fter one of the Pokémon movies released in US theaters a few years ago, I had the line “Pokémon-mon-mon” stuck in my head for year. But you know, for all the animosity that I’ve held for the series since it first started infecting young minds across our country, I did eventually break down to it’s cute charm and interesting idea of battling it out with your little Pokémon pals. Today I got a chance to sit down with Nintendo’s Pokémon Colosseum (we know, that word is misspelled on purpose, and even our friends at NOA don’t know why), and was happy to find a fairly deep RPG that not only helps to break the series out of its simple “catch ‘em all” formula but also adds a nice deal of exploration and NPC interaction.

Rather than just plunk you into the game and tell you to catch all the Pokémon you come across, Pokémon Colosseum adds a pretty interesting story to keep the game from getting too stale. As the game starts, the hero of the game (who you get to name anyway you like) steals a mysterious machine from a band of hooligans known as Team Snatch. Using the machine you just stole from them, the band has made a nice living for themselves by stealing other people’s Pokémon. Another evil organization is Team Shadow. These lowly folks, using a special machine, have figured out a way to turn Pokémon into Dark Pokémon. These Dark versions of the cute little monsters are a nasty bunch and don’t react all that well to human commands. Thus, the hero of the game is charged with bringing Team Shadow’s evil plans to a stop as well as capture all the Dark Pokémon he can and nurse them back to their previous normal condition. There’s more than meets the eye, however, as you later learn that there is perhaps a bond between Team Shadow and Team Snatch.

You start off the game with two Pokémon; Espeon and Umbreon. They serve you well during your early fights, but as the game progresses it becomes pretty clear that in order to win you’ll need to get your mitts on some better creatures. Early on in the game you get access to empty Pokeballs which can be used to capture other Pokémon that you take part in battles against. As far as the Pokémon series goes, this is pretty standard. What is new to the series is the fact that a heavy emphasis of the collection process lies in you capturing Dark Pokémon and nursing them back to health. When a battle begins, your traveling companion Meril will appear and tell you if one of your enemy’s Pokémon is Dark. If it is, you’ll need to use one of your Pokéballs to capture it. Once captured, you’ll then need to go about getting it to revert back to its normal self. You can also capture other regular Pokémon, but the crux of the game focuses heavily on capturing those wily Dark Pokémon and getting them nursed back to their former glory.

Normally during a battle a Pokémon will have a bar underneath its health meter, denoting the current number of experience points it has. Dark Pokémon, however, have a special Dark meter and consists of five bars. By fulfilling certain requirements you can get this meter to decrease over time and when it finally does dissipate completely you have succeeded in reviving that particular creature. The steps to revive a creature aren’t all that complicated, and if you keep a Dark Pokémon in your team, utilize it in battles, as well as use a special command called a “Call Out” you’ll eventually heal any Dark Pokémon that you may possess. You can also drop off Pokémon at Daycare (we’re not kidding) as well as give it a cologne massage (once again, we’re not kidding) to help purge the evil from your Dark Pokémon. You see, when you take a Dark Pokémon into a battle it sometimes goes into “Hyper State,” meaning that it can only use an attack called “Dark Rush” and basically becomes quite a pain to manage and command. By using the “Call Out” command you not only calm the creature down, but also heal it as well as decrease its Dark meter. Sound confusing? Well at first it is and it does take some getting used to. And, to make the process even longer, once you’ve gotten rid of a creature’s Dark meter, you’ll need to take it to a special shrine in one of the game’s towns to unlock the true form of whatever Dark Pokémon you’ve succeeded in nursing back to health. It’s also a bit frustrating that while you may have just snatched a great Pokémon from a trainer, if it’s a Dark one, you’ll first need to revive it before you can take advantage of its unique abilities. 

Battles are pretty standard in the game for the Pokémon series and feature two-on-two battles, a la Pokémon Ruby & Sapphire, meaning that you’ll be able to use two Pokémon at a time during a battle. Pokémon are capable of a number of attacks, as well as the ability to cast support “spells” or heal themselves. After successful fights, you earn experience points, and with enough of those your Pokémon will grow stronger with more hit points and will also get other increased attributes. Nothing much is new in this department granted that you’ve played previous Pokémon titles. The real draw of the game is the lengthy Scenario Mode where you run through various towns and try to not only capture new and Dark Pokémon, but also put a stop to the evil Team Snatch and Team Shadow. Along with battling other trainers, as well as some evil ones, you’ll interact with various townsfolk, take part in mini-tournaments, as well as shop around for new items and goodies.

The second mode of the game is entitled Colosseum Mode, and it’s in this mode that you can play against a friend or take on a computer opponent in more Pokémon Stadium style gameplay. There are no Cups like there in previous installments in the series, but battling is restricted to trainer levels. For example, the first few Stadiums and Colosseum’s are restricted to Pokémon that are at least Level 50. The more you play through Scenario Mode, the more levels are available for play in Colosseum Mode. Battles in Colosseum Mode aren’t just mindless melees, however, and each area will force you to adhere to strict battling rules. Certain items or moves can be toggled off, as well as the ability to swap abilities or adjust the number of Pokémon you can use during a particular battle.

Battle Mountain is back again in this installment of the series, but has a few new rules to make the experience quite a bit more difficult than it was in the past. First of all, for those of you unfamiliar with Battle Mountain, you’re basically set up against a staggering number of opponents and must beat as many as you can using a limited number of continues. Battle Mountain exists in both Scenario and Colosseum Mode, but do differ in a few key areas. When taking on Battle Mountain in Scenario Mode, you are charged with the lofty task of defeating 100 opponents. The upside to all that battling is the fact that your Pokémon end up garnering a lot of experience as well as the fact that you can earn a lot of Pokécoupons, handy for purchasing new moves for your Pokémon. After every battle on Battle Mountain in Scenario Mode your Pokémon get healed, which is pretty helpful considering the fact that some of the more advanced battles get really tough. Battle Mountain in Colosseum Mode is where you end up getting most of your Pokécoupons and as a result, that Mode is quite a bit harder. While your team is healed after every battle with a trainer, you only start off with five continues. If you manage to win a battle without losing a Pokémon, you’ll get one more continue added to your stash. If you manage to lose all of your continues, you have to start all over again from the first trainer that you fight against. To make things a little more balanced you do have the ability to save your progress anytime except during a fight, which makes it a bit easier to crawl your way through the very difficult battles.

While we’ve only had a short time to sit down with the game, the title does promise some pretty extensive as well as the ability to import Pokémon that you’ve captured in the GBA titles Pokémon Ruby, Sapphire, Fire Red and Leaf Green, for use during Colosseum Mode. You will need to first beat Pokémon Colosseum in order to do the Pokémon import, but once you do, all you’ll need to do is to pop one of the aforementioned titles into your GBA, connect it up to the GameCube using a Link Cable and voila, you’ll have the Pokémon you’ve collected in those titles available for use in the game’s battles during Colosseum Mode.

In all, Pokémon Colosseum is poised to expand the already mammoth Pokémon empire with some interesting RPG elements as well as the familiar and successful gameplay that made the previous games in the series such a success. With such a new focus on converting Dark Pokémon, I’ll be interested to see how the hard-core fanbase used to tournaments and other similar battles warm up to the more open-ended feel of the Scenario Mode. In all, however, the title still oozes that familiar Pokémon flavor and shouldn’t disappoint those fans who’ve been yearning for a little change to their Pokémon shenanigans.