Pokemon Diamond: - Shine On You Crazy Pokemon

Surpassing the 'fad' syndrome years ago, Nintendo's Pokemon series has gone on to become one of the most popular worldwide phenomena of all time. It's rare to find a serious gamer that hasn't played at least one of these titles, and it's equally rare to find one that doesn't enjoy them. Each generation of Nintendo handhelds has served as host to at least two of them, and the Nintendo DS' turn has come up. Does Pokemon Diamond continue the lineage of excellence? Read on to find out.

Pokemon: Diamond Version

Pokemon are mysterious creatures that inhabit the world. All animals, bugs, and fish are referred to as Pokemon, and many people across the world raise them for battle. As is Pokemon tradition, you are thrown into the role of a young up and coming trainer. Your goal? To become the very best by challenging the top Pokemon trainers in the region - this one (and the setting for the entire game) is the distinguished continent of Sinnoh.

Here is where the first problem arises. The storyline is virtually unchanged since the original Pokemon Red/Blue/Yellow games that came out nearly a decade ago, and it's not like they were anything special back then. There are a few slightly unexpected twists here and there, but you probably won't care enough to give full attention to the storyline. Seeing as how it's been a major complaint of fans for a long time, it's surprising that significantly more effort wasn't put into this field. Maybe next time?

Nintendo has always been a bit of a stickler when it comes to Pokemon releases by putting out two nearly identical versions of the same game. In the past it was Red/Blue, Gold/Silver, Ruby/Sapphire, and this time it's Diamond/Pearl. The differences between Diamond and Pearl are minimal - the most significant being that they feature a slightly different roster of Pokemon. Thanks to online trading you no longer need both versions to 'catch 'em all' which is actually pretty cool.

Pokemon Diamond is an alternative styled RPG. Sure it plays quite similarly to your typical turn-based role playing game, but there are several unique aspects to the series. For starters, you battle using Pokemon. What's more is that collecting them is a huge part of the game. Pokemon are obtained either from generous people around the world, or by capturing them in the wild using small devices known as Poke balls. While you're only allowed to use one creature at a time in battle (or two in double battles), you can carry six Pokemon with you at once.

Gameplay is significantly deeper than it appears on the surface. People who haven't played the Pokemon titles often just see a monster collect-o-thon for children, but they are much more than that. On top of having statistics to nurture for each of your Pokemon (including attack, defense, special defense, speed, etc.) each creature is designated one or two types. These are the basic elements such as fire, water, grass, etc, and they each have weaknesses and strong points to other types.

Pokemon moves are also classified under these different types. These special skills are learned by gaining levels (through winning battles), and some strategy is required in deciding which to learn (each creature can only know four at a time). What's more is that the potency of attacks are determined by what type your Pokemon belongs to. There's more depth to the element system here than in most RPGs.

With the basics out of the way, what's different in this new generation of games? Not a whole to be perfectly honest. You still travel the world battling an evil organization (the dastardly Team Galactic this time) while challenging various gyms (think boss characters) collecting badges along the way. Upon earning all 8 badges you can challenge the elite four - the best trainers in Sinnoh at a chance to become the Pokemon League Champion.

Pokemon Diamond is the first Pokemon title to take the action online. Through the internet you can battle or trade Pokemon with folks from around the world. The game makes use of the DS' built in microphone to allow for voice chatting. While talking over the net is not a deal breaker by any means (mostly because of the low quality), it was still thoughtful of them to include it. There is a big downside to the online mode though - friend codes. There's no option to battle random opponents, nor is there a hub to find other people in. You can only connect to them if you've traded friend codes. When will Nintendo learn?

Given their terrible history with online features, it's nothing short of a miracle that Nintendo included the GTS (Global Trading System). With this you can upload a Pokemon for trade on to Nintendo's servers. The system allows you to request a specific Pokemon in exchange for the one you've uploaded, and you can even choose which sex you want it to be. This is perfect for those of us who don't have Pokemaniac friends, and it's actually quite refreshing for the series to be able to trade creatures on a global level.

The Diamond and Pearl versions of Pokemon add around 100 new creatures to the mix. The people who designed them did a fairly good job this time around, with some decent ideas such as the ground type Hippodown, or the Ghost/Dark Spiritomb. The three starters Pokemon are also unique in design when compared to in the past iterations, and I'm especially pleased with Chimchar. The only thing I'm really disappointed about is the fact that they skimped out on adding new Dragon type Pokemon, with Grabite and it's evolutions being the only non-legendary new ones in to the mix.

Nintendo decided to go back to the days of Gold/Silver by adding back into the games the day/night system. Reading off of the DS' internal clock, the game will determine what time it is in real life and the game will reflect that. What's cool is that certain Pokemon appear only during certain times of day - thus requiring dedicated Pokemon trainers to adhere to that. This is one feature I was sad to see omitted in the last generation of titles and I'm more than pleased to see it return.

For being a colorful game marketed for all ages I think that Nintendo may have slightly overdone the difficulty. While it's perfect for an experienced Pokemon fan such as myself - I imagine children will have a tough time in some of the later areas of the game. I myself struggled on the elite four - trust me when I say that they are tougher than ever before. I don't even want to imagine how difficult it would be for your average ten year old. Nintendo should have included the a difficulty option for younger or less experienced gamers methinks.

The replay value is nearly infinite here. Expect to put a lot of time into Pokemon Diamond. On top of a lengthy single player quest you've got over 400 monsters to acquire, the ability to play against and trade with opponents online, and there's even post-game content. Dedicated fans will probably put an easy 100 hours into seeing all there is to see - the main quest alone took me around 30 hours to complete. That's pretty good for a game of this type if you ask me.

Those looking to collect all Pokemon will have a hard time with just this game. Thankfully Diamond allows you to transfer your old Pokemon from the GBA games (FireRed/Leafgreen, Ruby/Sapphire) by plugging the game packs into the GBA slot on the DS. The method of doing so is a bit weird however. On top of the fact that you can only transfer six a day, after doing so you have to re-catch them in the Park Zone. It's not difficult to do so, but it's a little asinine to be forced to catch all six transferred creatures over again.

To be honest, I was fully expecting Nintendo to screw up this game by making touch screen controls a big part of it. Thankfully my intuition was wrong. While there are some touch screen options they are never intrusive into the main game. An item called the 'Poketch' is completely managed through touch. It's functions include a calculator, step counter, item finder, and various other side options. I personally think this is a charming little element of the game, and while it's use is not required within the game, it's something that brought a smile to my face.

Graphically Pokemon Diamond is a disappointment. The DS is capable of much more than what we're given. Instead of being the first completely 3-D Pokemon we're given something that looks much more akin to the older titles. Battle sequences at first glance look identical to what we saw with the last generation of Pokemon titles, and even upon further inspection you may have a hard time noticing any real upgrade. Battle effects are the highlight, and seem to be one of the few things that actually take advantage of the DS hardware. At least the game is colorful.

Another aspect of Pokemon that hasn't evolved much for this iteration is the music. Don't get me wrong - it's a step up from the last games; it's just not a big one. The music is fairly catchy and it even changes depending on the time of day. The quality of sound effects is inconsistent. The newer Pokemon have brand new effects that take advantage of the advanced hardware of the DS. The problem is that Nintendo didn't update the effects from the older Pokemon. We're literally looking at Gameboy Color quality sound effects here.

Controls have taken the traditional RPG route rather than relying on the touch screen. The D-pad moves your character, X accesses the menu, A is the accept button, and B is cancel. Pretty simple stuff. As I mentioned earlier, the touch screen is optional. What's cool is that you can use it to select commands in battle, and to make things easier, the command boxes were drawn quite large. No major problems here.

Final Recommendation
Pokemon Diamond is an excellent game that will keep you busy for a long time. Because of it's robust features I'd say it (along with Pearl) is the best Pokemon game on the market. Why only four stars? To be frank, after 9 years the series is beginning to wear slightly thin with me. It's still a great game though, I highly recommend it to anyone who loves RPGs, and especially to fans of this series. For all who haven't tried a Pokemon game before this is the perfect time to jump in.