Mystery Is Afoot—and Totally Adorable—in Detective Pikachu
Detective Pikachu is an unusual angle for a Pokémon game, to say the least. Of all the roles for Pikachu to take on, why a detective? Why a procedural puzzle mystery game? Who knows. The series hasn’t exactly been rigid in its many spin-offs over the years, so they may as well. A game about catching a menagerie of pocket monsters whose premises grows thinner and thinner with each generation probably wasn’t too sacred in the first place anyway.
That being said, I like Detective Pikachu. It starts Tim Goodman, the son of detective Harry Goodman, who has gone missing in the course of investigating a local mystery. Together with his father’s former sidekick, the titular Pikachu, Tim retraces the steps leading up to Harry’s disappearance, unveiling the true reason behind the increasing aggression of the city’s Pokémon while trying to find his dad.
As a puzzle game, Detective Pikachu isn’t terribly difficult. The formatting has little room for error, and becomes a bit boring until you get a sense of the pacing. Items of interest are highlighted with a magnifying glass, and simple procedural questions are answered with clues using a basic drag and drop system. The second screen organizes the clues and each mystery well, all but holding the player’s hand as they walk through each investigation scene. Since Tim is the only one who can speak to Pikachu, he does so on the sly, with short cut scenes that act as a guide towards the next challenge. If one were to get stuck on an obtuse puzzle—all but impossible at this difficulty level—simple trial and error would solve it within minutes.
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