Pokemon Stadium

"Nothing Special..."

After the sheer phenomenon that was Pokemon Red and Blue (Green in Japan) and the Special Edition Yellow, Pokemon Stadium was the first N64 game for the spectacularly popular series. Many people waited in great anticipation for a game, which they thought would be a smash hit. Unfortunately they were wrong. Despite Nintendo Official Magazine giving it a 9 out of 10, I will reveal the TRUTH about this game.

Pokemon Stadium should have been an adventure game, similar in style to the Gameboy Games, but in glorious 3-d. However, this was not to be. Despite the obviousness of it all, Nintendo decided NOT to make gamers happy, and instead added a suplement to the Gameboy Games, instead of an entire new one. Pokemon stadium consists almost entirely of mini-games and the like. Sure, most of the mini-games are extremely fun, with some hilarious party games, which, of course, can feature up to four players can cause a couple of riots between you and your mates. But only a couple. After the novelty wears off, you actually realise just how boring the mini-games really are.

OK, there's some other modes. Stadium Battle is one of them. This is where you can go head to head either against the computer or a human opponent. It is great to play with Pokemon in full 3-d, to see all the great moves for everything. One really good thing that you can do is to upload your own Pokemon from Red, Blue, Green or Yellow, ones that you've hand raised from a little baby and play them on your N64, using the transfer pack. A nice little feature about this is the colours, whereby the different nicknames change the colours of the Pokemon. Not completely, obviously but it changes the shade of the colour of the Pokemon. Not a huge thing, but it's a nice little adition. However, the animations for everything are all the same. No variations. While the moves do look good, there's no actually contact, just a shot of Pokemon 1 starting move, then Pokemon 2 receiving move. Not really that interesting when you get down to it. Also, some moves make no sense at all. For example, in Voltorb's tackle, he spins upside down then flicks forward, and the other Pokemon magically takes damage.

Next is a mode which requires the Transfer Pack, which is GB Stadium (or something). In this, basically you can play your GB version of Pokemon on the N64. Not really very good, you could have done this on the Super Gameboy on the SNES, so it's not exactly new technology. And with the Super Gameboy, you could play other games too, whereas the Transfer Pack only really works with Stadium. However, you can get different bits round the screen, which I suppose adds something, although extremely little. But, I don't want to play my Gameboy Version on my N64, that's what I bought a Gameboy for. I want a huge adventure, in full colour, in 3 dimensions and with amazing full scale battles, but what did I get. A chance to play my Gameboy game? You can only imagine my horror, having spent £50 on it (about $75).

Finally, there's one more mode, which is Gym Leader Battles, in which you fight all the Gym Leader's as well as several other trainers, with one team of Pokemon, before facing the Elite Four. The problem with this mode is that you lose interest all too quickly. You see, it's just battles after battles with nothing else, and after the second leader, it's just repeating the motions. And it's not like any of them are difficult if you pick the right Pokemon. Overall, there's not much in the Game modes to impress. The game is far too easy, in all modes, it quickly becomes stale and repetitive, and there's nothing ground breaking or revolutionary.

The graphics are all right, but there's nothing really that special, it looks fairly nice, but there's some pretty crappy animations of moves, and there's only one for each move instead of at least 3 or 4, pushing towards 5 or 6, depending on characters etc.

The sounds are pretty much the same as the Gameboy Games, except they sound a little better, due to the advanced sound of the N64.

Overall - You should avoid this game. Seriously, it's not actually any good. Buying it is pretty much setting yourself up for a huge disappointment. It adds very little to the Gameboy versions, and while there's some fun to be had, it's not enough to warrant a whole buying of the game. Even the most dedicated Pokemaniac won't enjoy this much. However, rent it for a weekend if you have three mates over, as you'll have some fun together.

5/10

Reviewer's Score: 5/10, Originally Posted: 02/23/03, Updated 05/09/03