Any fan of the series will probably have all ready played this; I managed to pick up a cheap Nintendo DS and was eager to try out this instalment of a great series that has generated millions of pounds for Nintendo. Long gone are the days of just 150 Pokémon, more in the region of 450 these days! After giving this instalment of the series a good play through, here is what I think about it;

Story
The story never really changes that much in any of these games, but the beauty of the game is that the story is average and a very common plot, but it excels to better than that! As a young boy/girl you venture out to the lake in your local town with your best friend, you soon find yourself in the long grass and get attacked by wild Pokémon.

Here you get to choose from the generic; Water, Fire or Grass type. Once you have made your decision you will have one of the easiest fights of your Pokémon trainer career. After the battle is done your friend (haven chosen the opposing element – if you have fire, they have water etc) will tell you that you both battled well. You are soon caught using someone else’s Pokémon and are asked to visit a nearby town to return them. On your small quest to the next town you will encounter a few fights against low level Pokémon and soon end up having the first Pokémon you battled with to keep and train as best you can!

This is where the adventure starts; you are given Poke Balls and sent on your way to fill your Pokedex with every Pokémon possible. The main quest being to go from town to town, catching and raising Pokémon, making them stronger to take down the Gym Leader in each town, earning a badge for doing each (a total of 8, like in all the older games) then make your way to the Sinnoh League to take on the Elite 4 and be crowned the best trainer. A Pokémon Master! On your way you will encounter a group of no good goons who are after other people’s Pokémon for evil. As you would expect, you get heavily involved and help take them down.

This is really all there is to the story of the game, a few little side quests here and there and you have yourself a brilliant, but simple RPG for all ages! While it stays true to what it knows you don’t mind, because it works.

Battle System
One of the main functions of the game, to catch Pokémon and battle other trainers. So if the game fails here, then surely it would in the charts! As I’m sure you would expect, it pulled it off better than ever before. Being able to use the stylus and DS to command your Pokémon’s moves, in a 1 vs. 1, or a 2 vs. 2 battles. This is the newest addition to the battle system, other than that the developers have once again stayed safe by not going to far from anything done before. Each Pokémon can have up to 4 moves, all of different Elements, affecting the strength of the move on another.

Another safe move from Nintendo on staying true to what the fans like, but just tweaking it a little bit so you feel your money has been well spent. Don’t expect anything you haven’t seen before, but then if something work, don’t change it!

Graphics
the best the series has seen by far, until now it has all been very 2-D, with little change to the appearance of houses, other characters and even the Pokémon didn’t look like they should. Brighter, bolder and revamped, it all looks beautiful, the part 3-D element works wells, and the change of scenery even creates better atmosphere within the game. There is not much more to say other than it is a very welcome change, everything looks fantastic and you wouldn’t have dreamed of it looking any better on the Nintendo DS. You will have to play it to truly appreciate the impact it has on the game.

Sound
In my opinion the sound is possibly the worst aspect, very high pitched and can become annoying, especially because all the other components work so well you will be on it for hours. The Pokémon’s “cries” are still dated and they could have spent time taking sounds from the shows or using a better sound than just what normally sounds like a screech.  While I do not want to sound negative, this is just an average aspect to a very good game!

Online
Never before in a Pokemon game like this have we seen the ability to connect via Wifi and battle anyone you want, or trade your Pokemon for some exciting new ones! The game is given a whole new life with this ability and you can spend literally hours breeding Pokemon, hatching the eggs and trading for one you really want. Taking on your friends to see who is the strongest and best trainer makes this, in my opinion, the best in the series so far.

Overall
If you have ever played one of these before and enjoyed it, then you really should have played this by now, it is better than the rest in most aspects, while it is not original, it is an improvement with graphics and battle system. Battling and trading online makes this the longest experience of Pokémon and more in-depth than ever before. More Pokémon to catch and raise, meaning this is a strong and fun RPG all the way through. It really should be in your collection, and so it deserves a very strong;
9/10