This is it. The moment I have been anticipating for years.
I am a giant fan of thePikminseries. GIANT! And every year for the last few years, I have hoped and prayedPikmin 3would be official and announced at that year’s E3. At first I thought it would be a Wii title … and that never came true. Then I could have sworn it would launch with the 3DS … and that never panned out as well.
Well, here we are, all these years later, andPikmin 3isfinally official. And I have played it! I still can’t believe it.
But what did I think about the game? Did I love this new iteration of the series? Or was I so disappointed that I dramatically knocked over the demo kiosk and ran out of the Nintendo booth with my arms flailing?
There were two levels to play in the E3 demo. The first was a more traditionalPikminlevel and the second was an extraordinary boss battle.
Let’s get into the first, more classic level first.
Pikmin 3can be played with either the newWii U GamePador the Wiimote-and-Nunchuk combo — very similar to the way thePikminWii re-release plays. Actually,exactlylike that. The GamePad was great and comfortable (and the map on the touch screen wonderfully helpful), but I actually preferred the Wiimote and Nunchuk. It felt great and made controlling the Pikmin easy and accurate.
But I have to reiterate: the GamePad is fantastic and I will most likely use that when the final game is released. Not being that familiar with it yet, though, the Wiimote and Nunchuk made it easier for me to jump right in.
The first thing you will notice aboutPikmin 3is that it is DROP-DEAD GORGEOUS! The animation and colors on the Pikmin are slick, but the backgrounds — my God, the backgrounds are exquisite. The lush foliage and swaying grass are so detailed and almost photo-realistic that they need to be seen to be believed. Everything just looks so amazing. I can’t imagine how incredible everything will look once more varied areas are introduced in the final game.
As far as gameplay, things were instantly familiar.
For the demo — a level that is most likely not in the final game — some things were left out. Your Pikmin couldn’t die (and, if they could, not easily at all), and there was no respawning by growing Pikmin from the home base onion. There was only a limited time with the demo, so some sacrifices had to be made to let players do as much as possible.
But keep in mind that this stuffwillbe in the final game. I mean, what isPikminwithout growing and managing your multi-colored troops? The classicPikminwe all know and love will be back and better than ever. This was just a simple demo.
In the level on display, you must use your red Pikmin to collect fruit and kill enemies. The blue and yellow Pikmin were absent from the demo, but they will, of course, be in the final game.
After traveling through the gorgeous level, you run into a giant floating jellyfish. Throwing your red Pikmin on the jellyfish to destroy him unlocks the newest member of the Pikmin family: the rock Pikmin.
Outside of being AWESOME, these rock Pikmin are very similar to the purple Pikmin inPikmin 2, as they are super-strong. Instead of just using them to easily kill enemies, though, these new rock Pikmin can do so much more. There are glass walls and rocks everywhere that can only be broken with these powerful Pikmin. This use of specific-colored Pikmin adds more strategy to the proceedings. (More on this deep mechanic when I get to the boss battle later.)
A wide variety of enemies and environmental obstacles was present in the booth demo, each more beautiful and daunting than the last. One nice change to the formula comes in the form of bridges and slides. In the last twoPikmingames, bridges were automatically made by Pikmin in certain spots. InPikmin 3, there are piles of rocks that much be carried to make the bridge. Each rock piece forms the bridge, so it all feels much more realistic than before.
The slides are fun pieces of the environment that Olimar and the Pikmin can slide down. (In the demo it was a blade of grass formed in a fun spiral.) These slides are great as shortcuts, but can only be used one way and Pikmin cannot carry certain items down them. They just add to the subtle strategy of the level layout.
I really can’t stress enough how beautiful and polished this game looks and feels. Everything just comes together perfectly and truly feels like a classic Nintendo game.
After collecting a bunch of fruit, killing a bunch of meddlesome creatures, and traveling through a gorgeous world, the demo came to an end and I couldn’t have been happier. It felt exactly likePikmin, just more detailed, smooth, and BEAUTIFUL! Everything I could have asked for.
And I think I may have died from happiness.
The boss in thePikmin 3demo was a giant caterpillar/scorpion/beetle kind of thing. Huge, fluid, and gorgeous.
The bosses in the other twoPikmingames were great and well-designed, but this boss took things to a new level. Both the red and rock Pikmin needed to be used in this fight. The rock Pikmin had to be thrown first to break apart the hard metallic shell of the monstrous creature. Once the individual sections were shattered, the red Pikmin had to be used to do damage.
You see, the only way to damage the boss was to have the Pikmin grab onto the exposed skin and attack away. The heavy rock Pikmin, with their skinny arms, could not grab onto the fast-moving beast, and therefore could not do damage outside of breaking the shell.
This attention to detail made the boss even more fun and challenging than I could have imagined. I loved it so much.
There’s no word on whether the final version ofPikmin 3will be more like the firstPikminwith its above-ground levels and more straightforward goals, orPikmin 2and its deep, wonderful dungeons and higher challenge.
I am hoping for something closer toPikmin 2, but, either way,Pikmin 3promises to be an unbelievably welcome sequel and an outstanding addition to the early Wii U library.
I adored my time withPikmin 3and think it is my favorite game of the show so far.
I can’t wait to play more.
No, seriously, I am going to lose my mind waiting for this to be released.
