You're welcome. I can see your precious Vortail avatar and I know you're quite excited for Lumentale, but I just couldn't let the issues slide anymore. I say this also as someone who is getting ready to re-install Xenoverse in my new computer so I can finish a Mono-Fairy run. I hope they can eventually sort out these issues so perhaps I can be a little more excited for it, but right now it's quite hard.
Other "Pokemon-like" monster collecting RPGs?
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You're welcome. I can see your precious Vortail avatar and I know you're quite excited for Lumentale, but I just couldn't let the issues slide anymore. I say this also as someone who is getting ready to re-install Xenoverse in my new computer so I can finish a Mono-Fairy run. I hope they can eventually sort out these issues so perhaps I can be a little more excited for it, but right now it's quite hard.
Honestly I would say I'm probs the biggest fan for the game so to learn that this happened is unfortunate.
After a google google search and twitter search I couldn't find anything in the 1.5 years since that tweet so I truly hope deep down that Beehive rectified the situation with the artists.
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Temtem & the Alternatives to Pokémon
it's no secret that pokémon, fun and endearing as the franchise can still be for many longtime and new fans, isn't really being handled to its fullest potential as the highest grossing media franchise ever. many of us obviously feel that while the pokémon company continues to expand the scope of the games while also maintaining a regular cycle, the actual developers of the games (game freak ofc) either don't themselves have access to or choose not to have access to the appropriate resources to meet the standard of quality that should reasonably be expected of something so financially successful.
i'm not here to debate the internal conditions at game freak though, and whatever leads to the less-than-excellent present state of pokémon's mainline games isn't of concern. what's important though, is that fans love the concept so much that despite consistently voicing their issues with the modern direction of the series (through ludicrously out of hand situations like dexit, or the general public reaction to sword/shield, scarlet/violet being extremely buggy and borderline unplayable for some) most people still buy the games anyway. setting aside simple brand loyalty, this suggests something about the core catch 'em all, battle 'em, trade 'em concept really appeals to players in a way that hasn't been meaningfully found in any competitor.
after all, the series has existed for nearly three decades. in other gaming markets, a drop in quality or drought of popular concepts often leads to grassroots indie revivals or earnest passionate attempts at reclaiming what made something popular in the first place. to give an example that was officially endorsed and released, sonic (a franchise which has perhaps had an even more infamous battle with quality) managed to put out sonic mania after a long absence of true, crowd pleasing 2D sonic games. sonic mania is of course, one of the best received games in the entire series and absolutely one of the best seen in the last 20 years.
but all of this begs the question - where are the competitors to pokémon? that's essentially what i want to talk about in this thread!
i myself haven't really done much looking into the concept, although i do remember one notable example in recent memory - temtem, an example of pretty much exactly the sort of thing i described above as grassroots indie revivals. with the financial backing of kickstarter and publishing by humble bundle, spanish studio crema managed to produce an MMO answer to the pokémon alternatives question.
back when i played it, it was in early access and quite incomplete, but i do remember having a good time with the game! i really liked a lot of the designs and the decision to add new "crystal" and "cyber" types were nice choices, as well as cleaning up some of the more arbitrary type distinctions in pokémon's original set. i don't personally agree with the seemingly popular sentiment that pokémon is in dire need of more multiplayer functionality, and would hate to lose a true single-player campaign in favour of such things, though admittedly scarlet/violet's (theoretically) seamless integration works well.
when i played it, temtem felt a little too mmo-y and too much focus was on the multiplayer experience - something which didn't gel with the launch's server issues and giant queues! i do still own the game, so i could very well boot it up some day soon and give it another go - i'd be interested to know if anyone here has played it and particularly more recently than me, in the last 3 years or so, and since i still see the game getting updated i'd really love to know how much more there is to do now!
secondarily, i'd also love anyone to tell me about other pokémon alternatives out there! to be specific, i'm not including rom hacks or pokémon fangames in this conversation, though there are many many wonderful things to be found in those fields (that nintendo is more determined to snuff out of existence!). i'm only referring to "pokémon-likes" such as temtem - original IPs clearly modelling themselves on creature catching and battling games like pokémon! i'm sure there are more out there, so enlighten me!
it's no secret that pokémon, fun and endearing as the franchise can still be for many longtime and new fans, isn't really being handled to its fullest potential as the highest grossing media franchise ever. many of us obviously feel that while the pokémon company continues to expand the scope of the games while also maintaining a regular cycle, the actual developers of the games (game freak ofc) either don't themselves have access to or choose not to have access to the appropriate resources to meet the standard of quality that should reasonably be expected of something so financially successful.
i'm not here to debate the internal conditions at game freak though, and whatever leads to the less-than-excellent present state of pokémon's mainline games isn't of concern. what's important though, is that fans love the concept so much that despite consistently voicing their issues with the modern direction of the series (through ludicrously out of hand situations like dexit, or the general public reaction to sword/shield, scarlet/violet being extremely buggy and borderline unplayable for some) most people still buy the games anyway. setting aside simple brand loyalty, this suggests something about the core catch 'em all, battle 'em, trade 'em concept really appeals to players in a way that hasn't been meaningfully found in any competitor.
after all, the series has existed for nearly three decades. in other gaming markets, a drop in quality or drought of popular concepts often leads to grassroots indie revivals or earnest passionate attempts at reclaiming what made something popular in the first place. to give an example that was officially endorsed and released, sonic (a franchise which has perhaps had an even more infamous battle with quality) managed to put out sonic mania after a long absence of true, crowd pleasing 2D sonic games. sonic mania is of course, one of the best received games in the entire series and absolutely one of the best seen in the last 20 years.
but all of this begs the question - where are the competitors to pokémon? that's essentially what i want to talk about in this thread!
i myself haven't really done much looking into the concept, although i do remember one notable example in recent memory - temtem, an example of pretty much exactly the sort of thing i described above as grassroots indie revivals. with the financial backing of kickstarter and publishing by humble bundle, spanish studio crema managed to produce an MMO answer to the pokémon alternatives question.
back when i played it, it was in early access and quite incomplete, but i do remember having a good time with the game! i really liked a lot of the designs and the decision to add new "crystal" and "cyber" types were nice choices, as well as cleaning up some of the more arbitrary type distinctions in pokémon's original set. i don't personally agree with the seemingly popular sentiment that pokémon is in dire need of more multiplayer functionality, and would hate to lose a true single-player campaign in favour of such things, though admittedly scarlet/violet's (theoretically) seamless integration works well.
when i played it, temtem felt a little too mmo-y and too much focus was on the multiplayer experience - something which didn't gel with the launch's server issues and giant queues! i do still own the game, so i could very well boot it up some day soon and give it another go - i'd be interested to know if anyone here has played it and particularly more recently than me, in the last 3 years or so, and since i still see the game getting updated i'd really love to know how much more there is to do now!
secondarily, i'd also love anyone to tell me about other pokémon alternatives out there! to be specific, i'm not including rom hacks or pokémon fangames in this conversation, though there are many many wonderful things to be found in those fields (that nintendo is more determined to snuff out of existence!). i'm only referring to "pokémon-likes" such as temtem - original IPs clearly modelling themselves on creature catching and battling games like pokémon! i'm sure there are more out there, so enlighten me!
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I've played Nexomon: Extinction and it was pretty solid for the most part. It got very grindy at the end, however. I know some people who got to the end but then got stuck because of it. It's been a while since I played it. But afaik you can softlock yourself right at the end if you're underleveled due to a point of no return with no way of grinding at that point. Though, I may remember that one wrong since I happened to be high enough of a level so I never ran into that problem. ^^"
When I played it it also crashed on a regular basis. I think there was a problem with Unity-based games on the Switch. I'm not sure if they've already fixed it. I wouldn't be surprised if it was, though. Like I said: it's been a while.
When I played it it also crashed on a regular basis. I think there was a problem with Unity-based games on the Switch. I'm not sure if they've already fixed it. I wouldn't be surprised if it was, though. Like I said: it's been a while.
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Merged your thread with one in the Video Games subforum. Posts to explain it to new and old responders. (Also pings to notify.)
Cannot comment on Temtem, unfortunately.
Adds "Monster Sanctuary" to the list of Pokemon-like games. Never played this either. Watched a bit of it. Begins with either the Spectral Wolf, Spectral Eagle, Spectral Toad, or Spectral Lion. Uses a skill point tree to increase power. Fights with a party of three. Enlists things like Blob and Catzerker. Evolves some monsters through items.
Playing through two on the Switch right now in Coromon and Cassette Beasts. Coromon mechanics are pretty similar to Pokémon with the main difference being that there is an SP bar used for every move instead of each move having PP, while Cassette Beasts has the player character transform into various monsters. Both pretty fun options, albeit I haven't finished either yet. Coromon also has built-in nuzlocke rules for people who are interested in that kind of challenge.
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this sounds like such a big winner for a lot of people, since managing difficulty is something pokémon has really struggled with especially since the jump to 3D. optional challenges being baked in is one great way to handle it (that we'll no doubt never see in the mainline games since apparently tpc considers nuzlockes equivalent to hacking pokemon in or making unlicensed ROM hacks)