For ten years now, Nintendo has chosen to produce Pokémon Mystery Dungeon alongside the main role-playing game series. Developed by Spike Chunsoft – who has already applied the recipe to other universes like Dragon Quest in Japan – it offers not to train Pokémon but to embody one of the small creatures of Game Freak. Indeed, the pitch is the same in each episode and this Mega Mystery Dungeon is no exception to the rule. The hero, a young human, wakes up in the body of a Pokémon (chosen beforehand by the player or proposed by the game following a personality test) and obviously, he has no memory of why or how. Collected in the village of Bourg Tranquille by a shimmering Pifeuil, the latter will quickly build a small team of friends to go and play explorers in the surrounding dungeons, as is the immutable recipe of the series.
THE CHANGE IS NOT NOW
For those who have never looked at it before, Pokémon Mystery Dungeons are based on a relatively simplified dungeon-crawler. The levels of each dungeon are randomly generated and consist only of corridors and rooms. Divided into boxes like in a tactical-RPG, they are also inhabited by hostile creatures. With each of your movements, the monsters of the level also move while the battles take place on a turn-by-turn basis. The goal being as usual to find the staircase of each level to finally reach the boss or simply the exit. On that side, very little change. Spike Chunsoft has slightly tweaked the handling, making the best use of the triggers. We can now push a partner, even if it sometimes jerks group movements. Above all, it is now possible to trigger a Synchronized Attack with the help of your partners.
LOOT AND DIFFICULTY
This new episode therefore inherits the repetitiveness and the somewhat clumsy side of its elders, without really succeeding in transcribing the feeling of addiction that a rogue-like can provide. Admittedly, Pokémon Mega Mystery Dungeon pushes the player more to explore dungeons in search of loot, instead of going straight to the exit. The problem is that this precious loot is far too ephemeral. First, because you can lose it in an instant after being scolded by a damn too strong boss and a bit out of nowhere. And then also because the developers have decided so, as for the ephelites, which are part of the small novelties of this episode. These stones, which you can pick up in dungeons, provide statistical benefits to one of your creatures, but only for the duration of the current dungeon. Hence an impression of overall progress that is ultimately quite limited.
Technically very clean, it also benefits from an original soundtrack of surprising quality as well as a brand new system of relationships between Pokémon.
Beyond this lack of real novelty, Pokémon Mega Mystery Dungeon is above all weighed down by a boring rhythm to die for. The tutorial spans too many hours, the adventure takes way too long to get off the ground (if it actually does), and the uninteresting dialogue takes up way too much of the overall game time. Even the division of the story into successive days seems to slow down the whole. Too bad because this new 3DS opus is not entirely devoid of qualities. Technically very clean, it also benefits from an original soundtrack of surprising quality as well as a brand new system of relationships between Pokémon, which forces you to work on your "contact book" to complete new quests and above all to recruit. new companions. Enough to feed the rescue teams, which can be used in most dungeons as a second chance in the event of a knockout.
