"Pickmin 4" review: lead friends to explore the world of adults, full of childlike strategy game

Pikmin 4

Game type: strategy adventure

Release date: 2023/07/21

Production and distribution: Nintendo

Game language: Chinese

Gaming platform: Switch

First, the puppy appears

Nintendo's games have always attached importance to gameplay rather than plot. This work, like previous generations, tells the story of Orema exploring the planet and being shipwrecked, and going on adventures and self-rescue with the native species "Pikmin".

The story of "Pikmin 4" is a little more complicated, telling that Olema sends his own distress information through wireless signals, and the headquarters sent 6 search and rescue personnel, but I didn't expect that the spacecraft was also wrecked.

I had to send another search and rescue officer, that is, the player, to rescue the two groups of team members who were in distress.

The main line of the game is still to command the Pikmins to collect and fight, adding action elements.

Pikmin, a small creature with a similar ecology to cordyceps, has a natural habit of moving things, and under the command of the whistle, it can gather and lift objects much larger than their own bodies.

The seeds in Pikmin's nest will take root after they land, and after a while they will grow leaves, indicating that they are ripe, and the player can pull them out like a turnip, and they will become small creatures running around the ground.

Pikmin has a radish body, with big eyes and green leaves on the top of his head, which looks very cute.

In addition to the basic version of the red Pikmin, there are also charged yellow Pikmin in the game, white Pikmin with poison, blue Pikmin who can swim, etc.

Pikmin with the ability to freeze has been added, which can freeze rivers and create roads that provide more possibilities for exploration.

The bigger change is the emergence of the exploration dog "Ouqing", which is a two-legged puppy that will jump forward in one jump.

Compared with Pikmin, Ou Qing has more skills, he can use his head to knock away obstacles, dig soil to find tunnels, and let the protagonist run on his back, which is really the strongest tool man (dog).

Since puppies can hit and jump, they can also play a huge role in battle, such as huge creatures that can be knocked over with it, and then send Pikmin to defeat them, otherwise Pikmin can't catch up with his calves.

In addition, the introduction of Ouqing also makes the game more action-oriented, a bit of Mario game.

Pikmin's happy hitchhikers would gather on Ou Qing's body, long leaves fluttering in the wind, and the puppy was like a flowery green feather blanket.

Second, full of childlike fun

The development of this game uses Unreal Engine, which has greatly improved the lighting and shadow effects, compared to the previous three generations of the port, both in terms of ground vegetation, character modeling, and monster types.

With the function of NS, it can basically cope with it, and a few complex scenes also have frame drops and mold wearing, which can basically stabilize 30 frames.

In addition, it has to be said that the scenes of this work are richer, in addition to mountains, rivers, caves, etc., indoor scenes have also been added.

Interestingly, the interior scenes are arranged according to modern families, and because the protagonist is very small, these daily objects become very large, and the protagonist can ride Ou Qing to explore in a living room for half a day, which is quite a sense of novelty in the country of adults.

Pikmin's own AI has also improved, finding things to play with when they are resting, using electric fans to blow themselves onto bookshelves and then slipping down like a slide. Hide and seek among various books, bouncing around from small items, having fun, and it's very cute.

The volume of "Pickmin 4" has also been improved, each area has its own characteristics, the breadth and depth of the scenes are more suitable for exploration than the previous game, there are more main quests and side quests, and the guidance is good, and the excitement of finding hidden places and solving puzzles is still preserved.

The operation of the game is a little changed, the left stick controls the direction, the right stick controls the viewing angle, ZL can restore the face direction at any time, and the left cross button is used as a shortcut menu, which can open the map and browse tasks at any time, which is more convenient.

As a new "jumping" action, the X button has two functions, light touch is to control Ouqing jump, and long press is to let the puppy rush forward, which is a more commonly used function.

The B key is to summon Pikmin, and the A key is to direct the attack or carry.

Miyamoto Shigeru designed this set of real-time strategic improvement operation methods in the first generation, and it is still used today, which is still more reasonable.

Since the controller lacks the range control ability like the mouse, this "set" large-scale control method can only be said to be the optimal solution.

For novices, the operation of the game still takes a certain amount of time to get used to, especially during the battle, while operating the Ouqing attack, controlling the perspective, and commanding Pikmin, it is inevitable to be busy.

As in previous generations, the game has a time-lapse setting, and Pikmin can only move during the day, about 15 minutes of real time a day, and must return to the nest at night to rest.

If you run too far and don't get home in time, Pikmin will be captured by the monster and look very distressed, so you must pay attention to this.

Third, the ideological gap

I sometimes think about what the game is really telling us, and then I seem to think of something when I put away toys for my daughter.

When she was a child, she liked to put toys in a large piece in the living room, and then run around by herself, playing with this, playing with that, chanting words in her mouth, and finally I could only clean up when I was tired of playing.

She would stare at me when she put it in the box, and each toy had to be placed in a fixed position, not pressing the doll, not putting the house at the bottom, and some saying goodnight.

I feel that children treat these toys as real personalities, and they cannot distinguish between reality and fantasy, and they are immersed in their own world wholeheartedly.

"Pickmin" is to provide us with a child's perspective of a fantasy world, we walk through the world of adults, everything is so huge.

We take our friends on adventures and collect things that adults don't seem to care about, but we treat them as treasures because they hold our dreams.

In this game we can also find many items, such as Nintendo's console, Coca-Cola bottles and even bottle caps collected as children.

When playing this series, I sometimes think of Orson Scott Card's science fiction novel The Dead Advocate. The novel describes a magical creature that was born from a tree, grew up into an animal, and the highest honor was to be dismembered alive by their kind, and a sapling grew in its body, which once again became the form of a plant.

A human contributed to them, and they dismembered the man thinking that humans were just like them, but instead of becoming a tree, he started a war between the two races.

The author wants to use this novel to tell us that there is a huge gap between people, do not use your own thoughts to substitute others, that will cause unforeseen disasters.

Just like us and our children, don't bind them with our rules, they have their own world, better than we think.

Although, my daughter has not learned to pack her toys by herself now.

Overall, it's a game full of dreams that takes us back to childhood and explores the world of adults.

There is a certain threshold in operation, and you will enjoy it after adaptation.

Except for Ouqing, the game does not have much breakthrough. Two-player play is actually a cooperative mode, one person is responsible for movement, one person is responsible for movement, and playing with children should enhance family bonding.

Unfortunately, no one wants to play this kind of game with me now.

No Responsibility Scoring

Gameplay: 8.5

Fluency: 8.5

Game features: 8.0

Overall recommendation: 8.5

That's all for today, thank you for reading.

Your attention is my greatest encouragement.