Miyamoto Shrine> Nintendo Gamecube> Pikmin 2 Impressions

On the first day of ECTS Pikmin left me unimpressed, the demo consists only of the first 10 'levels' of the new challenge mode. Limited play left me thinking the sequel was near-on identical to the original Pikmin but playing it a bit more on the second day changed my opinion of the game.

Pikmin always had lots of room for a great sequel, Nintendo have added new Pikmin, a new co-op mode, new worlds and lots of new gameplay modes. The new Pikmin are the Violet Pikmin and the White Pikmin, the former seems to be stronger and can lift heavy objects in fewer numbers, the later seems to be faster but I'm unsure of it's other functions. Olimar (Why did NOA change his name from Orima?) now has a second spaceman with him but playing the game left me clueless to what he actually does. You can select and deselect him just like a Pikmin and he will follow you around when selected, apparently you can also switch control between the two spaceman so I presume there will be lots of puzzles requiring the two to perform different actions in different places at the same time.

The challenge mode is now much better than the previous arcade style mode in the original Pikmin, you now progress through 50 different levels each with multiple 'floors' in which you need to find a key in order to progress to the next floor. In challenge mode you cannot grow any more Pikmin than what you are given to you at the start of the level, bringing enemies and items to the onions will give you coins which will improve your ranking at the end of the level, your ranking is shown on the level select screen for each level, you will get either a leaf, bud or flower depending on how well you did on that particular level.

The maps were slightly more linear than the normal single player Pikmin maps, the aim was to battle through various enemies to get to the large key at the end which will take you to the next floor. The environment had you changing Pikmin often, water and fire commonly blocked your access to items and enemies. Once you find the key and take it back to your onion a small cut scene will show a geezer appearing out of the ground, you must take your Pikmin to it and press A whilst over it so that you and your army of Pikmin are sent flying up to the next floor.

The Co-Op mode was quite fun for the limited time I got with it. Your strategies and Pikmin management change dramatically when you've got a second player to help you out, usually one player will have one type of Pikmin and the other player will have the other so that you can both progress through the map using teamwork.

Perhaps not mind blowing (yet) but Pikmin 2 has improved on all of the original game's tiny faults. My time with the game seems to indicate that this will prove to be an extremely fun and addictive title when it's released in a few months time, fans of the original should definitely look forward to it.

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