Revisiting Pokémon Legends: Arceus before this preview of its sort-of-sequel, Pokémon Legends: Z-A, I couldn’t help but be struck by its almost singular eeriness. Legends: Arceus is deathly quiet, thanks in part to the total lack of voice acting – a long-running Pokémon quirk continued again here in Z-A, even in the lengthy cutscene we were shown at the start of the preview – but also, more intentionally and more interestingly, because of its environment. Legends: Arceus was set in the ghostly wilds of Hisui. A cold, unwelcoming, frequently haunted corner of Pokémon’s take on the Japanese region. It made sense to dial into the sounds of swaying grass and gusting wind, the braying Ponyta, the heavy footsteps of human travellers in untamed lands. What an odd game, with such an odd vibe. I kind of loved it.
Pokémon Legends: Z-A
- Developer: Game Freak
- Publisher: Nintendo, The Pokémon Company
- Platform: Played on Switch 2
- Availability: Out 16th October on Nintendo Switch and Switch 2
With Pokémon Legends: Z-A that whispering atmosphere is turned inside out. It’s chaos, frankly, or at least the hour or so that I had with it was, spread across four, separate micro-demos in the heavily Paris-inspired Lumiose City. Z-A has taken the bold, and potentially quite ill-advised leap of going full real-time action with its battles, which coupled with its modern approach of overworld-roaming Pokémon means you’ll frequently find yourself in the middle of absolute carnage, moves flying everywhere, wild pokes on all sides. And, if you’re much like me, maybe just a tiny voice carrying through amongst the noise, wondering whether this is, now you mention it actually, really any fun?
I say that, but should also right away throw in some hefty caveats. This is only a preview, and one that was both quite brief and also heavily devoid of context at that. A lot of the magic in Pokémon comes from outside of its mechanics, and instead in how they all knit together – the knitting is the part I haven’t seen. Instead, as I said, four miniature demos in one. The first: a Wild Zone.
Wild Zones are a concept first introduced in Pokémon Sword and Shield (though really something that has threads tying it right the way back to the Safari Zone of Pokémon Red and Blue). Here, they’re dotted around the city sporadically and bursting with alarmingly aggressive Pokémon. I set foot into Wild Zone 6, where the preview’s first section took place, and was immediately assaulted by a Lv.33 Alpha Houndoom (the red-eyed, souped-up stats Alpha mechanic of Legends: Arceus returning again here) and its gang of surrounding Houndours. The party we were given was a fair bit below that level – around Lv.25 – adding to the challenge, as did my starter of choice for this demo being Chikorita. Curiously, evolution has received a tweak here: it’s now something you opt into, rather than out of – when your Pokémon’s ready to evolve, you go into your party menu and select the option to evolve it. Moves, likewise, can be swapped out on the fly for free as with Legends: Arceus, as long as you’re not mid-battle.