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"The Jet Gamer" Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Gates to Infinity
8 years ago
It’s time to play one of the Pokémon games from the main side series of Pokémon games.
Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Gates to Infinity
I haven’t played a Mystery Dungeon game in quite some time, and this is the first one I am playing for the review series as well. Pokémon mystery dungeon I know isn’t a game for everyone, as many people are used to the main series, but after being around this long, apparently some people enjoy this side series quite a bit. Let us take a closer look and see if this is another Pokémon game worthy of a good score or not shall we?
Gameplay
The basic gameplay of Gates to Infinity is essentially unchanged from previous games, though with small tweaks here and there of course. You still are taking control of a team of Pokémon, as you explore grid based dungeons where you go from floor to floor, collecting items, and battling other Pokémon as you work to get a job done. That part of the gameplay is the same, but the small changes can be noticed by long time veterans, but newbies likely aren’t going to notice them or even really care I bet. If I hadn’t looked it up for example, to remind myself of past games, I would have forgotten that there was a hunger meter in the older games, which is absent here. While some people will feel this takes away some of the challenge with having to stay fed as you play, this does mean there is one less thing to worry about and you can explore the dungeons at your leisure without having to worry about them starving and losing health. You are still roaming around attacking other Pokémon as you naturally heal yourself as you roam around. You just don’t run out of that ability due to a hunger meter. While it is an added challenge when you had it, I honestly don’t mind it not being there. While I could have seen that being some sort of difficulty option maybe, I don’t think it’s essential. You can now just concentrate on exploring and battling. Between missions, you are in your hub area, which is a town and a customizable area where your Pokémon lives. The town is for when you want to talk to local Pokémon friends, or if you need to do some side shopping. Your home area is like your secret base in a way, because you can customize it. You get to make areas be a certain setting type, such as plains, or a forest, and in those areas you can create your own shops that grow or do what you need them to do. For example, you can have yourself an oran berry field, or you could have a little mini game area where you can win some prizes. This is all customizable and up to you what you do with it, so it is a neat little gameplay option that you are essentially making your own little town around your house. Most of this isn’t really required, but I found it neat. I just wish there were more shop options or I wish it was possible to make it a legit town and not just tons of shops. You go on story missions often in this game, and these will be a bulk of the game as the side missions are about half the gameplay, and the main story is the other half in a way. You run around a dungeon or dungeons in some case one after the other, and you have to advance the story. Here is the thing though, you do at times feel and are forced to play the story and not the side missions. There are many times where the game flat out tells you, you have to go on these story missions now and that you can’t train or gather supplies at this time, which is a bit often as well. I don’t mind getting the story over with, which I like to do at times, but I would like the choice of when I could go sometimes as there were a few times I might would have wanted to do some of the side jobs. The side jobs consist of you and your partner taking a note from the bulletin board by your house and going out to fulfill a mission during the day. This mission is how you get supplies to build your little village, and it gets you some money and needed supplies. However, one drawback is that you are only allowed to do one mission at a time, even if multiple missions take place in the same location. You can only do them one at a time. I remember the older games letting you do many at a time if you wished, but here you are restricted to one. I feel this does slow progress on side missions down quite a bit, but it can still be done. It just requires more trips to gather needed supplies, which can be interrupted by forced story missions. The difficulty isn’t too bad either, as long as you train your Pokémon at least somewhat, get a good move pool that you can work with easily, and you carry plenty of items for just in case situations to where you need to either heal, recover, or defend yourself in some way. The only time I felt cheated was with the multi hit moves, as they are so random to begin with, and some Pokémon get very lucky with them, and it can end up KO’ing you without warning at all. I’m glad there are revive items in the game, but for those that have friends, you can still use the friend coming to rescue you thing. You have to have that street pass thing though, and that isn’t something I have, so it wasn’t useful for me. One last thing I do have to mention, that maybe I should have mentioned earlier though is the Pokémon that you play as during the game. Unlike some of the other games, you only have five choices. You basically are picking from the gen four starters, Axew, and Pikachu of course. You get to pick which one you play as and then which will be your partner throughout the game. While I like getting to pick my own Pokémon and partner to play with, just having five choices is very limiting in my opinion. That is pretty much the basic gameplay of the game. You are really just going in dungeons, exploring, doing jobs, and getting money and items to help with you other missions and your town. It’s not too bad, but I did point out a few flaws I noticed as well. Still, the game is pretty fun I would say.
Story
This is the bulk of this game and it always has been with the mystery dungeon games. The base story has the same plot of the previous games, in that you are a human that has been turned into a Pokémon and you are wondering why you are there and if there is a way to go back while helping out the other Pokémon around you. However, the rest of the story seems to be unique and is what the bulk of the game is about. The Pokémon of this world all appear to be turning cold and mean to each other as everyone seems to slowly growing to trust no one and everyone is looking out for themselves and that’s it. Basically, other Pokémon are constantly not able to trust each other and make friends as everyone seems to just be out for themselves or just trying to make things up to constantly get their own way. Everyone is trying to use each other instead of actually trusting one another. Your Partner Pokémon, that you pick when you pick your own character, is trying to build his own paradise on a set of land he purchases in the beginning of the game. Your character has suddenly appeared at around the same time your partner is getting this land and the two of you are then setting out to try and help your partner fulfill his dreams. Your Pokémon though has been having odd dreams about some Pokémon that is in danger and you are trying to figure out what they all mean and where this trouble could possibly be taking place at as well. The bulk of the story after that is you and your partner building his paradise, as you work to try and gain new friends, get more people to join your team, and you try and figure out why have been brought to the Pokémon world. The story is actually pretty good and moves at a nice pace as you watch your partner slowly become more open and as the people around the town slowly become nicer. More and more Pokémon that are cold or not too friendly slowly start wanting to join your team, which makes you have more choices for Pokémon when you are in the dungeons. Some of the key Pokémon you recruit would be Pokémon like Dunsparce, Emolga, and Verizon. These three will be common Pokémon you will learn a lot about throughout the game, and they do a good job with their personalities and making them all unique and likable characters. This is one of those games I feel you should experience for yourselves in a way, because the story is pretty good. I don’t want to tell you every little detail, but you really do grow close to these characters, and I honestly wouldn’t mind seeing more with them really. This is honestly good material I could see people using to make their own stories with really. It’s good, other than the game using some of the same material with you being the human in a Pokémon’s body scenario that has been used several times in this series now.
Graphics
The graphics are pretty good throughout the game. The town is detailed nicely, the cutscenes look smooth and well done, and really, most things look well done and not skimped over really. Everything is usually bright and sunny, but the game knows how to make things sort of dark or dreary when you go to areas that exude such feelings as well. The pictures of Pokémon when they are talking aren’t just still pictures either all the time. When your Pokémon or the other Pokémon show expressions or emotions, the still photos change to match it, which is a nice touch and something that does add to the emotion of the story, as there are lots of emotions throughout this game. Some of the only things I would say with the graphics that are below the high standards I see though this game is that some Pokémon do look a little odd when they are roaming around the dungeons. You can sometimes tell Pokémon that are not meant to be moving around much look a little odd when they are moving around a lot, plus you are looking at smaller versions of some Pokémon as well. The still photos of the Pokémon are great, and often times look better than the models themselves. They still look pretty good though, and really, other than some areas that I feel could use some cleaning up, the game looks pretty good and does well with its emotions.
Sound
I must say, at first I wasn’t thinking too much of the music as it was sort of average, but the more of the music I listened to throughout the game, the better I felt it was getting. It never got to that point where it was feeling like it was super memorable, but I could see much of it being very relaxing music someone would want to listen to while they were working or something like that. It is just very relaxing and does a good job at times of being a nice little sound distraction while you are roaming the dungeons of this game. You do at times wish the game was more than just text of course, but I think I get it. Even if this game is about Pokémon talking, you don’t need the voices when the emotions and writing are done well enough that expressions and emotion are done well enough to where sound isn’t needed to get everything you want to express across to the audience. This is a good example of that really, so mostly you are just listening to sound effects and the music, but they are still good and something pleasant to listen to overall.
Control
The controls seem find to me really. I don’t think I really had any problem with the general play of the game as controlling your Pokémon in the dungeon and having them do their moves is pretty straight forward and easily explained. My only thing is that I sometimes think there were a few control issues in the speed of certain things that controls normally can sometimes make better. For example, doing certain things can sometimes take too many steps I feel that could have been accomplished more quickly otherwise. The biggest thing though is that there doesn’t appear to be any text speed up button. You are at times waiting for text to finish going up for you to read that you sometimes wish would go by a little more quickly. Maybe that’s a little nitpicky thing, but after a while, you do at times want the text to speed up a bit, especially if you accidentally click on an NPC more than once. Some of the NPC’s can talk for a bit, and if you accidentally click on that long conversation again, you have to sit through it at the slower speed yet again, instead of being able to speed it up when necessary. That is a little small thing with the controls, but in a game with so much text, you do sometimes want it to go by a little more quickly than it does. Other than that though, the controls are fine and pretty self-explanatory once you learn what they want from you.
Replay Value
The replay value is pretty good here in that there are a massive number of dungeons you can go roaming through, and making your paradise be the way you want it is going to take some time as well. There is also the part where you can go out and try and recruit all the Pokémon out there to be members of your teams, and just trying to get so many of the large number of items out there while you are getting the dozens of Pokémon out there to level up and be good members of your team. There is lots of replayability after you finish the main game, if you wish to play through it some more. Replaying the main story is only going to be different in that you can choose different Pokémon to play as on your do go through, but the main story is the same. Yes, the way paradise gets arranged and what Pokémon you take along with you during side missions and such will all be different, it is just the main game that won’t be that different. This is one of those games where a lot of your hours are going to come from after the main game things to do, if you wish to do them, as lots of this stuff is optional. That does make for good replayability if you wish to get more out of it or feel you don’t want to move on yet. With so many different dungeons to explore, you are going to be at it for a very long time if you want just want to level up, build and recruit for your team. That’s what the bulk of the replayability is about, which to some people is going to feel like quite a bit of grinding, which at times it is. Just be sure you are okay with that when you get this game. Though if you are familiar with Pokémon in general, you know there is a lot of grinding involved with it anyway, so you likely already know that and are used to it or don’t mind it too much. Still, other than grinding and a similar story mode experience, there is still a lot to do after you beat the main game.
Overall, I have to say I was impressed with this entry in the Pokémon Mystery Dungeon series and I feel it is another good entry in the series. I know it isn’t perfect, as there are a few flaws here and there, such the game forcing you to do the story a bit quickly, and the main story not being that different on multiple playthroughs, or even the story still using the base human in a Pokémon’s body idea, but overall, I must say the rest of it still has that mystery dungeon feel I’ve grown to know over the years, while still having enough to keep me interested. The story is a real treat I must say, as there are even parts in it, especially at the end that can leave you a bit teary eyed if you like certain kinds of stories. I know I knock the idea of the human in the Pokémon’s body again scenario, but you can sort of see why they still use it, as it does still work, even if the ending is a bit predictable. I would say if you want to try a Pokémon side series, this is the one to get and there is a reason this series has been around since the GBA. It is a good series. Who doesn’t want to see the Pokémon actually talk and have personalities instead of just being monsters that fight each other at the command of a human. It’s neat, and good story to boot. Go give it a try, and let your imagination run wild. Who knows, these are the kinds of universes that fanfics seem to easily be made out of it.
Overall, in my opinion at least, I give Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Gates to Infinity an eight point five out of ten.
Gameplay: 8
Story: 9
Graphics: 8
Sound: 9
Control: 9
Replay Value: 9
Overall: 8.5
Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Gates to Infinity
I haven’t played a Mystery Dungeon game in quite some time, and this is the first one I am playing for the review series as well. Pokémon mystery dungeon I know isn’t a game for everyone, as many people are used to the main series, but after being around this long, apparently some people enjoy this side series quite a bit. Let us take a closer look and see if this is another Pokémon game worthy of a good score or not shall we?
Gameplay
The basic gameplay of Gates to Infinity is essentially unchanged from previous games, though with small tweaks here and there of course. You still are taking control of a team of Pokémon, as you explore grid based dungeons where you go from floor to floor, collecting items, and battling other Pokémon as you work to get a job done. That part of the gameplay is the same, but the small changes can be noticed by long time veterans, but newbies likely aren’t going to notice them or even really care I bet. If I hadn’t looked it up for example, to remind myself of past games, I would have forgotten that there was a hunger meter in the older games, which is absent here. While some people will feel this takes away some of the challenge with having to stay fed as you play, this does mean there is one less thing to worry about and you can explore the dungeons at your leisure without having to worry about them starving and losing health. You are still roaming around attacking other Pokémon as you naturally heal yourself as you roam around. You just don’t run out of that ability due to a hunger meter. While it is an added challenge when you had it, I honestly don’t mind it not being there. While I could have seen that being some sort of difficulty option maybe, I don’t think it’s essential. You can now just concentrate on exploring and battling. Between missions, you are in your hub area, which is a town and a customizable area where your Pokémon lives. The town is for when you want to talk to local Pokémon friends, or if you need to do some side shopping. Your home area is like your secret base in a way, because you can customize it. You get to make areas be a certain setting type, such as plains, or a forest, and in those areas you can create your own shops that grow or do what you need them to do. For example, you can have yourself an oran berry field, or you could have a little mini game area where you can win some prizes. This is all customizable and up to you what you do with it, so it is a neat little gameplay option that you are essentially making your own little town around your house. Most of this isn’t really required, but I found it neat. I just wish there were more shop options or I wish it was possible to make it a legit town and not just tons of shops. You go on story missions often in this game, and these will be a bulk of the game as the side missions are about half the gameplay, and the main story is the other half in a way. You run around a dungeon or dungeons in some case one after the other, and you have to advance the story. Here is the thing though, you do at times feel and are forced to play the story and not the side missions. There are many times where the game flat out tells you, you have to go on these story missions now and that you can’t train or gather supplies at this time, which is a bit often as well. I don’t mind getting the story over with, which I like to do at times, but I would like the choice of when I could go sometimes as there were a few times I might would have wanted to do some of the side jobs. The side jobs consist of you and your partner taking a note from the bulletin board by your house and going out to fulfill a mission during the day. This mission is how you get supplies to build your little village, and it gets you some money and needed supplies. However, one drawback is that you are only allowed to do one mission at a time, even if multiple missions take place in the same location. You can only do them one at a time. I remember the older games letting you do many at a time if you wished, but here you are restricted to one. I feel this does slow progress on side missions down quite a bit, but it can still be done. It just requires more trips to gather needed supplies, which can be interrupted by forced story missions. The difficulty isn’t too bad either, as long as you train your Pokémon at least somewhat, get a good move pool that you can work with easily, and you carry plenty of items for just in case situations to where you need to either heal, recover, or defend yourself in some way. The only time I felt cheated was with the multi hit moves, as they are so random to begin with, and some Pokémon get very lucky with them, and it can end up KO’ing you without warning at all. I’m glad there are revive items in the game, but for those that have friends, you can still use the friend coming to rescue you thing. You have to have that street pass thing though, and that isn’t something I have, so it wasn’t useful for me. One last thing I do have to mention, that maybe I should have mentioned earlier though is the Pokémon that you play as during the game. Unlike some of the other games, you only have five choices. You basically are picking from the gen four starters, Axew, and Pikachu of course. You get to pick which one you play as and then which will be your partner throughout the game. While I like getting to pick my own Pokémon and partner to play with, just having five choices is very limiting in my opinion. That is pretty much the basic gameplay of the game. You are really just going in dungeons, exploring, doing jobs, and getting money and items to help with you other missions and your town. It’s not too bad, but I did point out a few flaws I noticed as well. Still, the game is pretty fun I would say.
Story
This is the bulk of this game and it always has been with the mystery dungeon games. The base story has the same plot of the previous games, in that you are a human that has been turned into a Pokémon and you are wondering why you are there and if there is a way to go back while helping out the other Pokémon around you. However, the rest of the story seems to be unique and is what the bulk of the game is about. The Pokémon of this world all appear to be turning cold and mean to each other as everyone seems to slowly growing to trust no one and everyone is looking out for themselves and that’s it. Basically, other Pokémon are constantly not able to trust each other and make friends as everyone seems to just be out for themselves or just trying to make things up to constantly get their own way. Everyone is trying to use each other instead of actually trusting one another. Your Partner Pokémon, that you pick when you pick your own character, is trying to build his own paradise on a set of land he purchases in the beginning of the game. Your character has suddenly appeared at around the same time your partner is getting this land and the two of you are then setting out to try and help your partner fulfill his dreams. Your Pokémon though has been having odd dreams about some Pokémon that is in danger and you are trying to figure out what they all mean and where this trouble could possibly be taking place at as well. The bulk of the story after that is you and your partner building his paradise, as you work to try and gain new friends, get more people to join your team, and you try and figure out why have been brought to the Pokémon world. The story is actually pretty good and moves at a nice pace as you watch your partner slowly become more open and as the people around the town slowly become nicer. More and more Pokémon that are cold or not too friendly slowly start wanting to join your team, which makes you have more choices for Pokémon when you are in the dungeons. Some of the key Pokémon you recruit would be Pokémon like Dunsparce, Emolga, and Verizon. These three will be common Pokémon you will learn a lot about throughout the game, and they do a good job with their personalities and making them all unique and likable characters. This is one of those games I feel you should experience for yourselves in a way, because the story is pretty good. I don’t want to tell you every little detail, but you really do grow close to these characters, and I honestly wouldn’t mind seeing more with them really. This is honestly good material I could see people using to make their own stories with really. It’s good, other than the game using some of the same material with you being the human in a Pokémon’s body scenario that has been used several times in this series now.
Graphics
The graphics are pretty good throughout the game. The town is detailed nicely, the cutscenes look smooth and well done, and really, most things look well done and not skimped over really. Everything is usually bright and sunny, but the game knows how to make things sort of dark or dreary when you go to areas that exude such feelings as well. The pictures of Pokémon when they are talking aren’t just still pictures either all the time. When your Pokémon or the other Pokémon show expressions or emotions, the still photos change to match it, which is a nice touch and something that does add to the emotion of the story, as there are lots of emotions throughout this game. Some of the only things I would say with the graphics that are below the high standards I see though this game is that some Pokémon do look a little odd when they are roaming around the dungeons. You can sometimes tell Pokémon that are not meant to be moving around much look a little odd when they are moving around a lot, plus you are looking at smaller versions of some Pokémon as well. The still photos of the Pokémon are great, and often times look better than the models themselves. They still look pretty good though, and really, other than some areas that I feel could use some cleaning up, the game looks pretty good and does well with its emotions.
Sound
I must say, at first I wasn’t thinking too much of the music as it was sort of average, but the more of the music I listened to throughout the game, the better I felt it was getting. It never got to that point where it was feeling like it was super memorable, but I could see much of it being very relaxing music someone would want to listen to while they were working or something like that. It is just very relaxing and does a good job at times of being a nice little sound distraction while you are roaming the dungeons of this game. You do at times wish the game was more than just text of course, but I think I get it. Even if this game is about Pokémon talking, you don’t need the voices when the emotions and writing are done well enough that expressions and emotion are done well enough to where sound isn’t needed to get everything you want to express across to the audience. This is a good example of that really, so mostly you are just listening to sound effects and the music, but they are still good and something pleasant to listen to overall.
Control
The controls seem find to me really. I don’t think I really had any problem with the general play of the game as controlling your Pokémon in the dungeon and having them do their moves is pretty straight forward and easily explained. My only thing is that I sometimes think there were a few control issues in the speed of certain things that controls normally can sometimes make better. For example, doing certain things can sometimes take too many steps I feel that could have been accomplished more quickly otherwise. The biggest thing though is that there doesn’t appear to be any text speed up button. You are at times waiting for text to finish going up for you to read that you sometimes wish would go by a little more quickly. Maybe that’s a little nitpicky thing, but after a while, you do at times want the text to speed up a bit, especially if you accidentally click on an NPC more than once. Some of the NPC’s can talk for a bit, and if you accidentally click on that long conversation again, you have to sit through it at the slower speed yet again, instead of being able to speed it up when necessary. That is a little small thing with the controls, but in a game with so much text, you do sometimes want it to go by a little more quickly than it does. Other than that though, the controls are fine and pretty self-explanatory once you learn what they want from you.
Replay Value
The replay value is pretty good here in that there are a massive number of dungeons you can go roaming through, and making your paradise be the way you want it is going to take some time as well. There is also the part where you can go out and try and recruit all the Pokémon out there to be members of your teams, and just trying to get so many of the large number of items out there while you are getting the dozens of Pokémon out there to level up and be good members of your team. There is lots of replayability after you finish the main game, if you wish to play through it some more. Replaying the main story is only going to be different in that you can choose different Pokémon to play as on your do go through, but the main story is the same. Yes, the way paradise gets arranged and what Pokémon you take along with you during side missions and such will all be different, it is just the main game that won’t be that different. This is one of those games where a lot of your hours are going to come from after the main game things to do, if you wish to do them, as lots of this stuff is optional. That does make for good replayability if you wish to get more out of it or feel you don’t want to move on yet. With so many different dungeons to explore, you are going to be at it for a very long time if you want just want to level up, build and recruit for your team. That’s what the bulk of the replayability is about, which to some people is going to feel like quite a bit of grinding, which at times it is. Just be sure you are okay with that when you get this game. Though if you are familiar with Pokémon in general, you know there is a lot of grinding involved with it anyway, so you likely already know that and are used to it or don’t mind it too much. Still, other than grinding and a similar story mode experience, there is still a lot to do after you beat the main game.
Overall, I have to say I was impressed with this entry in the Pokémon Mystery Dungeon series and I feel it is another good entry in the series. I know it isn’t perfect, as there are a few flaws here and there, such the game forcing you to do the story a bit quickly, and the main story not being that different on multiple playthroughs, or even the story still using the base human in a Pokémon’s body idea, but overall, I must say the rest of it still has that mystery dungeon feel I’ve grown to know over the years, while still having enough to keep me interested. The story is a real treat I must say, as there are even parts in it, especially at the end that can leave you a bit teary eyed if you like certain kinds of stories. I know I knock the idea of the human in the Pokémon’s body again scenario, but you can sort of see why they still use it, as it does still work, even if the ending is a bit predictable. I would say if you want to try a Pokémon side series, this is the one to get and there is a reason this series has been around since the GBA. It is a good series. Who doesn’t want to see the Pokémon actually talk and have personalities instead of just being monsters that fight each other at the command of a human. It’s neat, and good story to boot. Go give it a try, and let your imagination run wild. Who knows, these are the kinds of universes that fanfics seem to easily be made out of it.
Overall, in my opinion at least, I give Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Gates to Infinity an eight point five out of ten.
Gameplay: 8
Story: 9
Graphics: 8
Sound: 9
Control: 9
Replay Value: 9
Overall: 8.5
