I have not played a Pokémon game since I was in grade school so here we go...
Story
You are a boy or a girl and you just turned 10 and in the messed-up world of Pokémon this is OK. You wake up in your room and your mom greets you and says, "Go to Professor Elm to pick your first Pokémon". I picked the Cyndaquil for my Pokémon and this is where your adventure begins. Your job is to be the very best but I think you already know that. So you can only carry 6 Pokémon with you at a time and the Pokémon can only learn four moves. Keep that in mind, because I forgot about the four-move limit and it threw me off at first.
Gameplay
It is turn-based like it's been since the first game, but the way you battle has changed a bit over the years. There are some double battles that show up in the game so two Pokémon come out and the other side throws two Pokémon too. This is really cool; it makes you think about which Pokémon you want to hit, and if you use a move that is a spread move will it hit everyone including yours? For example, if you use Earthquake it will hit you and your opponent so use it carefully, because you will kill your own Pokémon if it's stronger then the other Pokémon you have. Capturing Pokémon is the same as it's ever been: you go in the grass, you find a Pokémon. If it's early in the game it is a Rattata - I hate those things. There are so many in the game. You throw a Poké Ball and if it's too strong it will break out, so you have to weaken it. You throw it again and bingo, it is yours to train and love. To train them you go back in the grass and make the wild Pokémon faint and this gives you experience to level up your Pokémon to make them powerful. Doing this they learn new moves. Remember, they can only learn four moves so chose wisely.
So now you have some Pokémon - it is your job to go find other trainers and battle them to make sure you have the best Pokémon.
The trainers of Pokémon are sadly, pushovers. I have a level 20 Pokémon and the trainer has a level 12 rat. I've got the fire type so it dies painfully in a fire. After you take down the swimmers and bug-catcher and some other people that you made sorry, they want to be friends! So you become friends and you exchange phone numbers and they will call and talk about some wild Pokémon they tried to catch and got away, and how their Pokémon are really strong ... I just let it ring. I actually wish it had a vibrate mode. After you take down these weaklings you are ready for a gym battle if you can find them. They've got this habit of never being around so you have to go find them somewhere, and when you find them they will be in a meadow looking at the sky. That is where I found Misty. After you find them you face them in a battle. There are eight (8) badges in the world but if you beat the elite four there are eight more and that is sixteen badges in all. If you can find the gym leaders, that is - they like to slack off and go get soda or something.
Graphics
I haven't played a Pokémon game in, like, ten years, but the Pokémon world is very nice-looking. The buildings and boats are in 3D, and it makes the game have a very nice look to it. The ground looks like ground. The rest is in 2D - the grass, going into buildings, etc. In battles there are some really nice animations when you do moves like Earthquake. The ground moves; it is really nice to see the other Pokémon get it. When you cut a bush an animation of the Pokémon cutting it pops up. It's a little cheesy but at the same time not too terrible. When you go in to battle there is battle animation. After the 300th time this gets boring, but the gym-leaders' battle animations are awesome and one of the coolest animations in the game.
Music and Sounds
This has not changed much - when the Pokémon come out of their ball you hear the same 8-bit sound since the very first game. They did not bump it up to better sounds. This makes the DS sound bad. Overall the music in the game got a bump-up; the music sounds essentially the same but better quality. It is nicely re-done. But when you hit a Pokémon it sounds like you hit it. Hoping in Black and White they step-up the quality and make it sound like it should. This is really sad that the game still sounds the same as from 10 years ago; it shows it's age and makes it looks sloppy. Hope they make this right.
All in All
It feels the same like it's been the last 10 years, although this is not necessarily a bad thing. They did put a nice polish to the game: the touchscreen moves are a nice touch. But playing hide-and-go-seek with the gym leaders is annoying. And moving two steps and a wild Pokémon wants to battle you is also annoying, but it is part of the game. Their gym leaders are smarter this time: they will fully restore but they are dumb the way they use it. When I have a more powerful Pokémon I hit it with my move and then kill it on my second hit. This is really annoying because they're supposed to be smart. However this is dumb and did not help them. Instead it makes them look like they don't know what they're doing. To even give Blaine a beatdown you have to have a water type with ice to level 50. So I had to grind for three hours with one Pokémon to level 50. I did it and I beat him. But the four times I faced him was like being in the walls of Jericho: when you think you got him he pulls you back to the middle of the ring because he uses a full restore and all your hard work goes down the drain. After that you just want to take that DS and shove it where the sun do not shine. Training the Pokémon to face the elite four you have to battle weak Pokémon to get to 50. They need to make stronger Pokémon higher up in the first game. You could catch level 50 Pokémon in Victory Road. Now they are really pathetic - so fix this Nintendo.
So it is a fun game but sometimes I am screaming my head off saying it F%$@ sucks - why is this happening?? The other thing I hate: the lower level gets the first move and gets you confused, or does another move. This makes me so mad because I have a Pokémon 10 levels up and they get the first move and they almost kill you. And when you get confused sometimes the Pokémon hurt itself. This is awful because I am at the mercy of the other guy's Pokémon; that is bogus.
If you like RPGs you will like this. For me it was at times a frustrating mess, but overall it's fun. If you like Pokémon give it a try, but if you don't this one will not convince you otherwise. On the other hand, if you want a game that is long and will take a while to play, pick this one up: you will not put it down. I know I can't.
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