Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Gates to Infinity Review+ Post E3 Updates!

Hey everyone! I know I promised a Last of Us review.... yeah I kind of lied. When I went into Gamestop instead of ordering TLOU for some reason I said I'd like Pokemon Gates to Infinity! Why? I don't know! But I thought, why not do a review of it! However, I have one quick post E3 announcement for you. If you plan on ordering an Xbox One or PS4, do it now! Supplies are dropping rapidly only one week into presales, and soon there will be no more pre orders available. So if you plan on getting a next gen console day one, I suggest you pre order now.

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon Gates to Infinity (besides the fact that that title takes infinity long to say, see what I did there? Ha!) is overall a faithful installment to the long running Mystery Dungeon series. This game is leaps and bounds ahead of its predecessors in many ways, but it also falls short of them in other categories. Let's break it down section by section.

The most notable difference of this installment compared to its predecessors is graphics. This is the first Mystery Dungeon game on the 3DS, and using the 3DS's increased processing power over the DS, Gates to Infinity features stunning 3D landscapes, character models, and dungeons. However, although the graphics are 3D, they aren't actually... 3D. When you actually enable 3D features, the game just gains a little depth to the textboxes, and other than that, there's really no change. This game could have taken advantage of the 3D features with immersive cinematics and large amounts of depth, but overall 3D features really weren't taken advantage of, and just cause unnecessary headaches. Speaking of cinematics, we move on to my next gripe.

In this installment of the Mystery Dungeon series, there are more cutscenes than usual, (that don't even take advantage of the rich 3D landscapes present in the game) and while this wouldn't be a downfall, they are excruciatingly long. They go on for an incredibly unnecessary amount of time and over explain every little detail. I can say the same thing for the tutorials. While tutorials are obviously a necessary element for first time players (although a disable option would have been welcomed) they go on for an incredible amount of time, and explain details that could be picked up easily through actually letting you play the game, which you rarely get to do.

However with all that said, there are two crucial points a game needs to have strength in to be worth playing, plot and gameplay, and this game exceeds in both of these categories. The game uses the same gameplay from previous installments and builds upon it with necessary and welcomed editions. For example, in earlier editions of Mystery Dungeon if you didn't bring partners on adventures, they'd quickly fall behind in leveling up, thus they'd soon become very weak and you wouldn't be able to bring them on future adventures. However, in this game partners who don't go on adventures still gain XP, allowing you to take them on future adventures.

Overall, I really enjoyed this game. It builds on the tested and true gameplay of previous installments with new features that make the game even more enjoyable. I wouldn't call it a must have for the 3DS, however, it is a fun game that I recommend any fan of the Pokemon series to buy!

                                                        

                                                                                        -Colby