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Sucked

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 4 / 14
Date: October 04, 2006
Author: Amazon User

This game just sucked. There wasn't a regular walk around battle style like in the other games, the battle system didn't work, there wasn't enough story line to make up for it. DONT BUY THIS GAME. YOU WILL BE SORRY.

Good idea, but really bad game

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 0 / 4
Date: December 29, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I bought this game with high expectations(it's a Pokemon game, after all). This game is horrible. I thought this game would be a traditional Pokemon game. It isn't. Heck, it isn't even developed by Nintendo, rather by "Chun Soft", a Japanese company without an English website. Don't waste your money on this crap.

Poor Service

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 0 / 8
Date: January 09, 2007
Author: Amazon User

My American Express card was charged, and I never received the game. I go ZERO customer service help and rsponse on this item. Very poor service.

don't buy this

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 1 / 2
Date: July 04, 2007
Author: Amazon User

This is by far the worst pokemon game tha I have ever played. I even bought the walkthrough and I still could not make heads or tails out of this game. The grafics are good but that's about it. The story line could use more work, and the controls could be a little esay're.

The Game Itself is a Mystery

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 17 / 21
Date: September 21, 2006
Author: Amazon User

The truth is, I really wanted to like this game. I really did. It's all because the Pokemon RPGs of the past have been good. The craze for the Red and Blue versions, and then the far superior Gold and Silver versions (arguably the best of the lot). Then Ruby and Sapphire came along. All these RPGs were simple, yet for some reason delightful to play. Now Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Red and Blue come out, and it seems I had my hopes up for this one. It's no where near as interesting, and it's even sadder that even on the Gameboy Advance the game just didn't go above and beyond.

The basic premise of the story is, like every Pokemon game, rather simple. This one throws in a different twist, though. You're an aspiring trainer who one day falls asleep only to wake up as a pokemon. The pokemon you wake up as depends on how you answer the questions at the start of the new game. You'll also be able to choose a Pokemon partner who will be the one that awakens you. You and your partner will find yourself in a world completely full of pokemon. Unfortunately all is not safe. You and your ally will soon discover that other pokemon are always in need of help in this new world. So it's up to you to answer ditress calls of other pokemon, go to the specified dungeon and save them. As far as the story goes it's really not all that bad. It's full of the simplistic charm that Pokemon games are well known for. Plus, it's about time we actually got to play as the pokemon and not the trainer. Throughout the entire game you'll never spot one trainer. Ever.

Since there are no trainers, one has to wonder how to expand upon his or her party. Well, you still get new pokemon from the wild as you did before, but it's slightly different. When you defeat a wild pokemon they will offer to join your rescue team. It's up to you whether or not you want to take them. Learning moves however is almost exactly the same as previous games. You'll learn moves as you level up, or by TM's. That's all there is to learning moves. Your pokemon can also combine moves for some devastating attacks. You'll also still have to pay attention to types. Grass is weak vs. fire. Fire weak vs. water, etc. If you're a pokemon veteran, you've probably got that all memorized by now.

All these things are really engrossing, and they've got some neat things going for it, but it doesn't separate from a few things. The dungeons you go through each have floors that are randomly generated. These dungeons aren't really exciting in design. In fact, each and every floor looks virtually the same. The wild pokemon in each dungeon also just aren't plentiful enough. You'll encounter the same three or four pokemon until you get to the end of a dungeon. This wouldn't be so bad if battling were actually somewhat fun. You can wander around with up to four pokemon at a time in your party, yourself included. The problem is, these wild pokemon don't even begin to put up a fight, even when they have a clear type advantage. The other problem is that you can only control one pokemon. The AI will take over the rest, and it's not really all that good in most cases. Even with the lackluster AI, though, you could do virtually the same strategy for just about every battle you get into. Boss battles aren't a real challenge, either. In some cases you can even just sit back and let your AI controlled characters do all the work, and they'll win the battle with hardly a scratch, despite the AI! This includes bosses, mind you. This goes to show just how bad the AI for your enemies is. Rinse and repeat through the entire story mode. After a while this process gets really repetative, especially considering the lack of the challenge the game has going for it. The random dungeon generator doesn't help either. They don't always come out too good. You could, for example, enter the next floor right next to the exit.

The world also isn't all that big. There's nothing you can do on the world map except shop and save. That's it. There's really not much, if any, exploration at all in this game.

What's really urking about this game is that the most interesting aspects of it can't be done until after you've completed the story mode. Your pokemon evolve in this game, but they are incapable of doing so until you've completed the main story. That means Bulbasaur will be Bulbasaur until you complete the main story, regardless of what level you bring him to. Other aspects of the game like being able to take control of other pokemon, or abilities don't become availible until after you've completed the story mode. If some of these aspects had been included in the actual story mode the game could've been so much better and more interesting to play. Instead the story mode gets stale and repetative before it ever actually gets good. And that's sad considering the story isn't half bad for a pokemon game.

What would a Pokemon game be without two versions? There's the Blue version which is on the Nintendo DS, and then the Red version which is on the GBA. Don't be fooled, however. They're basically the same game. Just like every other set of Pokemon games, though, each version has exclusive pokemon. It's yet another ploy to get you to either convince your friend to get the opposite version you have or to just go out and buy both. The Nintendo DS version is, of course, the better of the two.

The saving grace of this set up, however, is all the connectivity features that can be done. If you insert both games into your DS at a time, you can import Pokemon from one game to another. This is an easy way to start collecting all of the 387 pokemon to be had throughout the game. It's very interesting. It's also really neat that you can trade items, missions, and pokemon this way. In addition, if you get KO'd in a dungeon and your party gets wiped out, you could send out a message to your friend and he/she will have to come and rescue you. The connectivity features are very engrossing. And of course, you can hook up via wireless (for DS owners) or link cable (GBA owners) and battle with your friends.

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon doesn't really look all that great. It's no surprise; Pokemon games never look fantastic graphically. The two versions look exactly the same. The game is certainly colorful, but there's just not enough varitey in the enviornments. All the floors in the dungeons use the same boring backgrounds and such. For the Gameboy Advance this isn't nearly as hurtful as it is to the DS version. However, the GBA is capable of much more when compared to even early GBA games. Even in battle the pokemon still aren't that animated with their attacks. Pokemon has been this way since it's initial release on the outdated original Gameboy.

Worse than the graphics is the sound, though. A lot of the sound effects and such come directly from the normal gameboy games that are almost ten years old. The music itself isn't so bad, but it is quite repetative. Again, however, it's no surprise because as usual, Pokemon games don't usually push a system to its limits.

It's hard to suggest Pokemon Myster Dungeon. It's a Pokemon game, but it's a rather bland Pokemon game. It's neat that you can finally play as a Pokemon, but the game as a whole could've been presented far better than it actually was. There's little variety to it, actually, which is really sad considering how big and expansive previous Pokemon games are. It's got plenty of rescue missions, but after a while they're much more repetative than exciting. I can't suggest one buy this. Even the most die hard of Pokemon fans will have trouble getting into this game.

On the positive side
+It's an interesting idea, full of the simple, yet charming, story motives that Pokemon is known for
+There's plenty of connectivity stuff to be done between both versions, mastering the game as a whole will take a really long time
+There's never and end to rescue missions, even long after you've completed the story mode

On the negative side
-Story mode is rather short
-Dungeons are really bland and boring
-Dungeon designs are terrible
-Battles are stale and boring, wild pokemon just don't do much of anything
-The AI for your enemies and allies are bad, yet the game is still easy, and your AI controlled characters are still competant enough to get through the battle without you
-Most of the more interesting tweaks of the game are availible only AFTER story mode is complete, such as evolving your pokemon, or taking control of other pokemon
-Graphically the game doesn't hold up
-The sound effects are absolutely terrible

Fine for kids, boring for older pokefans

2 Rating: 2, Useful: 5 / 6
Date: March 14, 2007
Author: Amazon User

I baight this game expecting it to have the depth of the other games. Those can keep me going for months on end. This one was fine, but once the story was over, I was done with it. I was actually falling asleep trying to go through the 37+ levels in some of these missions. and if you die, you have to start all over again! I'm sorry but I dont even have that attention span. All the levels look the same even though they are randomly generated, they use the same tiles over and over. like I said, one the story was dont, I got rid of it for credit twards one of the newer games like dimond or perl.

Currently into Pokemon Ranger. Much better than this one. Highly recoment this one. Great side story.
There is a reason they are makeing a movie from the Ranger story and not from the rescue team story...

Cute but pretty dull

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 26 / 28
Date: September 25, 2006
Author: Amazon User

Well, there was no way I was going to miss out on this one. I had my copy reserved since August, and on September 19 I was the first one to the store to bring home this game, which I had already determined in my mind as the best game ever. You get to play as a Pokemon, after all!

Needless to say, I was kinda disappointed. But I'll start with the things I liked.

The personality quiz at the beginning is very cool. The questions are random, so it's difficult to cheat, and the results are pretty darn accurate in my opinion. After being assigned my Pokemon (it was Pikachu, if anyone cares), I got into the real game.

The story is very cute, and even has some moments of drama or suspsense, surprisingly enough. All the Pokemon you meet (save for the wild ones you battle) have real personalities, and the best one of all is the special "partner" you get to choose at the beginning of the game, who adores you and follows you everywhere. Overall, it has much more of a plot than the normal Pokemon games, and Pokemon make better characters than humans anyway.

As for the gameplay, the controls are pretty intuitive, and the AI manages not to deserve banishment to the black lagoon (not that it's great, mind you. It's just passable).

So, what don't I like about this game? Well, for starters, it's very repetitive. Since the dungeons are randomly-generated, every adventure amounts to a series of simple enemy-filled mazes. This isn't so bad in the beginning, when the dungeons are small, but towards the end it's extremely boring. The final dungeon in story mode has a grand total of 35 floors, for crying out loud!

Making this worse is that the items, too, are random. You may get several great TMs, or you may wind up with squat. You may pick up tons of food on the ground, or you may starve (which causes fainting). Since some of the missions involve bringing a certain item to a Pokemon, this can get frustrating.

Another upsetting element is the "catching" of Pokemon. This part of the game is--you guessed it--random. After you beat an enemy, it may offer to join up with you. The problem is, this doesn't happen nearly enough. The only way to increase the odds of a joinup is to be at a much higher level than the potential teammate, and by then their joining you will be pointless anyway since they'll be too weak for you. So unless you want to spend hours trying, you'll pretty much have the same basic team for the majority of your play.

Finally, as a reviewer above me mentioned, many things that could have broken up the monotony are "saved" for after the credits roll. Despite raising my partner Chikorita to level 35, they refused to let her evolve even once until the end, when she went all the way to Meganium in one shot! I also never got to control any other Pokemon 'till after the ending, and by then I was bored of the game and didn't care. This really upset me, especially since I was wondering throughout the entire game when I would get to evolve!

So overall, should you get this game? Well, if you're up for something pretty quick (10-15 hours), love Pokemon, and don't mind being slightly bored, go for it. But on the other hand, there are tons of great games coming out this season, and it really might be better to wait for one of them. I almost wish that I had.

Don't buy RED.

3 Rating: 3, Useful: 0 / 1
Date: January 19, 2007
Author: Amazon User

My son has a Nintendo DS but wanted the Red version of this game. We have the blue version as well but they DO NOT interface well. Nintendo is embracing WiFi and leaving the SP series behind. Blue rescue team is fun for a couple weeks, then gets boring as there isn't the depth of prevous games (Blue, Green, Ruby, Emerald, etc.). No breeding, no "shiny" pokemon, no real depth. Ranger doesn't seem to be so great too. Wait for Diamon and Perl which should introduce >100 more pokemon and work nicely with the wireless croud. If you don't have one, its going to be the reason to buy a DS.

This Game is Great! Not Pokemon's Best Though

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 7 / 12
Date: September 22, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I really think this game is elegant and has great gameplay and all that jazz. One day a trainer wakes up to find that he or she has been turned into a pokemon. You have to take this brain-wracking quiz to find out what pokemon you start out as. (I ended up as a Mudkip, I have no clue why). Then you pick your partner( I picked Pikachu). You then appear in a pokemon world, haven't I heard that before? Your partner gets rather annoying running around following you. O.K. the story is that you and your partner go and do rescue missions in caves hence the name red rescue team mystery dungeon. You can visit Pokemon Square, Tiny Woods, and lots of other places. At the Pelipper Post Office, you can apply for jobs and rescue missions that citizens post. Then you go do them hooray you get stuff. The only bad thing is that this game gets very repetetive I mean like every day your annoying partner wakes you up and then you do a rescue mission blahblahblah then you go back to bed after it. Now the battle system I like. You battle without having to have the screen pop up and say blah blah wants a challenge or something. I still haven't realized how to get another person on your rescue team it says you have to like befriend them or something. I still like the trainer games better but it was good for Nintendo to try this out.

I Thought This Game Was Good But...

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 4 / 6
Date: November 24, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I like this game because you actually get to play as a Pokemon. But in reality, though, I am more anxious for Pokemon Diamond and Pearl instead. This game was fun, no offense, but I like games where you get the freedom to move around. Pokemon Dungeon hardly lets you move around alot. I also miss the feature where you get to save no matter where you are at. That's another reason why I want Pokemon Diamond or Pearl. You could be in the middle of nowhere and you would still get to save. I like the personality test at the beginning, though. Another feature I miss is pressing the START button to open your menus to select items and things like that. This game does not let you do that, you have to press the B button instead, and that's kind of hard for when you're in a hurry.

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