolve into Vespiquen. Another was Pachirisu. It was just another knock off version of Pikachu, only this time it was in the form of a squirrel. The last cartoon that I feel I should talk about is the pokemon Drifloom. A ghost, flying balloon pokemon? To the creators of Pokemon, please get a better idea for pokemon. Some, not all, suck.

In the new games your goal right away is simple; see all of the pokemon in the region. There are 150 pokemon that you have to see in order to receive your very own national pokedex. I thought that it was more fun that you had to catch all of them so that you could be rewarded with something. In Pokemon Emerald version, I liked the idea of giving you one of the Johto starters. But instead they give you the upgraded version of the pokedex, and the ability to use the Pal Park. The Pal Park was simply a way of getting your old pokemon to the current game. A clever idea, but not a terribly smart one. You can upload six pokemon per park usage, and per game cartridge used. After you use that game cartridge, you cant use the exact same one for another twenty-four hours. That was a smart limitation, but the whole concept was not. Its too simple, should cost something, and have a bigger park zone like the Safari Zone.

Finally the options on the game have been sped up because of the stylus. In battle its faster to hand select the attacks then wait for the curser to go over the attack then select it. The touch screen plays a huge part in the over all game. Especially in the Universal Underground area. Here you have the ability to check the walls for any valuable things like spheres, treasures, and even fossils. A nice touch (no pun intended).

Community review by bexran (May 24, 2007) A bio for this contributor is currently unavailable, but check back soon to see if that changes. If you are the author of this review, you can update your bio from the Settings page.