
Pokémon Quest is a traditional mobile collect 'em up that's launched early on Nintendo Switch ahead of its mobile release in about a month's time. It doesn't quite offer enough to fill the Pokémon-shaped void on your Switch, but it's more than good enough to plug the gap between now and November, when Pokémon: Let's Go Pikachu! and Let's Go Eevee! will basically reduce it to redundancy.
You play as a Pokémon Trainer who's exploring the recently discovered Tumblecube Island. It's an apt title given how everything – be it Pokémon, tree, or cooking pot – is shaped like a cube. It all combines to create a visual style that's best described as a cuter version of Minecraft.
As soon as you land on Tumblecube Island, you get to pick your starting Pokémon. Pokémon Quest only contains the first generation right now, so your options are limited to the likes of Pikachu, Charmander, and Squirtle. You know, the core Pokémon of the first generation.

Once you've chosen, it's time to set off on your adventure, which is made up of a series of expeditions across the various regions of the island. Well, you don't actually do anything besides watch your Pokémon do all the heavy lifting. It will run around a small area defeating waves of enemies entirely without input from you, and the level ends when you beat a boss. To be fair, you can tap on their moves to make them unleash them and order them to temporarily run away, but that's it.
At this point you're probably wondering what the point is, but this is the nature of mobile games, which are typically designed to play themselves while you're busy doing something else. Much like in Pokémon GO, your role is strictly managing your collection of Pokémon.
In between battles you can cook a variety of meals that will attract new Pokémon to your base camp, at which point you can befriend them and add them to your team. That's only if they're worth it though. While Pokémon Quest doesn't have the statistical depth of the core Pokémon RPGs, the different 'mons do have their own HP and attack scores that will affect their combat power.

On top of this, they have nine Power Stone slots, which you can fill to increase their stats. These are arguably more important than even their base stats. Most slots can either be filled by an HP stone or an attack stone, though you can rarely come across a slot that lets you fill it with either. If you have too many of one and not enough of the other, the Pokémon is basically rendered useless.
You've also got the Pokémon's moves, which are selected at random when you collect them. These aren't quite as important, as you can change a bad move fairly easily, but not all Pokémon are created equally, and some will only have a single move. Moves also sometimes have a Power Stone slot or two, that let you alter it in a variety of different ways.
The system is a more casual affair than even Pokémon GO, but there is enough depth for those that aren't quite satisfied by just collecting Pokémon and making them run errands. It's also simple enough for an amateur to pick up, and they might find themselves paying more attention to their Pokémon's stats than they first thought. That puts them in good stead for when the core entries launch.

That basically sums up the core loop of Pokémon Quest. Send your mon on adventures to collect ingredients and Power Stones, cook up meals to attract new Pokémon, and equip your team with Power Stones to increase their power. Rinse and repeat.
And it's as compelling as you'd expect from a Pokémon game – at least when it lets you play. This is a free-to-play game with all of the trappings you can expect. That means an energy system and progress that slows to an absolute crawl until you splash the cash.
To its credit, this isn't a money sink. Pay £26.99 ($29.99) for the entire DLC collection and it speeds up drastically. The energy system doesn't go anywhere, but you get plenty of free PM Tickets (the virtual currency) from completing challenges, and it's super cheap to recharge.

The only other content you can actually spend money on are Power Stones, but you can collect these by playing anyway. In fact, you can unlock most of the content by playing and hoarding your PM Tickets if you so wish. It will take you a fair while, and you'll only ever have a single cooking pot, but the option is there if you're really resistant to splashing the cash.
Conclusion
Pokémon Quest is a fun little time waster that will satisfy your collect 'em all urges until the real deal launches on Switch in November. This is, for all extents and purposes, a free-to-play mobile game though, so you will have to splash the cash if you want to get the most out of it, but it's far from a money sink. You can get everything you need in a single purchase, or unlock most of it slowly by playing for free. It's one of the most generous freemium systems out there. Overall, it's a great jumping off point for new fans of the series, and the cutesy art style just might win over veterans. Give it a shot.
Comments 69
I'm actually really enjoying this!
Just not interested in this at all, and the particular look/style of the blocky graphics doesn't work for me personally. And, to be clear, it's not because they're blocky--I actually think block could look great if done right--but because their particularly take on blocky just looks rushed and unpolished to me.
Had a quick go of it yesterday and it's got a nice visual style to it. Nice and easy to play, too. But don't think it's going to be enough for me to spend much time with in the long run. Already got a backlog of Switch games and this doesn't quite do enough to rise up the ranks.
How come the review doesn't mention things like the recipes, cooking pot upgrades, camp decoration buffs, how many Pokemon there are / Pokedex?
“your options are limited to the likes of Pikachu, Charmander, and Squirtle”
Poor bulbasaur...
Surprised at how much I've played this so far. Not really big into Pokemon, but my son and I have quite enjoyed playing at the same time. I even play it when hes not around.
@PhilKenSebben Is there local co-op? I helped my son start this and watched alongside him as he played. He enjoyed it but I hadn't realised it had traditional 2-player?
@Smigit Bulbasaur is the best gen 1 starter too. I hope that's just the way the writer has said it as opposed to meaning Bulbasaur isn't an option. I will fight people.
This game is surprisingly decent. I gave it a go because it was free even though I wasn't convinced about it. I ended up liking it quite a lot. People should give this a try.
@Smigit Bulbasaur and Eevee are also available.
@Lroy Oh. No, I dont believe so. Sorry for how I worded that. We both have our own systems.
@PhilKenSebben Yeah, we do to (each have our own system). Is there any way to connect the two and play together? Or are you just both playing your own solo-games, next to one another, lol! If that makes sense.
Joe Merrick from Serebii, who works to cover all the Pokémon games he can, hated this game. The worst game he's had to cover as he puts it.
There's absolutely no need to pay money to enjoy the game. I'm already in areas 7-10 (halfway through both 7 and 8) and I'm guessing there are 11 areas in total. My best Pokémon was a Lv. 32 Kadabra but then I got the silver pot and the first thing I got was a Lv. 64 Diglett. At this rate, I've beaten the game by Sunday.
@Spectra You can, right? Just pay the full price in-game and you're done. From the article: "You can get everything you need in a single purchase"
I am not interested in this, but mainly because this is the kind of game you want to pull out of your pocket and play five minutes while waiting on a train platform or something. Once I'm sitting on the train, I'd rather play Xenoblade 2 or Bayonetta or whatever.
Once it hits mobile, though, I might give it a whirl.
Not getting this partly because i don't think the art style works for pokemon to me also it seems to play itself mostly
@Lroy It does make sense! We are both playing solo, just sitting physically next to each other.
@Tsurii Don't write off Let's Go just yet! Maybe it's just me, but I'm pretty psyched for it.
@Smigit "The LIKES of" - I wasn't listing them all, just giving you an understanding of which ones you can choose
@PorllM I didn't mean to neglect poor Bulbasaur! Just didn't want to list all of them in the same place. "The likes of" suggests there are more
The biggest disappointment to me came from the fact that this is obviously the next iteration of Pokemon Rumble World, which is free on 3DS to download, and World was so much better than this. I put hours on end into World, it was fun to play. Yes, I got stuck near the end, couldn't purchase the last 2 balloons b/c I was short on currency, but I had played the game enough by then anyway. I'm 3 hours into this one and I'm pretty close to done I think since I never pay any money for free games and I really don't like to replay levels and grind.
If free-to-start Rumble World hadn't existed a couple of years ago maybe this would be ok for a first attempt, but Rumble World, Rumble U, Rumble Blast and Rumble all came before it, and they dumbed this down so much it's barely a game. For free it is better than $17.99 Rumble U, that was an insult to the series. I'd say go download the free Rumble demo on Wii and buy that full game for $10 rather than play this. My kids played that demo for hours on end - it's made for local co-op 2 player - and then when we bought the game they played it even more. Well well well worth the 1000 points.
https://www.nintendo.com/games/detail/OwXo8iT5DBGbZRawA4iYnWpxtJr2bfnz
I do think this game will be continually updated and it may even evolve into something that's enjoyable - controlling your group's movement would be a nice start - but I'm about done now after 4 hours.
Shuffle and Rumble Blast were way better games on the 3DS...and were free. On mobile, Go and Duel are better games, though tbh, I think my luck in Duel has been abnormally high...
@aaronsullivan "Just pay the full price in-game and you're done"
You stopped a little short, he then goes on to say - "The energy system doesn't go anywhere". So even if you pay the $29.99 for the DLC you are still limited to 5 batteries then you have to stop until they refill. Unlike $30 Pokemon Rumble World on cart where if you bought the full game all of that nonsense went away. People seemed to like paying $30 for that free 3DS game more than playing it for free and waiting.
I think my favorite freemium Pokémon game will always be Pokémon Picross, but this is definitely a fun one. Looking forward to catching them all
I managed about 2 minutes of this before I became bored. It's the very definition of telephone gaming shovelware. It's a 0/10 game. Truly abysmal.
I downloaded it but I do not think I'll be getting to it anytime soon.
@Late " I'm already in areas 7-10"
That's impressive. Have you been grinding a lot? I was stuck about 3 hours in near the end of world 3, I think it's a 2300 boss. I was going to give up playing and just collect my 50 tickets every day hoping the game would get improved in the months to come. When I checked last night a level 14 Doduo was visiting. I put him in my party, raised the team power to 1985 and beat the boss. I then took that team and beat the first couple of levels in both worlds 4 and 5, up to about 2800 or 2900. Then my battery energy ran out. Got the team up to about 2200 collecting powerstones. I had started with Squirtle but he's been on the back burner since I got Duduo.
Thing is I'm not a fan of replaying levels or grinding, so this may be it for me, unless my new bronze pot gets me a higher level Pokemon. I have a level 9 Onyx w/ 600 base health but his attack is 0, polish for fast movement. So I'm not sure how much further I go.
So how do you get to area 7 w/o spending any money?
@PhilKenSebben Cool! Always like to hear of parent and their children enjoying gaming together. Very much like that in our house 👍
Nice to see a free time waster being offered, but I just cant get into it, pleased for those who are enjoying it tho
@rjejr I had to replay some stages before I got past area 3. Areas 4-6 caused some trouble along the way as well. I have lost twice in 7-10 so far. My team's power is under 6000 but I'm beating stages that recommend you to have over 8000 power. I'd say HP is more important than power.
I've heard Onix is a really good Pokémon in Quest due to its high HP. My sister has a Rhyhorn and it was a great tank as well. Even if it only has Rock Polish, it can stay alive and hit Pokémon with its normal attack while your other Pokémon are getting back up.
You can also try to get a better move for it. I had an Abra with Light Screen and Flash but I was able to replace Flash with Psybeam. Now my Kadabra sometimes confuses bosses and that helps a lot. For example, Golem got hit itself due to confusion, lost 1/3 of its total health and killed itself.
There are a lot of small things you can do to increase your chances of winning. Make sure to avoid attacks, pay attention to area bonus types, change your stones frequently.
@Tsurii He did, and he was pulling his hair out at the method for encountering Regigigas.
The fact that the Regice in your party needs to hold a cold item was one thing, but being nicknamed was another.
@Lroy Ditto my friend. We are counting down the days until Minecraft over here. Itll be the 3rd system we have played it on together, but man he loves it so much. Makes me happy.
Lets face it, we have very weak gaming here. And people complained that Kirby star allies played on its own. This is far worse. At least its free.
@rjejr Unfortunately with Rumble, no one can add points to download the game any longer. You should be able to download the demo, but you can't buy points any longer.
How much fun would a real Pokémon / "Power Stone" crossover be. Pretty fun, I'd bet.
@Tsusasi Thanks for the info. That does explain why the page had a link for the demo but not the game. I thought it would be available as a VC game on the Wii U eShop like Mario Strikers Charged but I guess they never ported it that way. Well that demo may still be more fun than this game for people who want to play couch co-op.
@Late Thanks. I forgot about normal attacks for Onyx. I'll have to check it's powerstone slots, I think it has 3 health and 1 attack, meaning I could get it to about 1000 health and 200 attack. I also have a Rynhorn but I can't recall why I never used him, I think he was similar to Onyx. Geodude was also similar. I have 11 Pokemon but I think I've only used 5. Vulpix? (fire spewing horse thing) was good for awhile but his fire breath misses way more than it connects so I abandoned him. And squirtle just couldn't keep up. My son the Pokemon fan told me it was ok to abandon my starter, most people do, I was planning on keeping him in always, which is why I was never planning on getting past the area 3 boss. Now that he's out I don't see him coming back in.
I paid 5 bucks for the smaller dlc. Worth it.
Didn't really expect to like this but am actually enjoying it a lot. IAP stuff isn't too greedy and I really like the visual style of it. Will definitely be better on a phone though so I'm looking forward to that coming out
I have played it a bit and it's not terrible. I would like to hope that I can continue to play the same file on my phone one the phone app is released. This game is nothing to write home about and I think a 7 is very generous. But that said. It is free to play and pretty generous with its in-app purchases.
It'd make me more interested if it linked to Pokemon Go or the Let's Go titles in some way.
@rjejr I think it's also worth mentioning that you do get a battery extension for paying too – mine's up to 8 now. Tbh, that's fine for me because I don't really want to be playing this all the time, and I'm finding I'm not really using up the batteries ever. I just sort of dip in, do a few expeditions, then leave it for a bit. That's just me though.
So it's a tide-over, for the tide-over coming in November, for the real thing in 2019?
Gotta filler 'em all!
This game sucks
@FoxyGlen I'd be ok w/ 8 batteries, I'm ok w/ 5, but if a parent bought it for a kid for $29.99 they might expect the kid to be kept busy for longer than that. There's no time limit on Minecraft. At least none that I'm aware of.
@rjejr I didn't think of the kids angle tbf!
Downloaded but haven’t played. I just want to look at the weird art style they chose.
@rjejr yeah around World 3 is where you start to have to grind and it ramps up. Using the recommended types for each area really makes a difference though, you can be quite a few levels lower and bulldoze through (the more of that type, the better, using all three of that type is very helpful). You still have to grind but don’t stick to one team and you actually grind best (I prefer dual types because they’re useful for multiple areas). I’ve read type weaknesses don’t come into play so don’t bother trying to exploit that.
I think I'll try this on mobile at some point. It looks like it has its own charms but I doubt it'll be a long-term investment for me.
@Spectra @rjejr Fair enough. I don't like timers either. Interesting what @FoxyGlen discovered, though.
Beautiful game, nice gameplay and lovable cube pokemon.
"for all extents and purposes" LOL, you've butchered a classic cliche.
@aaronsullivan What did the discover, about the batteries? I thought that was in the description. The description that said if 1 account buys the DLC, say you or I, our kid accounts can play the DLC but they wont' get the bonus. I think the battery may be the bonus.
"The bonuses included with this DLC can only be received once by each user on this Nintendo Switch console. You may have already received the bonuses if this DLC has been purchased by a user with a different Nintendo Account on the same console. If that is the case, you will not receive the bonuses again even if you purchase another copy of the DLC."
https://www.nintendo.com/games/detail/pokemon-quest-switch
@ShadJV "type weaknesses"
You mean what's weak to what? I haven't gotten that far in my thinking yet. I do know my underpowered water team, or non-water team w/ water attacks, I'm still a little iffy on a couple of those, made mincemeat out of the world 5 rock type Pokemon. My 2200 team smoked a 2700 or 2800 level.
And it does seem like the game wanted us to start to grind near the end of world 3. I had given up ever beating the boss until my kid helped me rearrange my team. Kind of feels like first 3 worlds should be a demo and then we pay to unlock the rest. Sort of like Super Mario Run. But they'll make a ton a more money this way. They didn't put a boat in the game for only 1 island, the other 650 Pokemon are out there on other islands somewhere. Stats are going to have be over 9000 the way this ramps up.
@FoxyGlen Not a problem, I never thought of kids until I had some, and now that I'm a stay-at-home dad I can barely stop thinking about them. Like I just found out they are both off from school June 12th so we'll all be able to watch the Nitneod E3 Direct at noon together.
It looks like garbage.
Been enjoying this far more than I thought I would, though it seems like I had some bad luck so far with the various Pokemon I've gotten. nothing terrible, but I've had to grind a bit and play smarter in some areas, and I'm currently stuck at the 3rd world.
The gameplay is weird in that, it feels like a hands-off management system that can get slightly intense. I appreciate being able to pause any time, or even being more leisurely while playing, unlike any online game, but I've actually managed well enough timing my team's retreat, and making sure everyone attacks as soon at they can. Surprisingly, because they're not under your control, it also pays to time your attacks here and there to make sure they get the most Pokemon in a horde.
Just managed to lure a Lvl 4 Scyther with my cooking, so I'll be grinding with him and a few other Pokemon, and hopefully get some better momentum. I want to see if I can beat this game without spending anything.
I'm surprised the review didn't even mention the controls. And god, it feels so clumsy tapping on the screen. I'm never sure how to grip my Switch to do this. Do I disconnect my Joy-Cons and put them aside, which is really weird, or do I play with them on? But then my thumbs aren't long enough to reach all the areas. Or do I grip it underneath with one hand and play with the other?
Sure, you can play it with buttons, but that onscreen cursor is so awkward you can tell the game was designed with touchscreen controls in mind.
As for the game.. yeah, it's ok, but surely better suited for mobile devices. As an iPhone timekiller it could indeed be a 7/10, but as a Switch title? Nah, i'd give it 5/10 at best.
It would be far cooler to get something like co-op Rumble games. And besides, I'm worried that if Switch is seen as a good place for f2p games, the Store is gonna be flooded with trash (which is kinda happening already).
Can't believe they bought this out,they should be working on core Pokémon experience that should release this holiday season,I will not pay a penny towards this rubbish.
I honestly think this barely qualifies as a video game. There is very little actual gameplay to it. You sort of just sit back and watch it play out for the most part. It makes turn based JRPG's seem really engaging in comparison.
If I could control one of my pokemon directly I could probably get into it, but as it is this feels like the definition of a time waster free-2-play mobile game. The fact that the controls are just awful with a controller only makes these issues even worse.
@Tsusasi You should still be able to play Rumble on the Wii U and 3DS.
I would certainly love this!
I'm a huge Ninty fan, but Pokémon has always been meh to me lol but this is good fun and I'm enjoying it
It sounds fun enough in a "Pokémon Rumble World" kind of way. I'm intrigued by the Xenoblade like battle system it uses. I'll download it once I get a Switch...
Looks like a Atari 2600 game if it was 3D... can barely make what what the blockly characters are meant to be. N64 has had better models then this.
@johnvboy Well, I'm not going to pay a penny for this either, just like I haven't for "Pokémon Shuffle" or Pokémon Rumble World," but that doesn't mean you can't still download it and enjoy it for what it is in 15 minute (or so) sessions every once in a while.
The part that is the worst to me is that there is an “auto” button that will play the game for you. The Pokémon will attack on their own and use moves... I’m literally sitting here right now typing this as the game is playing on the tv.. it’s a pointless game and that’s all I have to say about it.
I'm probably not going to play this game much, but I got to choose between charmander, squirtle, bulbasaur, pikachu, and eevee. Is the eevee not normal or something?
I've been playing this since yesterday, and i found this game to be really fun!
I mean, it sure looks Like a Mobile Game they decided to put on Switch, but it's still a good experience!
Btw, i think the dlcs would be better if they had new levels for the game, instead of regular mobile microtransactions that The game want us to think that are Dlc
@BulbasaurusRex,
To be honest my comment was a little sarcastic,I don't see any issue with a free to download Pokémon title,my guess is this is aimed more at the mobile market.
I played for about an hour before deleting it from my system, the game just wasn't interesting enough to me and it felt a bit too much like a mobile phone game.
By the way, you can also start with Bulbasaur, can't you? The review doesn't mention it as a starter choice.
Cisco Ramon on "The Flash": It's the cutest one of all!
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