Topic: Pikmin 3 Deluxe Thread

@Mountain_Man
Risk vs reward. It’s good game design.

And even if Pikmin 3 isn’t very difficult (and let’s be honest, even on Ultra Spicy it’s likely going to be a breeze), it’s still fun, and that risk vs reward mechanic still works to entice the player to explore.

I discovered this in Fire Emblem via casual mode. That even when I knew I essentially couldn’t lose, I was still thoroughly engaged with the game, because the challenge was no longer simply winning, it was doing so as well as I could. It was the engagement via strategizing that made it fun, even with an easy difficulty.

Not to say harder difficulty doesn’t have its place, just that, when a game is designed well, it will be fun regardless.

I was never fond of the mission mode back on the Wii U, but it's really enjoyable now. I wish there was more on the demo

Played the demo over the weekend and was quite impressed. Also glad that apparently the progress you make on it transfers across to the proper game!

@Tendo64 Was there ever a proper demo that did that? I started thinking about it yesterday and couldn’t find an answer.

@App Plenty. Octopath Traveler's second demo, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon DX, Dragon Quest XI S, Trials of Mana, Daemon Ex Machina's second demo... it's been pretty consistently a thing on the Switch, but I can't recall any examples on prior systems off the top of my head.

EDIT: NBA 2K21 and Ori and the Blind Forest do as well.

@link3710 oh, nice to know companies are actually smart. I’ve never played any of those games so I would’ve never known.

Most story-based demos on the 3DS did that too.

That's how I got into Etrian Odyssey. I played the demo a lot, and got enticed by chance of continuing that in the final release of the game.

I thought letting you carry the save over to the full game was fairly standard for demos these days.

@Mountain_Man I've played plenty of demos where that wasn't the case. I thought demos actually saving was rare. Guess not!

Switch Lite keeps having the same gyro glitch. Every day I wake it from sleep and pick up the demo again, gyro sticks and doesn’t move smoothly. And because you need to reboot to fix it it means losing your progress in the middle of a Pikmin 3 day. So I finally just turned the Gyro off for the Lite, and have been playing with analog.

And it’s actually been going really well. The new lock on actually does make the analog controls viable. I had played with them a bit before in the demo on the TV but now I’ve had a chance to really sink my teeth into it with default controls, and it’s fantastic. No complaints at all. It’s legitimately playable without gyro now. Of course I still prefer the Gyro but if I’m playing on the Lite and the gyro is acting up, this totally works.

I’m also impressed with how amazing it looks in handheld mode. I keep hearing the res is like 570p In handheld, but... either that’s not true, or I’ve let people wrongfully skew my perception of what that res actually looks like. Because it really does look excellent. If I didn’t know any better, I’d easily mistake it for 720p (aside from a few spots here and there like earth’s round edge from space).

All this to say, I really love this game. I love it, love it, love it! I freaking ❤️ this game! I love the graphics, I love the gameplay, I love the controls, I love the characters, I love the enemies... when I see the majority of podcasts hyping up Age of Calamity while casually dismissing Pikmin 3 as “eh, I guess it’s worth checking out if you haven’t played it” it frustrates me to no end. Not to say Hyrule Warriors doesn’t look great in its own right, but this is the game people should be paying attention to. I’d be shocked and amazed if Age of Calamity is even half as good as Pikmin 3, and I say that as someone who’s genuinely excited for Age of Calamity.

Huh... I just assumed it was full resolution in handheld and docked because it looks so good overall (except for the jagged letters in the lower right, which I only noticed when docked). I think sometimes people get so fixated on specs that they forget that what it looks like is what actually matters.

I tried the demo yesterday and definitely the game is not for me as I don't like timed chalenges (not that it was hard but I still got to the end of second day and just finished with it)

@Mountain_Man It's 720p docked. I think you'd have to see a comparison with a 1080p, because I think you will notice it quickly. I remember thinking 480p on the Wii was the end-all resolution for games. But once you're used to 1080, or even 4K, it becomes obvious that it clearly wasn't. I agree that people focus too much on the numbers, but a higher resolution can make a game look even better. I think Pikmin 3 in 1080p would look even better. Nintendo's art style ages really well, but despite that, some of their games haven't aged well. Look at Skyward Sword on the Wii, the art style is great, but it looks horrendous because of the low resolution. I guess that's the biggest downside of most Nintendo hardware, especially when retro consoles is the only way to play most of these games.

@Octane
For sure it would look better, but it still looks good.

There's a threshold that exists somewhere for TV play where games stop looking super blurry and you're 80% of the way to full clarity, and that threshold is typically 720p. Increasing to 1080p then jumps you to 92% clarity, 1440p jumps you to 96% clarity, and 4k gets you up to 99%. 8k would give the full 100%. Point being, 720p is 80% there.

For handheld play I've found around 600p is that threshold. Maybe 570p since that's what Pikmin 3 is. And no, it's not as good as max res for handheld, but it's 80% there. Its close.

@Balta666 It's not really timed. You have to get to the ship in a certain amount of time, but you can easily go back and do whatever you want. The only thing you might have to worry about is enough fruit, which can be found everywhere so it's not that big a deal.

@App but I like to take my time as I see fit to explore (the game looks fine but just not for me)

I'm an exploration gamer myself (whenever a game hints that I should go right, I'm the type of player who will go left instead), and everything I know about Pikmin 3 says that it rewards that type of play by giving you extra days. If you find every single piece of fruit, which you naturally will if you take your time and search every nook and cranny, then you will be rewarded with nearly 100 in-game days to explore to your heart's content.

@Mountain_Man
I’m not a big fan of timers and stress, but Pikmin 3 was always an exception to that rule thanks to its design encouraging exploration, and the fact you’re basically permanently exploring the entire game, but in 15 minute intervals at a time.

The more you explore the more fruit you find, the more days you have to explore, like you said. It’s a perfect gameplay loop.

Almost 48 hours to go people! I’m taking vacation from work this Friday and binging on Pikmin 3 Deluxe all weekend. Just 2 more work days...

@ToadBrigade
You must feel like a kid in a candy store at this point.

Saw your post about never playing MH but now being really excited for Monster Hunter Rise, and now the demo turned you on to Pikmin 3... such great games. I wish I could re-live my first experience with them. My first time playing Monster Hunter and Pikmin was in 2013, with Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate and Pikmin 3 on Wii U.

Kinda feels like reliving that in a way, with Pikmin 3 Deluxe and Monster Hunter Rise just months apart. But nothing tops that first experience.

Are you guys disappointed that the game will be 720p / 30fps like it was on Wii U, even in docked mode?