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- P I K M I N -





Warning: This review contains a few spoiliers, so don't read unless you've played the game or would like to obtain more information about it.


Pikmin is a unique game that came directly from the mind of Mr. Miyamoto himself. You, a space explorer by the name of Captain Olimar, get stranded on a planet full of exquisite little creatures unlike those you have ever seen before. What do you do? Your ship has been broken up into 30 pieces by the impact of the "landing". Where do you go? What can you do? Unfortunately, your space suit will only supply you with thirty days of carbon. Oxygen is no good (which is what the planet's atmosphere is mostly made of). That's barely enough to keep alive! What about the rest of the ship parts? Little do you know that creatures who are willing to help inhabit the world you have crashed down upon. Seeing as how they resemble the PikPik carrots back on his world, you decides to call the creatures Pikmin.

The magic of Blue, Red, and Yellow

Each of the different Pikmin possess a special power that you will need in order to obtain all of the missing ship parts scattered across the planet. There are three known types of Pikmin that Captain Olimar encounters - Red, Blue, and Yellow. Descriptions of each are listed below, in the order of which you find them.

Red

The Red Pikmin are the first you meet up with on the planet. The special thing about them is their ability to resist fire. Plenty of fire-breathing enemies can be found on this Pikmin planet, and many ship parts are hidden well in areas where the red Pikmin are required to traverse through firey obstacles to reach them. These Pikmin cannot swim very well.

Yellow

Yellow Pikmin cannot resist fire or swim. But to make up for that, they are capable of being flung twice as high as regular blue and red Pikmin, and can carry bomb rocks, which are essential for tearing down large walls that may block a road to a ship part. These Pikmin are extremely useful when it comes to reaching ship parts that are much too high for other Pikmin to get to.

Blue

Blue Pikmin cannot resist fire or be tossed up very high. But they can "swim" (i.e. walk through water). This is VERY useful in the Pikmin world, where water dominates quite a bit of the surrounding area. Unfortunately, these Pikmin are the ones you find last.

The World

Captain Olimar can explore five different areas of the Pikmin World. Each has its own unique obstacles, terrain, and enemies. Keep in mind that you can only get to all of the ship parts if you have a few (or many) of each type of Pikmin. The bigger your party, the better. Keep in mind that you can only command a groups of 100 Pikmin at once, though the amount of Pikmin the onions can store is endless. So take some time away from finding the ship parts to grow as many Pikmin as you can. You never know when you'll need them.

Cultivation

How do you grow more Pikmin? There are plenty of ways. First, you sick your Pikmin on enemies. Once they are destroyed, command a few of your Pikmin to pick up the carcass and take it back to camp. The Pikmin will take the enemy's body under their corresponding onion color (the onion is the Pikmin's "home"), which in turn will suck up the enemy and spit out new seeds. The amount of seeds thrown out range from 1-50, depending on the size of the enemy or how hard it was to defeat. Other ways of obtaining new Pikmin are the collection of pellets found growing as flowers or dropped along the ground of the world. Pellets come in three colors - Blue, Red, and Yellow. Give a yellow pellet to a yellow Pikmin (or more than one yellow Pikmin, depending on the pellet size), and the Yellow Pikmin will take the yellow pellet to the yellow Onion, which will spit out 3-20 (depending on pellet size) yellow Pikmin seeds. If you would give a red pellet to a yellow Pikmin, you would still get Pikmin seeds, but in a lesser amount. So pay attention to color!

Enemies and War

It turns out just about every other living creature on the planet loves to eat Pikmin. Any kind of Pikmin. And the greater the amount of Pikmin eaten, the better. And apparently, these little creatures at the bottom of the food chain are sticking close to you in hopes of protection or a way of defeating these enemies that are constantly after them. You can send your Pikmin to fight enemies by commanding them with the C-Stick or throwing them with B. Once the Pikmin has gotten the idea of what you want it to do, it will begin attacking the enemy. Sending more Pikmin to fight will most likely kill the enemy faster (assuming you know its weakness), but could jeopardize your army. Experiment with each enemy and find new ways to defeat them quicker and faster without losing too many of your Pikmin.

After Hours

Before the sun sets and your rocket takes off for the night, make a quick run of the surrounding terrain to make sure you haven't left any Pikmin behind. Those that do get left behind... well, let's just say you'll never see them again. Note: Remember where you leave large groups of Pikmin, and find them via colored dots on your map. You really don't want to lose them.

Closing Notes

Pikmin is a pretty short game, so I would recommend renting it before buying. It's also one of those games that you don't know whether you'd like or not until you've played it. Another one of my recommendations would be to give it a try before putting it back down on the shelf and search for a new game. This is something you really don't want to miss not playing. And it's another masterpiece of the well-known genius, Shigeru Miyamoto :).