New Pokémon Snap Developed by Bandai Namco Arrives April 30th!
Affiliate Disclosure: I earn commissions for purchases made through links in the post and at no additional cost to you! Hello friends and gamers! The wait is almost over as […]
Affiliate Disclosure: I earn commissions for purchases made through links in the post and at no additional cost to you!
Hello friends and gamers! The wait is almost over as the announced released date for New Pokémon Snap is upon us! A direct sequel to the 1999 Nintendo 64 Game, Pokémon Snap, the player will once again have a chance to photograph ’em all! The original Pokémon Snap introduced the concept of taking photographs of Pokémon on a rail-shooter game design. The game had a high replay value because you had to go back and make sure you photographed every little Pokémon, or take the perfect shot of a Pokémon doing a rare pose or animation. These often required throwing a pester ball, tossing food, or playing the flute to find hidden content. I played the game all the time on the Nintendo 64, so I’m just as excited for New Pokémon Snap on April 30th!
Story Background
Journey across an exclusive Nintendo Switch adventure traveling between islands of various biomes in the Lental region. You’ll play as a photographer filling out an ecological survey which requires snapping pictures of Lental’s wild Pokémon and research them in their environment!
Pokémon and vegetation in Lental have been seen glowing from time to time, and the process is referred to as the Illumina phenomenon. In New Pokémon Snap, your job is to discover the reason why the Illumina phenomenon occurs as you photograph and study the Pokémon in their natural habitats.
New Pokémon Snap – Nintendo SwitchMain Characters
Phil is your rival photographer that comes with you to the Lental region. You both join the professor’s research team, but Phil is competitive so he’s always on the lookout to nab better photos of Pokémon than you.
Professor Mirror heads the Laboratory of Ecology and Natural Sciences (L.E.N.S.). He and his team of researchers put studying Lental’s natural environment at the top of the to-do list.
Rita, Professor Mirror’s research assistant, helps teach you about the islands of Lental, the professor’s ecological survey, Pokémon habitats, and more. She’s a really helpful assistant to both you and the research team.
New Pokémon Snap – Nintendo Switch
Gameplay
Appearance—There will be appearances to choose for your character at the start of the story, but screenshots taken from the game appear to have little customization options for your appearance.
Genre—The style of gameplay is a rail-shooter, so you’ll float safely along a set path inside a pod called the NEO-ONE. Once you select a research site, the pod will steer you automatically, leaving everything else to you in order to snap those perfect shots!
Photography—In the original game, there was hidden content that you could unlock by taking photographs of shadows or mountains that resembled Pokémon, and New Pokémon Snap will most likely feature similar concepts. You’ll want to look literally everywhere when out on your adventures. You might spot a Diglett pop out of a hole in the ground, a Magikarp splash out of a pond only mere seconds away from turning a corner, or even an Altaria straight above your head camouflaged as a cloud!
Research—New Pokémon Snap will feature many different environments for a variety of habitats to explore. Investigate plants, wildlife, and interesting objects to build up your research score. The more you research on the same path, your research level there will increase. At higher levels, Pokémon may display different expressions and behaviors. This adds to the replay value as you could end up seeing things you never saw before just as long as you keep researching the same area. There’s bound to be legendary, mythical, or dare I say, shiny (let’s hope) Pokémon out and about.
New Item
Illumina Orbs—These are a completely new item to the Pokémon world. You can throw these orbs to make Pokémon glow or change colors, resulting in more behaviors and expressions shining in the spotlight of your camera lens. Illumina orbs are also useful in lighting up regional areas during night time explorations.
Improved Items
Fluffruit—Replacing the apple from the previous game, the Fluffruit is a “tasty fruit” specifically found in Lental. You throw the food in hoping a Pokémon will grab, taste, play, or create some type of behavior or expression in order to snap the perfect shot of the Pokémon.
Melody Instrument (Flute?)—The trailer doesn’t specifically show the flute being used, but you do hear the narrator comment about playing a melody which causes a happy reaction out of the Hoothoot. The previous game used a flute, so I think we will get to experience more fun times with the flute in New Pokémon Snap too.
Removed Item
Pester Balls—Pester balls were used in the previous game to cause reactions out of Pokémon by spraying a noxious gas in the air. After 20 years, Pokémon researchers have learned from their past mistakes and removed the item that was considered harmful or painful to the Pokémon. Fluffruit now has the same role of the pester ball but without harming the Pokémon or disturbing their habitat.
New Pokémon Snap – Nintendo Switch
Photograph ‘Em All—Complete Your Pokémon Photodex
After coming back from a research site and hopefully taking tons of awesome photos, you’ll get them evaluated by Professor Mirror. When Professor Mirror evaluates your photos, each one will be scored based on your subjects’ poses, how large they appear, direction they are facing, where they appear in frame, and other factors. Every photo will be ranked one to four stars, indicating how common or rare the behavior displayed is. You can register a photo from each star category to a Pokémon’s Photodex page. Four-star photos are the most difficult and rare ones to capture, so use every tool available to snap that perfect moment! You can keep the best shots to build your own Photodex!
Personal Album
The player will also have a personal album to save photos in which is separate from the Pokemon Photodex. Before saving photos to your album, you can use the re-snap function to create and edit versions of the original photo. Re-Snap Mode will allow you to adjust the brightness, blur, zoom, and add stickers, frames, and filters to your photos. Add on your personal touch and save it as a favorite to your personal album!
Nintendo Switch Online
If you’re a Nintendo Switch Online member, you are free to share your favorite photos with people around the world. Check out what photos are trending or what magnificent photo came out of someone’s research! If you see a photo you like online, award it with a Sweet! medal. Sweet! medals are equivalent to likes on a photo, and enough Sweet! medals on a particular photo can even be featured on the main hub to gain more attention! How awesome!
