Yo-Kai Watch

Genre: Monster-Collecting RPG

Players: 1-2 Competitive (Local Wireless), StreetPass Supported

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Review:

Yo-Kai Watch is a Monster-Collecting RPG released on Nintendo 3DS in 2015. This game is clearly inspired by Pokemon, though it does a number of things unique and different from that franchise. Rather than existing in a world where people and magical creatures exist, the titular Yo-Kai of this world are spirits that haunt a world much like a cartoonier, family-friendly version of our own, with these spirits going unseen by most humans. Players take the role of a child who happens to come across the watch of the game’s title, which enables him to see and befriend these Yo-Kai, and summon them to fight for you in battle with other Yo-Kai.

The 3D visuals in this game have a simple, colorful, cartoony look to them, but they don’t have the charm of the Pokemon franchise. In particular, the character designs here are nowhere near as appealing as what is in the Pokemon games. Similarly, the music is light and whimsical, but there’s nothing especially memorable or noteworthy here.

The RPG elements at least get some points for being unique, but “unique” doesn’t necessarily mean “good”. Combat in this game is mostly done with indirect control – your summoned Yo-Kai do their own thing without your input, and your only real influence in battle is changing which enemy they target, feeding them healing items and swapping them out with your reserve party, and playing simple min-games to power-up their special moves. As all of this is happening in real-time, this has the end result of making you feel like you’re constantly scrambling around to try and get stuff done, but never actively participating in these battles, which is super-frustrating.

At the very least I commend this game on making its map essentially a normal town that can be navigated freely, making it both feel grounded and give players a fair amount of freedom. As you’re wandering around, your watch will notify you when a Yo-Kai is near, and hunting these critters down and capturing them in your lens is satisfying. Less satisfying, however, is that it seems like random chance whether beating a Yo-Kai in battle will enable you to recruit it. Players do have the opportunity to feed opposing Yo-Kai to entice them to your side, but this sort of bribery doesn’t feel as well integrated into the game as the similar mechanic the Shin Megami Tensei franchise uses.

Ultimately, this game just leaves me feeling like it has some good ideas that could make for a unique entry in the Monster-Collecting RPG genre, but the execution is poor often enough that most players are better off just sticking with Pokemon. Or I suppose if they want something a bit more offbeat, they can go for Shin Megami Tensei. There’s just not enough here to compel me to keep playing this game instead of one of those.

tl;dr – Yo-Kai Watch is a Monster-Collecting RPG where said monsters are unseen spirits hidden throughout the real world. This game brings some unique ideas to the Monster-Collecting RPG genre, but too often the execution isn’t very good, especially the unsatisfying indirect combat. The result is a game I can’t recommend when players could be playing a Pokemon game instead.

Grade: C

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