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Pokemon Snap Review

The Game

As you all know, Pokemon Snap is not your 'run-of-the-mill' game. You take on the role of Toddy, a young adventurer whose goal to is to take pictures of all the Pokemon in 'Pokemon Island,' unfortunately, there are only 63, which is one of the game's weaknesses. How can you have a Pokemon game without having at least 150? For a list of whose in the game, click here. Okay, you ride on rails and try to take pictures as Pokemon pass by, you can say its a hyrbid between Sega's Panzer Dragoon and National Geographic. After you're done your pictures, you take them back to Professor Oak who rates them. He checks if they're centered, if they're doing special moves, how rare they are, etc.

Gameplay

Pokemon Snap is more rewarding the longer you play. At first, all you have is your measly camera, but as you go on, you will apples, gas-filled balls (to speed up your cart) and a Pokeflte. Each item opens secrets and reveals new Pokemon and their special abilities. It also makes some of the wilder Pokemon get into better 'poses,' which helps you with your score. The best photograph of each Pokemon is stored in an 'album' via the memory pak. So after you're done, you can cruise through the album and see all of the wonderful pictures you have taken. Another feature is you can bring your memory pak to a local Blockbuster and your photos will be printed out on photo stickers! Talk about weird.

Game Life

Although this game is pretty fun and interesting, it's also short. You can get about 50 Pokemon in only a few hours. Afterwards, the rare Pokemon will take a bit more time, but you can expect to spend a maximum of 20 hours before all your scores are maxed out and you have nothing to do.

Graphics/Sound

This game has some of the best graphics around. Those 3D Pokemon sure look pretty! The character models are detailed and full of personality. The environments are equally lust and detailed; the they have a high level of graphic variety rarely seen in Nintendo 64 games, and the frame rate is pretty good. The music however seems to suffer from a lack of instrumental richness (like all N64 games) because it's on a cartridge, but the tunes themselves are pretty catchy. The good thing about the sounds are they are taken directly from the TV series. So the cries sound very real and you can identify it immediately, bringing the game to a whole new level.

Final Word:

Pokemon Snap is a unique game that has lots to offer. This is a must buy for any Pokemaniacs, and non-Pokemaniacs should take a gander as well.

Heres a list of the Pokemon available in the game.