Pokémon X – Interactive Digital Narratives

Pokémon as a Form of Conservation

The Pokémon franchise is well known for its cast of colorful cartoon animals. Children of all ages easily come to love these creatures and do all that they can to raise them, but does this love of fictional animals translate … Continue reading →

The Pokémon franchise is well known for its cast of colorful cartoon animals. Children of all ages easily come to love these creatures and do all that they can to raise them, but does this love of fictional animals translate into a love of real animals? Four professors at Cambridge seem to believe that it does not, but that it could. In their article, “Why Conservationists Should Heed Pokémon,” Andrew Balmford, Lizzie Clegg, Tim Coulson, and Jennie Taylor detail how they came to this conclusion.

Many Pokémon resemble flora and fauna from our world, so does this foster a protective instinct?

In the article, the researchers discuss an experiment they conducted which determined a child’s ability to recall the names of a random selection of local wildlife and a random selection of Pokémon (Balmford et. al. 2367). Unsurprisingly—depending on your Pokémon fan status—the children were much more able to recall the names of the Pokémon than they were able to recall the names of the local wildlife (Balmford et. al. 2367). The researchers cite this result as proof that kids can get excited about wildlife and conservation when they are interested in the subject (Balmford et. al. 2367).

While I believe the researchers are making an interesting point, I am having some trouble with their tangential association of conservation to Pokémon. In my opinion, the researchers only focused on Pokémon as an example of a way that conservationists could go about improving interest in conservation. However, when I played Pokémon X, I found the game to contain an extremely conservationist message. Throughout the game, the player encounters numerous characters that encourage the player to develop a strong, loving relationship with their Pokémon. In the Pokémon world, the Pokémon are wild animals, so the game is therefore advocating that the player develop a relationship with wild animals outside of the game’s magic circle.

Pokémon X’s conservationist message can also be seen through the game’s villains: Team Flare. Team Flare seeks to make the world a “more beautiful place.” Though they aim to achieve this goal by eliminating Pokémon and conflict by enslaving the population, their message is still rather conservationist. In defeating the villains, the player enables all of the wild Pokémon to continue living a peaceful life, thereby preventing a mass extinction event—another conservationist cause.

Team Flare seeks to make the world a better place, some of their goals include maintaining energy consumption at conservable levels.

These are just some of the many examples of the conservationist messages scattered throughout Pokémon X. I fully believe that these researchers missed the mark in their article. Rather than focusing on the things conservationists do wrong, they should have focused on the things Pokémon X and the Pokémon franchise do to further the conservationist cause.

Works Cited:

Balmford, Andrew; Clegg, Lizzie; Coulson, Tim; & Taylor, Jennie. “Why Conservationists Should Heed Pokémon.” Science, vol. 295, no. 5564, 2002, pp. 2367–2367.

Image Sources:

https://www.pinterest.com/Lizzykatt77/pokemon/
http://pokedream.com/games/pokemon-xy/14-anistar.php

The Casually Hardcore Pokémon X

In my opinion, the Pokémon series was always a game series for hardcore gamers. With type advantages, and the stats of various Pokémon to memorize and manipulate, it always seemed daunting to take my experience as a casual gamer into … Continue reading →

In my opinion, the Pokémon series was always a game series for hardcore gamers. With type advantages, and the stats of various Pokémon to memorize and manipulate, it always seemed daunting to take my experience as a casual gamer into the Pokémon world. However, when comparing my experience playing Pokémon X to the characteristics of casual games found in Jesper Juul’s, “What is Casual,” I found it extremely difficult to clearly classify Pokémon X as a casual or hardcore game.

The first characteristic of a casual game is fiction. The cover of Pokémon X immediately clues the player into the game’s fictional setting. Taking place in a world populated by colorful cartoonish animals known as Pokémon, the game quite obviously satisfies this requirement.

The cover to Pokémon X’s box shows the positive fiction used in the game by highlighting one of the cartoonish and colorful Pokémon found in the game

It should be noted however, that Pokémon X contains some fictions more closely associated with hardcore videogames. Throughout the game, the player must battle the villainous Team Flare, a group of thugs who commit various crimes in an attempt to take over the world. This effort culminates in the activation of an “ultimate weapon” which has the power to kill all the Pokémon in the world (see video below). The inherent dangers of these plot points and setting provide an experience more characteristic of a hardcore game rather than a casual game.

Like the blurred aspects of Pokémon X’s fiction, the usability of the game also does not clearly classify it as a casual or hardcore game. The majority of Pokémon X’s controls are easy to use and understand. To move the protagonist, the player pushes the arrows of the control pad and there is a button for performing actions and another for canceling actions. However, Pokémon X also relies on a turn-based combat system that could be confusing to novice players. The turn-based combat relies more on the manipulation of stats (as the fastest Pokémon attacks first) and the player’s careful planning rather than a free-for-all combat system which allows the player to simply push buttons until their opponent is subdued.

The Pokémon series has many long-term fans, yet still attracts new players. The inability of Pokémon X to be clearly classified as a casual or hardcore game could explain the universal appeal of these games. Even if we take into account Juul’s remaining three aspects of casual games, the classification is still foggy as some aspects (interruptibility) push the game towards becoming a casual game, while others (difficulty/punishment and juiciness) are more reminiscent of hardcore games. These blurred lines suggest that Pokémon X is a much more complex game than it might appear, or that Juul’s classifications are not as clear and universal as they seem.

Works Cited:

Juul, Jesper. “What Is Casual.” A Casual Revolution: Reinventing Video Games and Their Players. Cambridge, MA: MIT, 2010. 25-63. Print.

Image Sources:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pok%C3%A9mon_X_and_Y

The Shackles of Pokémon X

The Pokémon game series is one of the most popular and successful handheld game franchises in modern history. The formula of each game is similar—players take control of a young adventurer who seeks to raise a strong team of Pokémon … Continue reading →

The Pokémon game series is one of the most popular and successful handheld game franchises in modern history. The formula of each game is similar—players take control of a young adventurer who seeks to raise a strong team of Pokémon to defeat opponents in battle. It has been many years since my last Pokémon experience, so it was extremely nostalgic for me to play Pokémon X. While playing the game, I was immediately struck by how limited I was as a player, especially for a game that appears to give players so much choice.

Within the narrative framework of the game, the protagonist lives a life of relative freedom. For example, even though the character is only 10 years old, they can explore the country unaccompanied by an adult and can make decisions about which towns to visit, and which Pokémon to battle and which to raise. Unfortunately, this freedom is not mirrored in the player’s opportunities. During my experience playing Pokémon X, I found the game to be extremely oppressive in what actions I could undertake.

This image shows the map of the Kalos region, with each town and route labeled

As seen from the map above, the Kalos region—the name of the country where Pokémon X is set—is quite expansive. However, the player is not able to explore all these paths at any moment. In some instances, non-player characters will block some of the routes and tell the player, “you do not want to go that way,” if the player attempts to pass. In other instances, some type of object will be blocking the path and the player is unable to pass unless they undertake a side quest to give them the ability to move the object.

At this point in the game, a snorlax blocks the character’s way, so they must travel down Route 7 to retrieve a flute to wake the Pokémon up

The other aspect of the game that I found limiting had to do with the actual Pokémon raising. Though there are hundreds of Pokémon that inhabit the Kalos region, the player is only able to hold 6 in their party at a time. As Pokémon get stronger by battling other Pokémon, the game almost advocates for the player to choose a core 6 Pokémon and stick with them to compete against the stronger trainers encountered later in the game. The game even forces the player to catch the games legendary Pokémon, Xerneas, at one point in the game, eliminating the player’s choice altogether.

The left side of this image shows the maximum 6 Pokémon in the players party while the right side shows the Pokémons maximum number of four moves

Also limiting is each Pokémon’s ability to only know 4 moves at a time. Whenever a Pokémon levels up and attempts to learn a new move, the player must choose one of the original moves to forget. Much of the time, once the Pokémon forgets a move, it is gone for good. These limitations imposed on the player combine to create an experience that I found extremely frustrating, especially when I compared my experience as a player to the experience of the protagonist within the game’s narrative.

Image Sources

http://www.serebiiforums.com/showthread.php?594375-The-Kalos-Region-Thread
http://www.gamerguides.com/pokemon-xy/main-walkthough/to-gym-2-part-1/route-7-riviere-walk-1st-visit
http://kotaku.com/tips-for-playing-pokemon-x-y-1444982237