Venusaur veteran
Hey, it’s me, Bloomr’s resident Pokemon fan, back at it again with that whole ‘I wanna be the very best’ lifestyle. This time around, I’ve been going hardcore on a little something called Pokemon Unite… You may have heard of it, seeing as how it’s been downloaded over 30 million times on mobile devices!
Machamp, Mo Problems
Pokemon Unite is yet another free-to-play multiplayer online battle arena (a.k.a. MOBA) in a crowded space full of similar games. Basically what sets it aside is the appearance of the world’s cutest and most collectible creatures in the form of Pikachu and his buds, which is enough to get millions of gamers to give it a go.
What’s different is that instead of battling other trainers to get gym badges, you control your Pokemon around an arena and attempt to slam dunk some basketballs in 5-on-5 matches. I guess this is how Nintendo makes its MOBA less violent and more palatable for kiddies to play.
Snorlax One Corner
If you were to judge the game based solely on how cute it looks, the colorful art style, and (dare I say it) how kiddy it appears to be, you’d be forgiven for thinking it’s an easy-peasy game that a small child could pick up and win. That’s where you’d be wrong though. In fact, that’s what I initially thought too, but after playing this with my friends for a few weeks, I see now that it’s actually one of the most intense MOBAs ever. Part of the tension comes from how each match lasts 10 minutes, as well as the lack of an in-game scoreboard.
Now, this is the part where I tell you that as a gamer, I’m the type who obsessively clicks on Tab to bring up the scoreboard when I’m playing first-person shooters: to check my kill/death ratio and more importantly, whether I’m top frag amongst my friends.
Pikachu Can Get It If You Really Want
Taking away the ability to check the score breaks that habit and makes me focus more on the game — is this what they mean by ‘being more present in the moment’? It also means that since both teams don’t know that they’re necessarily in the lead, they can’t just play defensively once a score threshold has been reached.
You see, part of what makes each round of Unite so engrossing is the ability to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, in the spirit of Istanbul. See, towards the end of the match, a big flying Pokemon called Zapdos shows up on the map. Zapdos is what happens when you cross Sesame Street’s Big Bird with Marvel’s Electro, and it’s your team’s job to beat the stuffing out of it to get a scoring advantage over your opponents at the last second. This brings me back to my point about how Pokemon Unite can get intense. I’ve played some close games that resulted in last-minute Zapdos comebacks, which feels super satisfying especially against opponents with vastly superior Pokemon team compositions.
As Pokemon Unite is a simplified MOBA at heart, there isn’t really a game-changing meta or massively overpowered character that lets you win. Even the pay-to-win mechanics that have caused much digital ink to be spilled on gaming websites everywhere aren’t really that bad compared to other games like Star Wars Battlefront 2. What this translates to is that I can pick Venusaur, my favorite existing character in Unite, and not have teammates shout at me for not choosing a better Pokemon instead.
Greed(ent) Is Good
If there’s anything that I would complain about, it’s that the core mechanic of every Pokemon game is not as strongly represented in Unite. Yeah, you know what I’m talking about… The Pokemon-collecting aspect is not a major part of this game compared to other Pokemon titles. Unlocking each available Pokemon is a slow process that is earned through a slow dribble of in-game currency. Of course, there’s an option to spend real-world money to get them, but as a long-time trainer, it goes against my Poke-beliefs. I’ll just do it the old-fashioned way and dress up my available Pokemon in the various cosmetics. I mean, just check out my Venusaur all decked out in a Hawaiian tee. Poke-fashion is the true endgame, y’all.
Anyway, if anything you’ve read has made you curious to try Pokemon Unite, I would say just go for it. It’s easy to pick up and learn compared to other MOBAs like League of Legends, and you can win games without ever having to learn terms like ‘lanes’ and ‘jungling’ and ‘meta’, thanks to the strong rubber-banding mechanics that the game deploys to help newbies. In fact, I think the game feels better for casual gamers than it does for super-competitive types as you’re less likely to throw your phone against the wall after losing a few games in a row.
Sylveon And On And On
I have a group of friends that I play with regularly and it’s fun even when we lose because the core gameplay is solid and rewarding. Slapping other Pokemon around as Venusaur never gets old. I’m not sure if I’ll ever spend money on Unite to be the very best like no one ever was, but as long as I’m having fun, I’ll keep coming back to catch ’em all.
