In the late 80s and early 90s, I was hopelessly addicted to computer games. I obsessed over SimCity and Empire as I slowly built thriving metropolii out of nothing and plotted to take over the world. I spent hours playing Zork as I explored imaginary worlds and solved riddles to beat the game. And I adored Lemmings, a game where the player had to guide scads of brainless critters through a series of puzzles to rescue them. It has been years since I have felt the same attraction to a game. Oh, I have liked many games. But there haven't been many that have made me become obsessed with my creations and with reaching my goals. Now I have discovered Pikmin, and all of that has changed.
Pikmin, a game for the Nintendo GameCube, is the brainchild of Shigeru Miyamoto, the same guy who came up with the Mario, Legend of Zelda, and Donkey Kong game lines. Miyamoto knows his stuff and manages to combine all of the elements that I loved in those old PC games into Pikmin
The story of Pikmin is relatively simple. Captain Olimar is a space explorer who crash-lands on a planet where oxygen is plentiful in the atmosphere. Unfortunately, oxygen is poisonous for our little 3-inch tall hero. (That towering height includes the little antenna and light coming out of the top of his space helmet!) His life support system will only support him for 30 days, after which time the captain will certainly die. But with the parts to his space ship scattered all over the planet and with his small size, he has a long struggle, lonely struggle ahead of him.
That is until he discovers the little creatures he dubs "Pikmin". These wide-eyed creatures are about an inch tall and come in three colors. The red are impervious to fire. The blue have mouths and gills which allow them to walk in water without drowning. The yellow weigh less than the others, which allows them to be tossed higher. They can also carry bomb-rocks, which makes them very handy to have around. Each Pikmin may be in one of three ranks: leaf (the lowest), bud, and flower (the highest). The leaf Pikmin are the slowest while the flower are the fastest. Flower Pikmin also have the advantage of having a higher probability of becoming seed when they die. Pikmin gain rank through being seed longer or by drinking special nectar. They can lose rank by having the petals knocked off of them in battle. The Pikmin spend nights in corresponding colored "onions" or ships. Things may be brought to the onions, which convert the items into seeds for more Pikmin. Captain Olimar quickly finds that he can use these creatures to help him collect the parts to re-assemble his ship and to return home. To play the game, one must build the population of Pikmin, locate all the parts, and bring them back to Captain Olimar's ship.
Game Play
The game play of Pikmin is fairly simple. The first day after Captain Olimar crashes onto the planet is spent discovering the red Pikmin and learning the basic controls of the game. The player learns how to pluck a Pikmin seed from the ground, how to grow new Pikmin, and how to use them to assist in the retrieval of ship parts. For the most part, only a few buttons from the controller are used to perform all the tasks. So the basics really don't take that long to pick up.
Play commences through five areas, which gradually become available as the capability of Captain Olimar's ship increases. It is not necessary to retrieve all of the ship parts in a given area before being able to move to the next area. It simply depends on the number and kind of parts retrieved.
The game is divided into a series of days. Each day has the same sort of cycle. The player selects the area in which to play. He then goes through the day growing Pikmin, eliminating a bunch of rather nasty predators, and tracking down parts. The predators vary from fierce ladybug type creatures called bulborbs (and yes, they DO bite!) to large armored beetles that spit rocks (armored cannon beetles) to creatures that spit fire. The game does not sport a wide variety of enemies, but they can be tricky to beat unless one studies their behavior as well as that of the Pikmin. When the day ends, Captain Olimar gives a log entry along with the progress of growing Pikmin and retrieving parts. The player may then choose to save progress, to continue without saving, or to start the day all over again.
Time is tracked through a sort of calendar on the game display. A sun moves across a scale to show the progress through the day. Counters show the day number so that the player knows how much time is left before Captain Olimar must depart. It is important to note that there is no saving during the day, so it's possible to waste a bunch of time by blowing it in the last time unit for the day! This can be frustrating, but it certainly takes all of the shame out of restarting the day. The actual time to complete a day in the game varies widely depending on the amount of time one spends studying maps and the number of time one restarts the day.
The movements of the Pikmin is controlled with the A and X buttons and with the control stick on the right-hand side of the controller. Most of the Pikmin are obedient and do what they are supposed to do. Some are not. They fall down while carrying things, wander off to more interesting things or to tasks that they haven't been commanded to do, and walk right into dangerous conditions when they really should know better. Getting a Pikmin to perform exactly as planned is one of the great joys of the game. Having the red ones walk en masse into water and die is not.
Graphics
The graphics and animation of this game are just adorable. That may be the kiss of death for some games enthusiasts, but not me! I fell in love with the first Pikmin when he popped out of the ground and gave me a rather curious look. Afterwards, the Pikmin have different expressions for different situations. When they accomplish an assigned task, they hop up and down with glee. When another Pikmin dies, they have a rather sad, resigned look (complete with slumped shoulders and hanging head). When one drowns, it splashes its arms around in panic. When the Pikmin or their enemies die, the image of their spirit rises above the remains. The animation makes it very easy to get involved with the Pikmin to the point where one almost feels sad when one (or several) die.
The graphics of Pikmin are exceptionally smooth when small numbers of Pikmin are being led. When the numbers get closer to 100, which is the maximum number of Pikmin that may be controlled at one time, the graphics tend to get jittery. While this was distracting, I didn't feel that it was significant enough to greatly reduce the play of the game.
Dialog
Captain Olimar's dialog and log entries are cleverly written but far from simplistic. Some passages are rather challenging, especially in the description of ship parts. Adults shouldn't have problems with it. However the following log entry should give you some idea why the youngest players will certainly need someone to read the dialog (and explain it) to them.
23 Days Since Impact
This is an ever-surprising ecosystem. What has caused this planet's vegetation to grow in such gigantic proportions. In comparison to the Pikmin and the other creatures of this planet, the scale of the plant life here seems inexplicable. Perhaps, long ago, creatures of incomprehensible size walked the surface of this planet. Just imagine!
Some of the dialog is humorous like the following:
9 Days Since Impact
Oh, horrors! A bomb rock explosion engulfed my Pikmin! That last horrified facial expression is burned into my memory... I must review my procedures for handling Pikmin with bomb-rocks so that I do not repeat this mistake.
(Note: You are not required to have Pikmin engulfed in bomb-rock explosions. But I did. I can still remember the sad cries of the poor creatures. Sniff!)
Sound
The sound of Pikmin is good but not spectacular. The music behind the game is not overly cute nor repetitive or loud enough to be annoying. I have noticed that the sound on this game is lower than on Luigi's Mansion or Super Smash Brothers Melee. This sometimes means that the person who plays Pikmin after one of the others must turn up the sound before playing and turn it back down after playing.
Still, it's a small price to pay for the being able to hear the sounds of the Pikmin. They sound something like the Lemmings of old, and their cries of pain and the battle charge call when they are directed to attack something is worth hearing at least once. The game also gives audio cues to allow the player to monitor different teams of Pikmin working on tasks simultaneously. This comes in very handy as tasks must be done simultaneously in order to complete them all in the allotted number of days.
Replay Value
Pikmin is addictive enough that one can easily play it multiple times. The first time I played thirty days of the game, I failed to get all the parts. So I saw one ending. Then I played it again and did a little better. Still, I didn't get all the parts. Then I played it again. I didn't get all the parts but I did get enough parts for Captain Olimar to escape the planet. I still haven't gotten the last part. (It's a real bugger!)
I still enjoy playing the game again and again though. Part of it is seeing how quickly I can collect the parts while losing the least of my precious Pikmin. Part of it is just watching my Pikmin population grow. Even though they are just small, mouthless creatures, I am constantly reminded of Horton Hears a Who and "A person's a person no matter how small."
For those who are just interested in Pikmin population growth, Pikmin also has a Challenge Mode that allows the player to see how many Pikmin can be sprouted in a fixed amount of time. There is a certain strategy to this, as it means being able to control the little guys.
Overall impressions
Pikmin is rated "E for Everyone", and I agree. It's not so violent that one will have reservations allowing a child to play it. It teaches teamwork, strategy, and requires puzzle-solving skill to reach some of the parts.
The only problem is that Pikmin is highly addictive. What's more, it is very easy to lose track of the time while playing. I know that time is passing while playing it, but I never have a really good feeling for how much unless I keep one eye on our wall clock. That's a bad combination! One day, I spent nine hours in a row playing the game. I would feel like a bad mother, except my daughter was having such a good time watching me play and listening to me yell, "Silly guys! Don't go THAT way! Get over here!"
Out of the GameCube games that I have played thus far, this is the first that I would say is a "must have" for GameCube owners. Get it! But before playing it, be sure to tell family and friends that you may not be seeing them for awhile.
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