More Miyamoto Magic

Nintendo, as a company, is dependent on its franchise titles such as Mario and Zelda to both keep older fans and draw in new ones. However, Nintendo's key game producer, Shigeru Miyamoto, has recently been developing original titles in an apparent attempt to avoid endless repetition. Pikmin is one of those games.

Here, I have identified Pikmin as a strategy game, although in reality it incorporates elements from a number of genres. The game's plot involves a 3-inch tall spaceman named Olimar, who crash-lands on a mysterious planet inhabited by small creatures that sprout and grow like plants. Olimar nicknames these creatures Pikmin, and enlists their help to re-assemble his wrecked ship. This plot is a little off-beat, but it holds together rather well within the confines of the game and strangely never seems so silly as to be ludicrous.

The graphics of Pikmin aren't overly flashy, but they are still quite beautiful. The game is set in a variety of environments, from lush forests to sandy beach areas. Olimar and the Pikmin themselves look good, but are rather simply constructed and plainly textured. This is a concession that probably needed to be made in order to allow 100 Pikmin, Olimar, and a number of enemy creatures to run around with a smooth frame rate. Speaking of enemies, Pikmin must be rather low on the food chain because nearly every other living thing on their planet will make a quick meal of Pikmin McNuggets out of your work force if you aren't careful. These enemy creatures are varied and colorful, with each requiring a slightly different strategy to defeat them.

Pikmin's music is very catchy, although there isn't a great deal of variety to it. There are separate themes for each of the different play areas, but other than that there isn't a whole lot of variation. The sound effects of this game, however, are one of its greatest strengths. The Pikmin are rather talkative little critters, making all sorts of charming squeaks, exclamations, and even whimpers. This really helps the player to come to view his or her Pikmin as actual living companions, making it all the sadder when a few are gobbled up by some predatory animal.

Gameplay in Pikmin is truly a unique and engaging experience. There are three color types of Pikmin, which provides for a rock-paper-scissors balance in the game. Red Pikmin are better fighters and can withstand fire, blue Pikmin are the only ones that can swim, and yellow Pikmin can be thrown farther by Olimar (yes, he can hurl them to distant or hard to reach places) and can handle bombs. The player must slowly build a number of Pikmin by laboriously collecting food (represented by hockey-puck looking things of various sizes) that must be carried back to your ship. Around your ship are the homes of the Pikmin, which Olimar dubs "onions." They consist of a bulb on three long stilts, with one for each color of Pikmin. They suck up the food and produce Pikmin seeds, which can be harvested as mature Pikmin in a short while. Onions also serve as a repository for extra Pikmin, since the player is only allowed to have a hundred active at one time. After a certain number of Pikmin have been produced, the player can begin collecting parts. This may require clearing obstacles such as walls or building bridges. Once a part is reached, it will require a significant number of Pikmin to move. However, all of this has to be accomplished in a single day, for at sunset Olimar's ship and the onions take flight to avoid nocturnal predators. The player must endeavor to get all of his or her Pikmin back to their respective onions before liftoff, or else they will be lost.

Once a certain number of parts are found, a new area is opened up. At the beginning of each day, the player chooses the area to land in. Certain parts in certain areas require the player to combat a boss enemy, one that isn't seen elsewhere in the game. These battles can be very challenging, and a player should expect to attempt many of them several times before defeating the boss.

With 30 parts to find in 30 in-game "days," (30 days is how long Olimar's life support will last), there is some pressure on the player to keep up a solid pace on finding items. It is possible, at the end of a day, to replay that day. This is a helpful feature, although the player can only save at the end of the day as well. Pikmin is a relatively short game, only requiring 10-15 hours to complete the first time through. However, Pikmin has a lot of replay value for many players to compete with themselves in trying to get the shortest time to completion.

Controlling your army of Pikmin takes some getting used to. The game, however, uses the first few days as a step-by-step tutorial to learn the player the ropes before turning him or her loose. At times, these tutorials seemed almost too basic, but their net effect was to lessen the steep learning curve substantially. The controls feature some handy commands, such as one that tells all the Pikmin you have active to spit into their different color groups and wait patiently. Tasks such as utilizing bombs, though, take a lot of practice to master. I have more than once blown up a goodly number of my own Pikmin in the process of attempting to destroy a wall. As a general rule, Pikmin's controls are well thought-out, but the larger the group of Pikmin you are controlling, the more difficult it is to manage them effectively.

Overall, Pikmin is a charming and off-beat little game that smacks of Miyamoto's gaming style and philosophy. Perhaps as a result of that, Pikmin  holds appeal for everyone. Younger players will have no problems getting into the game thanks to its tutorials, and older players will find that there is a lot of depth behind the game's seemingly simple premise. This is a promising start to what will hopefully be yet another highly successful Nintendo game series. I highly recommend that you give this one at least a rental. If  you are a fan of Shigeru Miyamoto's other games, buy it immediately!

By Andy Rucker