Pokemon HeartGold/SoulSilver

by Pramath Parijat

‘HeartGold/SoulSilver’ isn’t total train wreck, nor is it mediocre game, or good one at that. It’s only, quite possibly, the best handheld title ever made.

It can be tough to dispute the statement that Pokemon is arguably the single biggest franchise in gaming today. Every single game in the series has gone on to sell millions upon millions, and it certainly wouldn’t be an exaggeration to claim that Nintendo’s survival in the late ‘90s, when they were being assuaged by the Playstation from all sides, was ensured by Pokemon.

Therefore, it’s actually a little difficult to blame Nintendo for milking the series to the extent that they have. While there are only four titles in the main series, strictly speaking, accompanied by their respective remakes, there have been over fifty Pokemon spin offs spread across all genres released since the franchise’s quiet inception over a decade ago. However, the company surely invites skepticism when they announce the remake of what is not only the best title in the series, but also one of the greatest games ever created, and the best handheld game of all time. And yet, that’s what they’ve done. Listening to fans’ for a change, Nintendo is all set to release Pokemon HeartGold and SoulSilver, a complete re-imagining of the bestselling Gameboy Color titles Pokemon Gold and Silver, next year in the west.



However, the title has already launched in Japan, and been met with rave reviews, as well as mind boggling sales figures. We’ve got our hands on a Japanese import copy of the game, and after exhaustively going through everything that the game has to offer, I can very confidently state that Pokemon HeartGold and SoulSilver looks set to be the greatest Pokemon title ever, topping the originals and pipping them for the post of “Best Handheld Game of All Time.”

That is no exaggeration -- as fans would certainly know -- Gold and Silver were the high points of the series, which has only gone downhill since. And while it certainly managed to regain some of its lost charm with the recent DS titles, the sheer highs of addictiveness and (relative) innovation that the series touched with the ubiquitous pair of the GBC titles has never since been replicated. Fans have been clamoring for a release that will restore the series’ pride proper. And with HeartGold and SoulSilver, it seems they’ll get what they’ve wanted.

I’d go out on a limb and claim that HeartGold and SoulSilver represent the biggest sprucing up of any title to date. No other remake for any title has ever actually added so much to the original game, not even the DS version of Final Fantasy IV, which added full 3D graphics, CGI cutscenes, orchestral sound score and voice acting to an SNES game. For their part, Game Freak went all guns blazing on this one. And the result is the most thorough, loaded and deep Pokemon game ever, and considering just how deep the other Pokemon games have been, that certainly is saying something.

Breathtakingly beautiful visuals

I suppose the most obvious place to start about the game would be its graphics. Nintendo and Game Freak have, very clearly, ditched a realistic look in favor of a more “cartoony” 3D visual style, thus enhancing the pseudo 3D visuals of Pearl and Diamond a step further. The world seems to be very nicely drawn, and there are wonderful touches, like smoke coming out from the chimneys, or the golden autumn leaves littering the ground, that add so much to the immersion and believability of the game’s world. Pokemon Gold/Silver was the most atmospheric GBC game, and its DS progeny seems set to replicate that feat on a much larger scale.

Many a time, the game abandons all pretence and comes out with full 3D graphics, N64 style. While these excursions into visual delight are usually limited to the gyms (which have been completely redesigned, and barring the trainers and their elemental affiliation, bear no similarity with their Gold/Silver counterparts), there are several other portions in the game, usually several dungeons, that also have been given the complete 3D treatment.



There’s so much more about the visuals -- the way the water ripples and reflects the sunlight, to the small touches such as plant life on the surface of the water bodies, or the texture of a cliff, or the looming overhead bridge track for the magnet train. The game reeks of sophisticated personality graphically, and the developers have evidently taken it upon themselves to make HeartGold and SoulSilver the most visually immersive titles in the series.

There really is no way to describe the effect that this has had on the game in words. The new visual palette breathes a new lease of life into Johto, and the game becomes breathtakingly beautiful and visually pleasing, not to mention extremely atmospheric as a result. The graphics in HeartGold and SoulSilver have to be seen to be believed, and no screenshots can do them justice.

It hurts more when you’re so close to perfection

It is a bit disappointing, then, that while the overworld was so completely remade, the battle scene is largely the same as it was in Pearl/Diamond, which in turn was more or less the same as it had been back in the days of the GBA. It takes away some of the impact and sheen of the game, and smacks of laziness on the developer’s part. Going by the effort that has so obviously gone into this title, that may be an unfair accusation, but this reluctance on the developer’s part to actually move the series forward from its static slideshow style battles is baffling to say the least, and downright disappointing.

Similar inconsistencies can be found in the game’s sound design, which is now the absolute and unquestionable best for any game in the series, and also right up there as far as DS games are concerned. All our favorite chip tunes from the original game have been given the orchestral makeover, and they all sound so much better for that. While there may be many tunes that may not be to everybody’s tastes, by and large, everyone shall emerge happy from the experience, as the music directors have done a much better job of remixing fan favorites this time around than they did in FireRed and LeafGreen, where they simply butchered many of the classic themes.

There are other, subtler touches, which once again lend unprecedented depth to the game’s world. When you walk, you can hear the sound of your footsteps, and the sound actually varies depending upon where you walk. So you can hear slight rustling footsteps when you walk on grassy patches and the smart clicking footsteps when you’re walking on wooded floorboards, or even the sound of your footsteps when you walk on paved roads. It’s all wonderful, and points to great care being taken on the developer’s part.



There’s even more: when you’re near the sea, you can hear the sound of the waves moving in; each door has a different sound when it opens or closes; you can hear the sound of the smoke wafting from the chimneys in several villages if you will only stand still for a moment... It all comes together, and gives the game its own distinct auditory identity.

And yet, the sound department too is not flawless. The developers have once again recycled the screechy cries for all the Pokemon that they’ve been using since the 8 bit days, and considering how great the game sounds otherwise, these relics from the Gameboy era are a perplexing anachronism. Again, it wouldn’t have taken the developers much to ensure that the Pokemon at least sounded on par with the rest of the game, or even the Pokemon from Diamond and Pearl, which at the very least had their own unique identifiable sound. But no, they’ve glossed over this again, and this, to be succinct, is the game’s sound design’s greatest failing.

The best of the series

And yet all that doesn’t really matter, once you get down to it. The original Gold and Silver was a technically dated game, even at the time of its release, but most people could overlook that because the fundamental gameplay structure was so addictive. I am happy to report that the same structure has returned in HeartGold and SoulSilver, and it has also been refined using all of the series’ newer formulae, so that as far as refinement is concerned, HG/SS is the zenith for the series.

Consider, for instance, that your Pokemon follow you around. Any Pokemon can follow you, and their sprite specific characteristics (for instance, any gender differences that the Pokemon may have, or shininess) are retained. You can turn to your Pokemon to check on its mood, harking back to the days of Pokemon Yellow.

Also, this time you might just be tempted to actually try and follow the old axiom, and catch them all. The game just makes it so easy for you. The online mode returns from Pokemon Platinum, and it has been further refined, making trading for any Pokemon that you may want that much easier. You can still import your GBA Pokemon if you want to via the revamped Pal Park. A Safari Zone has been added to Cianwood City, to make it easier for you to track down the rarer Pokemon species.

But perhaps, in a significant first for the series, HeartGold and SoulSilver now offer every single non Sinnoh starter Pokemon and non event Legendary Pokemon within the game. Yes, that’s right, so you have the chance of getting not only ALL the starters (Kanto, Johto and Hoenn), but you can also catch ALL non event legendaries in the wild now (including MewTwo, Articuno, Moltress, Zapdoss, Kyogre, Rayquaza, Groudon, the whole gang). It’s wonderful fan service for the veterans, and a great way of ensuring the design isn’t too intimidating for newcomers.



Story-wise, the game follows the plotline of Pokemon Crystal rather than Gold and Silver, so you’ll have repeated encounters in the wild with Suicune, you’ll meet Eusine and you’ll have to enter the Dragon’s Den before you are conferred the Eighth Johto Gym Badge... it’s all there. Plus, Kanto, which was a sorry shadow of itself in the original Gold and Silver, returns in its full fledged form this time, so there will be no cutbacks and no compromises. Kanto this time is really worth visiting.

The version I played was Japanese, so I really didn’t get much of the script. However, I could easily tell that there were significant changes, including several new characters, and a complete restructuring of Team Rocket. There also is, according to reports by Serebii, a new added episode (that is evidently activated via an Event) where ??? comes face to face with Giovanni, and it is confirmed once and for all that he is indeed Giovanni’s son. Nice, and a nod to the theories that have always been floating around.

Summary

I don’t even know how to sum it all up. The best way possible, I suppose, is to state that Pokemon HeartGold/SoulSilver is going to be the best Pokemon game ever. Its minor (technical) flaws notwithstanding, the game is set to become not only the series’ new high point, but also the centerpiece of the DS’s already robust library, and the greatest handheld game ever created.

Initial concern when this game was first announced centered not only around whether it would be able to live up to the original -- that is a natural concern whenever remakes are concerned -- but also whether it would be able to recapture the spirit of the original. You see, Gold/Silver was the first and last time that the Pokemon series innovated, and that spirit would have been paradoxically impossible for a remake to recapture because of its very status as a remake. And yet, amazingly, HeartGold/SoulSilver bucks the trend and, true to its progenitor, moves the series forward again.

The game is set for a March 2010 release in North America, and May 2010 for Europe and Australia. We’ll have our final review for the English build ready around the time of the game’s North American release. Going by initial impressions, HeartGold and SoulSilver is set to receive the highest score that can be awarded to any game.