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Pokemon Diamond/Pearl Released in U.S. 61

Posted by Zonk from the squirtle-squirtle dept.
The wait for 'catch-em-all' folks in the US is over; Pokémon Diamond and Pearl are out today. Joystiq and Kotaku have coverage of yesterday's launch party at the Nintendo Store. "There was a station set up to play the card game, manned by adults who were there to teach the game to kids. Finally there was a station where Junichi Masuda, the game director, and Shigeru Ohmori, the game design lead, signed autographs for those old enough to know who they are. It may have been meant to push Pokémon merchandise (the guys at the card station handed out thin packs of cards to every kid who came by) but it also meant there was something for everyone." 1up and Gamespot, meanwhile, are offering up reviews of the game. Both hand it the respectable score of 8.5, saying that it's still a great game experience but dinging the developers for not moving the series forward in any innovative directions.
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Pokemon Diamond/Pearl Released in U.S. More

Pokemon Diamond/Pearl Released in U.S.

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  • So.... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Durrok ( 912509 ) <calltechsucks@nOSPaM.gmail.com> on Tuesday April 24, 2007 @12:07PM (#18856369) Homepage Journal
    Is it still the same game that I played 10 years ago with just more pokemon? Not that I am interested in playing it again but if I recall correctly that was the only difference between the red, blue, green, etc versions.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by TheRealMindChild ( 743925 )
      The pokemon games are released in pairs (for the most part), where you can only get certain pokemon on certain versions.

      With the pokemon red/blue/green/yellow, pokemon red/blue was what the main pair was for the original game... in the US. Pokemon green was Japan only, and I believe it held the place of pokemon red there. Pokemon yellow was, I think, Pokemon Blue, but you could start with pikachu.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        by Clazzy ( 958719 )
        With Yellow, you collected Bulbasaur, Squirtle and Charmander (i.e. the starting Pokemon on red and blue) along the way. I think there were certain other modifications to make it fit in more with the TV series like Pikachu being unable to evolve and some of the characters from the series.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by InsaneLampshade ( 890845 )
      You can battle/trade across the world via wi-fi now.
    • Is it still the same game that I played 10 years ago with just more pokemon?

      In a sense, but the Wifi abilities actually makes it worth it though. No more having to find people in the person to battle with.
    • Basically, due to the WiFi trading and battling, it is possible to beat the game without leaving your mother's basement, or making any sort of human contact whatsoever.
      They've also generally refined each of the Pkmn's that were already there, tweaks to the battle system, time/date sensitive events (like Animal Crossing), sortakinda 3d map, and adapts the game to the DS hardware (touch screen menus, notetaking, sleep mode so you can put it down w/o saving). But the online is the biggest change by far
  • "There was a station set up to play the card game, manned by kids who were there to teach the game to adults."

    Fixed.

  • Pokemon (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Pretty soon, they'll have to start using Hex codes instead of color names.

    Gotta buy em all, gotta buy em all.
  • I hate to nitpick, but the games released on Sunday, the 22nd. Not today. Not Monday. If you tried to buy them Monday or today, you probably couldn't without a pre-order, since most stores sold out.
  • And it's the same standard play you've seen in all the rest of the games so far. I think my biggest beef though is ineffective use of the touch screen. It would've been so much easier to reorganize your monster team by drag/dropping to switch instead of the little menu that was standard in the games. Or tapping the pokeball on the top left of the touch screen to bring up the switch screen in battle and so forth. Little intuitive things like that would've, IMO improved the game play and would've been simple
    • If you skipped the GBA ones(like I did) there's a lot of new stuff(and over 300 new pokemon). Berries, breeding, etc. etc. Jebus did they complicate this thing since Red + Blue.

      I guess if you didn't, the additions are minor. Shrug, the only reason I really picked this up was for the WiFi. That, and pokemon is a great JRPG lite.

  • Fantastic Game (Score:4, Informative)

    by Trip Ericson ( 864747 ) on Tuesday April 24, 2007 @01:23PM (#18857745) Homepage
    I see the first few comments are all very negative about this game.

    Yet I am 18 and greatly enjoy the game. It's got a fun storyline, a wider variety of Pokemon (the magic number is now 493), and at long last decent graphics.

    And I know I'm not the only one. I moderate the Diamond/Pearl forum over at Bulbagarden [bulbagarden.net], which is home primarily to a number of older fans, many of whom are older than I am. Say what you will, this game is not just for children. Just because there's no graphic violence and language in it, that doesn't mean it's not fun by a long shot.

    That said, I don't own a copy of the English version yet (still playing with my Japanese import of Diamond), but I'll be getting it soon enough.

    - Trip

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by CaseM ( 746707 )
      You'll be happy to know that if you have Action Replay, you can extract your save file from your Jap import, move it over to your US copy, and it will work. I believe even the Pokemon names change, too.
    • I like it. Been playing Pearl all morning. I never played the previous ones but so far a nice light RPG. Just getting into to it so I haven't messed with wifi yet.

  • DS Emulators? (Score:1, Offtopic)

    by SilentOneNCW ( 943611 )
    So, on a completely unrelated topic, how is DS emulation coming along?
    • Offtopic?

      No$gba can run these games. That's a gba emulator written in assembly.
      I ran this game just a few hours ago and it seemed fine.
    • The best one Ive seen is NO$GBA (which does DS in addition to GBA). It's a bit slow on my box (AthlonXP 2400+, 1GB RAM), but since my machine is a bit old YMMV. Besides the slowness, it is the most accurate DS emulator Ive seen. Some 3d is a bit finicky, but it's clear besides that. You need ROMs of course (which you own legal copies of, right?).
  • I hate to bash the editors, but the game was released Sunday, not today; and the party was Sunday as well. And I've got fifteen hours in already, and this is finals week. Oops.

  • My impressions. (Score:3, Interesting)

    by MaWeiTao ( 908546 ) on Tuesday April 24, 2007 @04:27PM (#18860899)
    I got it on Sunday and found the game to be readily available. Given how hard it was promoted in many stores I was expecting it to be harder to find.

    Not that anyone asked for them, but here are my initial impressions on the game...

    The last Pokemon game I played which was Pokemon Blue for the old Gameboy Pocket and this game despite being significantly more complex is very reminiscent that game. I have to say I don't agree with the complaints that the game should have been more innovative. Sometimes I don't want a game to be innovative. I want a game to adhere to a tried and true formula which I know I will enjoy. I don't want to feel alienated because the developers decided to completely revamp gameplay. I wouldn't want Pokemon Diamond/Pearl to be some stylus-based puzzle game.

    Perhaps if I had played all the Gameboy Color and GBA version I would be asking for something different myself. But there are already plenty of other Pokemon games with differing gameplay styles on the DS.

    I like the game. It's got nice vibrant graphics. When traveling around the world environments are subtly done in 3D; it all looks like it's sprite-based, but the environments are all 3D. Another neat thing is that a player can cross the entire world seamlessly. The outside world isn't broken into sections. Interiors and caverns, of course are the exception.

    The Pokemon, in fights, don't really look any different than what I've seen of the GBA Pokemon games. The lack of character animations is a slight disappointment. But I can appreciate the amount of production involved in dealing with over 400 Pokemon, especially since some aren't much more than blobs.

    The background music is decent. But Pokemon sounds leave a lot to be desired. Most consist of odd digital squawks. When I first encountered some of those sounds I couldn't help but momentarily wonder if those audio clips weren't corrupt.

    Fights are entertaining but can get tedious sometimes, especially since Pokemon can be taken down more easily than a player character in most conventional RPGs. Walking through tall grass or caverns can bring an absurdly high number of random encounters. Then there are the jerks who stand around waiting to challenge the player. I like the interface, especially during fights. It's colorful and easy to follow. There are some inconsistencies, however, particularly with the inventory. It's like a different team worked on that aspect of the game.

    One thing I've noticed is that this game has longer save times than any other DS game I've played to date. In some cases it even warns that it has to save "a lot of data".

    The minor issues aside I do enjoy the game. It does get addicting; I can't help but wonder why Nintendo hasn't considered an MMO version of the series.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Turn-X Alphonse ( 789240 )
      Not to atack your post but the battle system has been innovated in 2nd and 3rd generation which you missed and the 4th gen totally shook it up.

      2nd : Two new types to balannce psychic. split special into special attack/special defence.
      3rd : Limited EVs, so pokemon now have a max stat level instead of in previous games where the more you killed the higher their stats would go even if it was unnatural (killing 3 million geodudes = +400 to defence stat for example). Also added Double battles
      4th : Moves are now

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Ant P. ( 974313 )
        The 1st/2nd gen had limited EVs as well, the 3rd gen just changes it so it's a points pool instead of per-stat caps.
  • These games seem like fun. Not knowing anything about Pokemon - which one should I get? Diamond or Pearl? None of the reviews seem to mention what the difference is. I thought Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] would have some info but same deal here. Could someone point me at some info about the difference between Diamond and Pearl?

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Babbster ( 107076 )
      The only difference between the games is that each contains a few monsters unique to it. Unless you've got a friend/relative who is also buying the game (with whom you can trade the version-specific Pokemon), you can just grab whichever one you find without worry.
    • I got Pokemon Pearl simply because I liked the guy on the cover better.

      The only difference that I know of is that each offers some different monsters, I'm assuming late in the game. Otherwise, I doubt you'd ever notice the difference. And with the trading functionality I assume you could acquire anything with a single copy of the game.
    • Depends.
      If you don't have any Wi-Fi access, ask your friends (if they play) which one they're getting, and get the one they didn't get.
      If you do have Wi-Fi access (either through a Wi-Fi router, or Nintendo's fancy USB dongle that only works on Windows), just pick the one with the pkmn you think looks better on the cover, since you'll be able to trade for everything else online.
      The only major differences are which pkmn are available in the wild

      • I bought my daughter Diamond and she's been playing that thing non-stop since we picked it up on Sunday.

        She's turned into a Pokemon nut . . . I'm sure she'd love to learn about trading characters, etc. online, can you recommend any good sites that explain the trading and stuff?

        Thanks.

        • As far as the trading goes, I believe (My copy won't come in for an hour or so) trading has always been done from the second floor of the Pokemon Centers (check the manual, or wait for me to post when the mail arrives). The keyword you're looking for is "Global Trade System". From there, it boils down to searching the list for what you want (for example: Level 12 Female Bulbasaur), and it tells you who has one, and what they want for it. Naturally, you can also put up your own Pokemon and what you want i
  • I think they added too much pokemons, just the pokemons #1 to #150 is good enough. They also add too much other stuff, such as genders of pokemons and things. Even Pokemon Red/Blue is good but is a few things not very good. I would make it a bit differently.
  • Way way back in the day, I bought Pokemon Blue for my Gameboy (yes, the big clunky one that ate up 4 AA batteries). I was lots of fun and everyone at my school played, battled, and traded. Even kids that didn't consider themselves nerds had a copy and were willing to trade or battle if you asked. It was the most revolutionary game for a portable system since Tetris.

    I didn't play another Pokemon game since.

    It's been 9 years now - I'm married, going to college, and working. When I heard about Diamon

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