Pokémon Sleep has been a bit of an enigma ever since its reveal in 2019 and nobody quite knew what to make of it or even how it could possibly work. After years of silence, finally, in 2023, we have the game so we’ve fully got to grips with what's on offer, and it is definitely an interesting one. We’ve spent over a week with Pokémon Sleep, which includes a full week cycle of all of the mechanics.
The basics of Pokémon Sleep are quite simple; you just have to sleep. Each night you can load the game, enter sleep time and put the phone, or Pokémon GO Plus + on your bed in order for it to track your sleep through motion, and if using your phone, audio. The game does recommend you do this while charging your device, but you can track sleep without plugging it in as long as your phone has sufficient battery. If you record over 90 minutes of sleep, then your sleep session will be logged. The game doesn't reset the day until 4am as well so if you stay up late at night, it'll still count towards the previous day.
In the morning, or when your sleep session is done, your sleep session is rated. This is done solely based on duration so the longer your session, the better. The game counts up to 8 and a half hours for adults or 11 and a half for under 18s, and your Snorlax’s Strength is multiplied by that value to determine your Drowsy Power, which attracts Pokémon to the in-game sleeping Snorlax. The higher your Drowsy Power, the better the Pokémon you find.
There are three different types of Sleep that affect your Pokémon: Dozing, Snoozing and Slumbering, with Slumbering being equivalent to deep rapid eye movement (REM) sleep. Waking up and seeing such cute Pokémon snoozing sleeping on Snorlax’s belly is just a great way to wake up, and with Shiny Pokémon also being a possibility, it definitely makes us want to check it every morning.
After waking up and checking your app, you can catalogue all the sleep styles and befriend the Pokémon you have found by giving them Poké Biscuits, which you get as rewards or can buy in the shop. These Pokémon are then used as Helper Pokémon throughout the day to find berries and ingredients to help feed Snorlax and boost its strength for your next sleep cycle. This is done passively through the berries throughout the day or by making Snorlax three different meals. Helper Pokémon can level up and all have specific skills and subskills that unlock as you level to make them even more useful, and Pokémon of the same species will have different skills. There are dozens of ingredients and berries which help you make dozens of meals for your Snorlax.
This process repeats every day until Monday morning when, at the start of every week, your Snorlax will then leave and you have to start again with a new Snorlax which has different meal tastes and preferred berries. Essentially, you're starting from scratch but with increased ranks, improved dishes and upgraded Helper Pokémon, which helps speed up the process and makes tasks easier each week, and with different islands unlocking different Pokémon there’s definitely variety throughout.
That’s the basic structure of the game, but how does it truly feel? While the sleep tracking doesn’t mesh up exactly with other sleep tracking devices, it seems fairly solid, even if it does seem to think we take longer to fall asleep than we actually do. One night, it recorded that we took 30 minutes to fall asleep when we were out like a light as soon as our head hit the pillow, which makes us fairly certain that we'll fall into the Slumbering sleep style more than it claims we do. If only. We've tried with both the GO Plus + and the phone and they both tracked fairly similarly, though there is the fear of rolling onto the GO Plus + and deactivating it by mistake.
You can also add friends in-game, and when you do this, you will get a sleep report for everyone on your friend list each day and be able to see how they did and what Pokémon they found. Doing so gives you Candy for Pokémon which can be used to help level your Helper Pokémon or evolve them. This is a fun feature because you can also see your friend’s sleep score so you can sufficiently chastise them if they’re not getting enough sleep.
The gameplay itself is incredibly passive. Pokémon Sleep is not a game that you can just rush through to collect Sleep Styles and it doesn’t want your attention constantly like a lot of other mobile titles. If your Pokémon reaches their limit while collecting berries, for example, they will be given to Snorlax automatically even if you haven’t logged in. This game is definitely going to be a long burn, and based on some of the achievements where you need to sleep for the equivalent of 266 days, there’s certainly intent here for the game to last a while.
The issue is where things could potentially come down to busy work. After only a week of Pokémon Sleep, we’re getting lots of repeat Sleep Styles, even though it says we’ve unlocked the ability to get a lot more, which can be very frustrating. We fear that if this continues it would be taking away from the excitement of the game, especially as progress to go to different islands is locked behind finding a set amount of Sleep Styles. At present, there are only 104 Pokémon available, but that has massive potential to expand should the game go forward with further updates and even events, and that would alleviate some of the issues.
The game also has a fair few bugs within it, but the developer is seemingly proactive on fixing them. When we've been feeding the Snorlax and then go to a menu to check something, the game would often spit out an error message and return us to the title screen. Hopefully, these issues will be resolved sooner rather than later, but at the moment it can be a little frustrating.
Now it's time to dive into the big Donphan in the room: the microtransactions. There are two currencies in Pokémon Sleep — Dream Points which can be exchanged for items and are earned by your Sleep Score each day, and the paid Diamonds. Pokémon Sleep is a free-to-play mobile game and it is easy to play without putting money in, but if you want, then you can basically buy tons of items that can speed up progress and help get you items such as a Helper Whistle to get three hours worth of berries and a Good Camp Ticket which gets you an extra Pokémon each day as well as allowing for you to put more ingredients in a dish.
There is also a subscription for 6 months for GBP £49.99 / USD $50 which gives you 100 Dream Points extra a day for the item exchange, the ability to save more than 30 days of sleep records at any one time, access to a Premium Exchange for your Dream Points, monthly gifts of a Good Camp Ticket and gives every three months of Candy.
Now that can be more enticing for players if they want to go hard at the game, but it’s not being made mandatory or even encouraged all that much so there’s little danger of the game being pay-to-win, at least for now. Whether you think it’s a good thing or not, it’s up to you, but we don't feel forced to pay more to keep up at the very least.
Visually, the game is a delight. The Pokémon look great and as they grow tired you can see it reflected in their expressions. The art style is fairly static, with Pokémon moving in a fairly non-fluid movement style, You can definitely see the lineage between this and the developer Select Button’s previous game, Magikarp Jump.
The music is also nice and soothing, but subtle, appropriate for the game. However, there are some sound effects that could annoy such as when your Snorlax eats berries, the constant chomping of it could be annoying for some after a while. You can also get the game to play some relaxing sounds if you need some white noise while you sleep. There are multiple that you can get as you progress. The GO Plus + also acts in a similar way offering several lullabies for Pikachu to sing to you as you drift off to sleep.
Conclusion
It’s really hard to put a score to a game like Pokémon Sleep. The cute aesthetic and the enjoyment of waking up to document the new Pokémon are definitely there, but the question is if the busy work of building your Snorlax each week is compelling enough to keep coming back. However, the ability for the game to basically judge your bad sleeping habits can definitely help. If Select Button and The Pokémon Company can keep the game going with frequent updates and events without falling into the mobile game trap of locking stuff behind paywalls, then Pokémon Sleep could truly be something great and it could be in the upper echelons of Pokémon mobile games.
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Comments 32
The Pokemon Company used Yawn.
I wake up all the time. My snorlax would have bloodshot eyes.
I’m enjoying this app so far, but the sloooooow burn is getting a bit irritating. The review is right in that this game cannot be rushed (since you can really only sleep once or twice a day). I’ll stick with it for now, though.
I can't say it's awful, it's not great but it could be much worse, but I DEFINITELY won't call it a game. When the closest it gets to a game is tapping Pokemon when you wake up to fill out the Dex, and then cooking throughout the day which you barely need to do anything for (and yet is still kinda tedious), there's barely any "game" to it. It also just isn't grabbing me that much as someone who's never been a huge fan of filling out the Pokedex, it might be a completely different process compared to the actual games but it still really isn't something I'm all that interested in doing. Is it a good app? Sure. I'm not really the target audience but for what it is it's pretty decent. The microtransactions are horrendous but at least they're barely intrusive at all, I just think it's ridiculous that the monthly sub is $10 a MONTH for some in-game currency when you could get Xbox Game Pass for roughly the same price which, while it's incredibly far from perfect, is still an objectively better value. But regardless of all that, I stand by the opinion that it's not a game. It's a Pokemon themed sleep tracker which is fine, but when it's advertised as a normal mobile game pretty much everywhere, I can't help but think that's a little bit misleading when it's really an interactive Pokedex based around a sleep tracker.
This is like reviewing an alarm clock or a pedometer.
This isn't a game. If you go into this thinking you are going to "play" something, you're just wrong.
It is a sleep tracker app with some Pokémon graphics. There is some mild "game-a-facation" of sleeping that encourages you to set a bed time, stick to it, and get 8 hours of sleep every night.
That's it. That's what they advertised, that's what you get. As a sleep tracking app it's ... fine? The way it tracks your sleep stage is questionable, but It's about as good as you're going to get without a wearable (which this was originally designed to be paired with).
The only question we really should be asking about this new addition to Pokémon is simple:
Who is worse? The Pokémon professors who send children to their death, or this guy, who just really wants to watch them sleep?
That's the burning question!
It's more a tool than a game, and a decent one. So the people who complain about the slow gameplay make me scratch my head. It contributes to my concern about privacy buuuuut... Meh.
What's funny is that I started using Pokemon Go much more prior to this and have really been feeling the positive effects of getting out and walking more, and the week I've spent using this has helped put me back on a consistent sleep schedule. I don't need help with brushing my teeth but man with Pokemon Smile, I'm digging how the Pokemon company's been encouraging healthy habits.
@Brydontk Pokemon Wipe Yer Arse confirmed.
The fact that this has microtransactions just feels wrong and is one reason why I'll never even consider downloading this.
To add to the negatives, I do see that for anyone that this could keep you up at night, then you would get headaches. The microtransactions make sense as pokemon go made tons of cash. Pretty happy that this doesn't have super convincing or enticing microtransactions as pokemon go did.
Just what I needed, some more busywork added to my life.
@Yosher
I mean, you do you, but this seems really backwards.
The Microtransactions are part of a practice known a "Whaling ", where you count on a few ultra-rich players (generally less then one ten thousandth of a percent) to cover the entire development cost by offering completely unnecessary in-app purchases at, quite frankly, ridiculous prices.
We live in a world now where the wealth gap is so insanely high that some people literally can't spend all their money, while also living in one where billions of people think using that money to better society or other people directly is morally "wrong". So if some dude is going to spend $10,000 to befriend a few extra Pokémon, why not let them? Sure, you would never do that and likely can't even comprehend why anyone would. But that's because money, to you, is a limited and valuable resource. To some people ... it just isn't. That's why the prices are so insane ... they are literally marketing ONLY to people who do not have the ability or inclination to make a value assessment.
Not only doesn't that have any negative impact on your experience, but it allows Nintendo to deliver a much higher quality experience at no cost, and without pushing a traditional live service model (where you want 20% of your players to be actively spending money). It is the very definition of a win-win scenario for you and anyone else who chooses to ignore the transactions.
It also protects your invested time given you can keep the servers running even with minimal monetary conversion. There is NO WAY Pikmin Bloom would still have servers if it wasn't for this practice. And just like that game, the paid "content" is basically inviable unless you go looking for it.
Seems odd to be morally opposed to the idea of game developers allowing other people to pay for you to have a great experience rather then making you pay for it yourself.
@Yosher Most mobile games are like this. When Nintendo tried releasing these games with only one purchased, they didn't sell. Like it or not, the majority of mobile players want MTX in their games.
I haven't read all the comments but no one seems to be mentioning how you have to keep your phone plugged in and keep your phone on your mattress which in my case really roasted my phone not to mention the heat it generated made me concerned it was going to catch my mattress on fire. I finally put it on my night stand but it still got way to hot. I deleted it and unless they can stop it roasting my phone I won't be reinstalling it.
Not very often a snoozefest is actually the point of a game
@HeadPirate I don't agree with most of what you said except I do agree with you on the fact that a game with free content should still be trying to make a profit, and that usually means using microtransactions in some form or way.
But going that far just sounds like greed and an awful marketing strategy, in my opinion. Well to me anyway. It's used as the excuse while trying to maximise as much profit as possible in an extreme negative way for everyone except them.
But I don't really want to argue or debate a lot on this so I'll just say that.
And I'm talking generally. If your talking just on Pokemon Sleep then I don't know actually, but it looks to me like your talking generally about games with ridiculous priced microtransactions, so that's what I mean anyway.
Your right though, that it's not "wrong" for them to try to make a profit, in some way, on a free to play game or other game-like app. So I agree with you on that.
It just sounds awful to me if things are extremely overpriced. Sounds kind of ridiculous to me and just wrong.
When it's like that it's just about them getting as much money as they can without caring for their players, but trying to make it look otherwise.
I think prices should just be fair for everyone, as long as the players are given a positive experience for free and can get something out of paying at reasonable and farier prices they probably will.
I mean nothing with microtransactions games should be ridiculously priced, that's just unfair on everyone then and a nasty way to try and get the most money they can.
@Yosher They have to make money/a profit somehow if they give out something with free content. That's not wrong really because they should make money from it in some way. But I'm of the view the prices should be reasonable and farier for everyone, I.e small prices and not extreme.
I agree that they shouldn't be overpriced or forced in your face all the time. I dislike those practices too.
But if they give you something for free I don't see it wrong at all for them to make some money from it. I mean they have to really.
But it just seems a lot of these mobile games use needing to make money as an excuse to create a monopoly with overpriced microtransactions and I don't like nor think it's right myself.
@HeadPirate I get what you're trying to say and I appreciate you explaining it to me, but the mere existance of these things in franchises I love just makes my skin crawl. I've played Pokémon GO and Mario Kart Tour, and in both games I was always immensely bothered by the microtransactions being shoved in your face and by how expensive it all is. Plus, after a few days they just felt more like a chore to play than actual fun because of the grind you have to put in if you choose to not buy anything.
And it's not like I put the games down after a week or two either. I genuinely gave them a try, but the existance of those incredibly steep microtransactions just made it so much less enjoyable for me, and it felt like a massive weight was off my shoulders once I finally did delete these games from my phone. I don't really care what others pay for these games, I just don't want these kinds of things to exist in my games at all.
@Thief I'm one of the people who bought Super Mario Run and I genuinely had a great time with that game, because it was a complete package right there, and I do vastly prefer that. And it does sadden me that microtransactions just make that much more money that those are the standard even for Nintendo mobile games these days.
I promise you though, if this ever makes the leap to becoming the standard even on console gaming, I will stop being a gamer altogether. At least, regarding modern games. I'd solely play retro games from that point forward, no matter how playable the new games would be without buying any microtransactions.
Thankfully that's not likely to happen anyway due to how the console market and mobile market differ, but it will always just kind of hurt how these series are (in my opinion) tainted with this stuff now, and how genuinely cool content is locked inside such games that have these, like the costumes in Mario Kart Tour.
Also to both HeadPirate and Thief (and anyone else really who does enjoy these kinds of games), don't let my dislike towards these kinds of games stop you from enjoying these. If you enjoy these games despite these practices, that's great, and I'm happy for you! I just cannot ever share in that joy, and I'm just sad that even a simple sleep app like this has to have them. I guess it was to be expected though.
I am so not interested in software companies tracking my body functions.
Its pretty cool ngl! Not a game though.
i dont fell comfortable with a game/app, that is gonna monetize my sleep patern.
I’ve been enjoying it. I have noticed that it helps me sleep on time more regularly and it’s a nice start to my morning to check what Pokémon I’ve found. I definitely think I’ll keep using it as it’s a nice routine.
Honestly, you can’t view it as a game. It’s a lifestyle app. I know there are microtransactions, but it’s also not the kind of thing you’ll want to blow through. Just don’t view it as the typical “catch ‘em all!” Pokemon game and you’ll enjoy it.
It's a cute game. I'm enjoying finding new Pokémon when I wake up. But I was in a rush this morning so before analyzing my sleep, I just turned the screen off and put my phone in my bag with the intention of going through the process on the bus. Then I went back and it did everything automatically and it befriended a Rattata and not the Mareep that was apparently there 😭😭😭
Not sure how long I'll be into it, but I'm having fun with it so far. Also I don't have a consistent sleep schedule due to working opposite shifts every week, so there's that.
@Yosher
Both of the games you mention are live service. In that model, microtransactions need to be in-your-face and encouraged, as you need about 20% of your player base to be paying customers. I think it's fair to say the live service model is not ideal and most games are moving away from it (or sticking to it and failing).
It's not the system I'm defending or suggesting you reconsider.
There are two other models, the one I talked about early, and "coin-op", which is a system where everything (or close to everything) is unlocked but you have limited play time for free, with more play time costing money (hence the name "coin-op", based on coin operated arcade games). Pokémon Cafee uses this model, as an example.
Both are pretty great for the player with almost no downsides, while allowing games with larger budgets to be enjoyed by larger audiences and played for free.
I'm just saying that you're really not doing yourself any favors by labeling all games that offering in-app purchases as the same, and instead of just deciding to hate something as a concept, it's good to understand how implementation varies and what the alternative would be. Look at games like DOTA 2. A true AAA title, 100% free, 100% unlocked on day one, hosting $15 million tournaments ... paid for completely by people willing to buy a hat for $1000. Hard to argue that isn't a good thing.
@PMFan354
So if you walked into a restaurant and the person at the entrance told you that you could come in and eat completely for free, or you could come in, eat the same food but sit in a fancy booth for $10,000 ... you would walk out instead of eating the free food because of how offended you are that they offer the second option? The one you don't have to take?
I mean ... power to ya, I guess. But that just seems really odd to me. I like that I get free food, I like that other people get free food, and I like that someone with too much money on their hands if paying for it. I completely agree with this model and would like to see more of it.
"This process repeats every day until Monday morning when, at the start of every week, your Snorlax will then leave and you have to start again with a new Snorlax which has different meal tastes and preferred berries. Essentially, you're starting from scratch but with increased ranks, improved dishes and upgraded Helper Pokémon, which helps speed up the process and makes tasks easier each week..."
So it's a roguelite? Pokemon Sleep is a roguelite.
@HeadPirate But, to me in that scenario it's actually is that some food is locked behind extreme prices, so for that reason, you can't enjoy everything but yes to the fact there is some completely free food which of course remains a huge positive and I agree on that part and that point.
I still don't think things have to be overpriced and forced in front of your face often. I feel that's really too much and is the wrong way for them all to make money.
I mean a restaurant gives free food and shows other delicious food on the table saying you have to spend £300 to get some of that is extreme. If the prices were farier and more reasonable then I wouldn't feel negative about it, but it's like that really.
And then $10,000 is an extreme amount of money, even if someone has that much to spare it's way over price.
The thing is it doesn't work quite like this.
But I don't know. Free food remains amazing and I can agree with you on that point.
I just think though that prices should be reasonable for everyone really.
I agree they'd need to make money somehow.
I don't mean to be rude or anything though, it's just thinking differently and that's all I mean. If you feel otherwise then okay sure. I don't, but okay.
Sure but ... that's just demonstrably false. The free and paid experience here is virtually identical. You can befriend more Pokémon, but given there is a limit to active team size and you can hit that limit for free in 3 nights ... it's cosmetic. Not only that but the option to buy anything is 2 menus deep ... forget "in-your-face", even my example was a bit to harsh. It would be more like there was a small sign in the hallway to the bathroom that mentioned you could pay for the food.
You should read the comment above one you made where I explain different models of microtransaction games (post #22). We both clearly agree that the bad ones are bad! I think the disconnect here is that you're simply thinking the worst case applies to all games, and that's not the case. Live service games suck, but you're missing out on some great options if you don't check out other free-to-play models.
As for the price, that's just simple math. If you get $10 of free food and the option to pay is $300, then I have to ensure that 1 in 30 people pay full price. This is what necessitates the "in your face" approach of live service games. If I can't get enough people to pay, it's unsustainable. If the price is $10,000, then only 1 in 1000 need to pay, so I don't have to be so aggressive.
Money is extremely relative. My best friend considers $10,000 the cut off for value consideration. In other words, if something is less then $10,000, he doesn't consider it costing "money". 20 years of Google management including a HUGE stock signing bonus back when it was $5 a share will do that to ya. He would spend $10,000 more freely and with less consideration then I'll spend $1. At the same time, he rarely does ... he already has all the thing he wants that can be bought with money.
That's the mentality I'm trying to explain. Where you see something you want for $10,000 and think "oh thank god, finally something I can do with all this useless money I have". At some point in 2020, someone signed into DOTA 2 for the first time, a free game where nothing is behind a paywall, and spent $1.7 million on cosmetics. We know it happened because it effected a prize pool and various steam-spy tools confirmed it and found the account. He only played the game for 4 months.
Cost of living doesn't scale. For normal people, we spend half our money just to get by. We have to consider everything we spend because we always see it's value. But when your yearly costs for food and shelter are less then 1/100 of a percent of your income ... you think very differently. You can literally spend all your money today, ALL OF IT, and by the time your next bill is due you've already made more then enough to pay it.
You can't overspend. Period. There is no need for impulse control. It's a completely alien mindset for most of us.
The key term that's missing from this review is "Idle Game", that's the genre of the game following on from Magikarp Jump.
If you know the structure of an idle game, you'll recognise some of the mechanics, and how you have decision making in where to invest your resources to try and maximise growth.
The game is unique in that it assesses and leverages your sleep data to power the main mechanic of randomised pulls on each waking session. The sleep styles you study are like opening booster packs with a goal of collecting them all.
It's perfectly fine to just periodically check in, see how your numbers are progressing, feed the Snorlax, and look forward to the next day's results. It's an extremely long term based built around the sleep app.
Is this a comment section or a blog section?
I think I'll wait for the movie adaptation before reading this book.
@HeadPirate You know what, that's a fair point. I still won't get games like this though because it still feels like arbitrarily limiting the player imho, but it's a better model than what the live service games offer at least.
If I could shell out an X amount of money for these games and just get everything I'd feel more like getting them, but obviously that's not a big money maker in the mobile market, so.. yeah. I'll stick with console games.
No thanks I already put enough pressure on myself to get sleep
I'll absolutely NEVER play this app. For starters, it'll absolutely destroy your smartphone's battery health if you have to leave your phone plugged in with the screen ON all night long. It's also been cited as a possible fire hazard by New York's fire department because on top of all that, you have to leave your phone on your bed which is frankly a heat conductor and could cause sparks. It's the Samsung Galaxy 7 all over again, just not on a plane this time. Or you can spend $70+ CDN on a Plus+ device just to use a sleep tracking app (with Pokemon Go compatibility to be fair) that frankly is done better by literally everybody else who's done a sleep tracking app (if you have a smartwatch & sleep data is that important to you....use that).
@HeadPirate Hi can I apologies to you? Firstly, I don't know why but I got no notification for this reply or I missed it. Something like that, so that actually is the real reason I didn't respond again.
But the apology is just that I think I got a bit heated, maybe or something else.
It's not aimed at you, I don't like the system but it's not fully aimed at you or anything like that.
You're allowed a different opinion from mine.
I was also talking generally, rather than Pokemon Sleep specifically, but yes I know that that may be a bit different, so I might agree with you more depending how that's monetize. On that specifically though, not generally.
$10,000 though is still a lot of money. I like the f2p part and someone who can afford a lot making it f2p is an interesting and nice idea for certain.
But I don't like it all and how it's all handled and Gacha, generally. I think there should be more limits and restrictions and rules on the monetization but you do make some valid points and ideas too.
I don't want to argue or get heated or etc etc but that's my actual view. Roughly.
Anyway do have a nice day and I apologise again about my previous response or responses, depending when I started going on and into detail on all that.
I agree I didn't make many valid points but I think this does help clear it up.
I do take some level of offense, not complete offense but quite a level of it. I think I should lower the scale on that a little but I'm not getting rid of it all either. But thank you!
Take care! Thank you for sharing your view on the matter. Pokemon Sleep might not be as bad, I don't know.
I hope you have a nice day. Okay I'll stop there. Bye. Goodbye
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