Eight years ago i picked up Pokémon blue, many many hours later i “caught them all” then for a long time i didn't play a  Pokémon game, this year i decided to change that and i imported  Pokémon Diamond from the US. So much has changed and yet so much has stayed the same.

Pokémon Diamond starts you off in a world filled with Pokémon but not the same location as any of the previous games, there are a whole bunch of new Pokémon 107 new ones for you to throw pokéballs at.

Obviously no one in the Pokémon has yet learnt about lawnmowers as the long grass is still their main hiding place and will often result in a random battle if you stray in to it, which the game will force you to do many many times.

Graphically the game is still the same style as previous titles and they are yet to include 3d Pokémon models for fights, which i think is a shame as it would add to the enjoyment a fair bit to see fights play out properly rather than just Pokémon image move around a bit to simulate a Tackle or Bite.

The graphics are much cleaner and of a higher quality to the old games, and in what is personally one of the best Pokémon moments ever about two thirds of the way through the game as a full 3D cut scene involving a Legendary Pokémon.

The audio in the game can get a bit tiresome as often you will hear the same piece of music for quite a long time. A lot of the sound FX for fights seem to just be better quality versions from the other Pokémon games.

The major improvements in this game are the Global Trading System, Online Friend Battles/Trading and the Pokémon breeding system.

The Global Trading System or GTS as it's referred to in game as the name suggests is the system for trading globally. Firstly you have to select a Pokémon you are willing to trade to another player, then you select the Pokémon that you would like in return for it. You can pick the type of Pokémon, it's gender and it's level.

There is one condition though, that you can only request Pokémon that you have already entered in to your Pokédex, e.g. You have fought before or captured. This means that you can ask for some Pokémon that you might not come across till a fair bit later in the game and the GTS is open to players very early on. This i feel is a good and a bad thing, on one hand it means you can get Pokémon you haven't been able to see in the wild but have fought with a trainer that had one but on the other hand t means some Pokémon will not be able to be collected till very late in the game, by which point for the main story you won't bother to train it up any more as you have put so much time in to other Pokémon.

The best feature of the GTS is that you don't need to stay online or even have your DS turned on, the trade can happen at anytime as someone in japan might take a fancy to what you are offering and be able to give you the Pokémon you want in return, all you need to do is check the progress when ever you fancy going online.

The Wi-Fi battle and trading with friends is simply a system that should have really been added to Pokémon games a long time ago, it seems so obvious that you would want to trade and fight your friends without having to travel to them and yet it has only just been added. Trading with friends means that you can get what you want quickly and well worth doing as all traded Pokémon get bonus XP when fighting meaning they level up faster than regular captured Pokémon.

Pokémon Breeding has been in previous games, but this is the first time that i have come across it due to my big break in the series. Leaving two Pokémon of the same egg group will result in an egg if one is male and one female, this egg has to be carried by you for a certain number of steps until it hatches. Take a good look at Pokémon Breeding if you get this game as it can be the key to getting some fantastic Pokémon from the GTS if you breed the right gender and type as some i have found are very rare and people will give you just about anything you want for them.

Although this game takes a lot of elements from previous games and the basic style of play is the same, if you have enjoyed any of the previous Pokémon games then this is a must buy for your Nintendo DS. It offers a lot of hours of fun and with all the online features is guaranteed to last a long time and stay in your DS for weeks if not months.