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Pikmin 3 |OT| Starvation, Slavery, and Savage Creatures in a Cute, Colorful Package

NR1

Member
Anyone here go to one of the GameStop Demo locations today? I just got home from the Plano, TX location on Preston. There were quite a few people there, But nothing like the E3 demos at Best Buy in Arlington, TX last month. I pretty much walked it and was told I would play after the current game! I only played once (by choice), but I did watch several other play the demo.

It feels like classic Pikmin! The only thing that I was having trouble with was the Wiimote pointer... We played with the wii remote and nunchuck. To throw your Pikmin, you had to point at the location on the screen. I kept letting the pointer drift off screen. I'm too used to the GameCube set up of just throwing the Pikmin in the direction that my character is facing. The game is beautiful!!! We were playing split-screen 2 player and had to collected as much stuff within 6 minutes as a team. A ton of fun! I was told by the Nintendo reps that my team managed the 2nd or 3rd highest score of the day! Afterwards, they gave me a 3 pack of Collectable Pikmin iron-on patches. I was already hyped for the game, but the wait is so much harder now!

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Roo

Member
I saw today the Pikmin 3 trailer directly from the eShop.
Man.. those Miiverse screenshots and online videos do not make this game ANY justice.
Jaggies are almost non-existent and the ground textures look waaay better that I expected.

I'm sold anyway but this is what I needed to be completely sure.
August can't come soon enough :X
 

DrForester

Kills Photobucket
So I did the Gamestop thing. Fun, controlled well, except for one thing...

Can you not move the pikmin around your character in this game? I could find no way for doing it to try and slide them along a wall or something. I can't imagine it's been removed, but I tried anything I could think of with both the gamepad and remote.
 

NR1

Member
So I did the Gamestop thing. Fun, controlled well, except for one thing...

Can you not move the pikmin around your character in this game? I could find no way for doing it to try and slide them along a wall or something. I can't imagine it's been removed, but I tried anything I could think of with both the gamepad and remote.

OP said:
Second, the swarming (C-move) in other Pikmin games is gone (replaced by the lock-on). Yes, a bummer, but we must deal.

I am going to miss this feature too. :(
 

Tathanen

Get Inside Her!
So I did the Gamestop thing. Fun, controlled well, except for one thing...

Can you not move the pikmin around your character in this game? I could find no way for doing it to try and slide them along a wall or something. I can't imagine it's been removed, but I tried anything I could think of with both the gamepad and remote.

They compensate for the need to slide along a wall and whatnot by just generally keeping your swarm much tighter while you move than in previous games. You can still do the equivalent of pressing the c-stick forward to move your squad onto an enemy or item by shaking the nunchuck while locked on to the item (which you do with C or Z, I'm not sure which). You can also roll your squad evasively with left or right on the d-pad.

So yeah, it's out, but replaced with a variety of things that still allow you a fair amount of squad control.
 

Kouriozan

Member
I think I'll buy it on eShop, it is the same price (50€) and I would get 10% back (and of course that sweet 30% off for W101).
Still need some time to think about that.
 

bon

Member
I'd like to go to the demo event but apparently none of the Gamestops in my state are doing it. We got stiffed on the Best Buy E3 thing too.
 

SmithnCo

Member
I think I'll buy it on eShop, it is the same price (50€) and I would get 10% back (and of course that sweet 30% off for W101).
Still need some time to think about that.

I wish north america got that deal. Might make me go digital. But for now I'm staying physical I guess.
 

zroid

Banned
I'm thinking of going today, but it's like a 20 minute drive which isn't bad but still pretty far out of the way. Really isn't worth it just to spend 5 minutes with a game I'll be playing in a couple weeks anyway.
 

Himself

Member
Those patches are amazing.

I know I'm buying the damn game, but I think I may stroll in and try it out just to get my hands on those.
 

D-e-f-

Banned
So are there really no levels with purple & white Pikmin? :(

Not in story mode, no. (see OP)

So there are Co-Op challenge levels? Or something?

My wife would play that...she LOVED Nintendo Land Pikmin.

Yes, I feel the OP could be expanded a bit with how they work. It's the challenge levels that you can play either solo or co-op. (in addition to the Bingo Battle competitive mode)

watch this: Pikmin 3 (Meadow Co-Op Challenge) or Pikmin 3 (Autumn Co-Op Challenge) or Pikmin 3 (Oasis Co-Op Challenge)
 

G.O.O.

Member
I think I'll buy it on eShop, it is the same price (50€) and I would get 10% back (and of course that sweet 30% off for W101).
Still need some time to think about that.
I'm on the same boat. I don't want to buy digital with the title being tied to the console and all, but that's a sweet deal and I'd like to see other offers like this one from nintendo
 

Yoshi

Headmaster of Console Warrior Jugendstrafanstalt
So embargo is lifted today, a ton of reviews should be coming in. I hope all my colleagues had as much fun with that gem as I had :). Being positively suprised by a game I'm eagerly awaiting for a long time is something I don't experience all too often!
 
So embargo is lifted today, a ton of reviews should be coming in. I hope all my colleagues had as much fun with that gem as I had :). Being positively suprised by a game I'm eagerly awaiting for a long time is something I don't experience all too often!

Yup, my review is coming in in some hours.
 

Madouu

Member
Edge review was pretty nice to read although a tiny bit spoilery (8/10 if anyone was wondering about the score). I think I'll go on a media blackout starting from now, so that I can enjoy this game fully when I get to play it in September.
 

roddur

Member
i want to ask anyone who has played/watched the game in person. is AA in this game really bad? i was watching it being played in EB games yesterday. it's 2 player mode. the serious lack of AA really bothered me. i'm not a graphics nuts, and i know it's lacking a bit AA, but what i saw yesterday really took out the immersion for me.
 

D-e-f-

Banned
i want to ask anyone who has played/watched the game in person. is AA in this game really bad? i was watching it being played in EB games yesterday. it's 2 player mode. the serious lack of AA really bothered me. i'm not a graphics nuts, and i know it's lacking a bit AA, but what i saw yesterday really took out the immersion for me.

aliasing "takes out the immersion" for you? how does that even make sense?
 

roddur

Member
aliasing "takes out the immersion" for you? how does that even make sense?

every leaf, stone the environment in general. believe me i'm not too picky about graphics, but after seeing all those miiverse pics and then seeing it in person, the difference was more than i expected.

edit : and i'm stopping talking about it now, bcos i don't want to take away the serious positive vibe that we've in this thread.
 

The Boat

Member
every leaf, stone the environment in general. believe me i'm not too picky about graphics, but after seeing all those miiverse pics and then seeing it in person, the difference was more than i expected.

edit : and i'm stopping talking about it now, bcos i don't want to take away the serious positive vibe that we've in this thread.
That's interesting, I didn't notice anything and the Tv I used isn't all that good. Granted I played from a distance, while playing in kiosks you play much, much closer than you should so that should do the trick.
 

D-e-f-

Banned
Story mode 10-15 hours

15 missions (7-10 minutes each )in Mission mode.

Pretty short and lacking in content in my opinion.

You lack some perspective. Pikmin 1 was an 8-ish hour affair. Pikmin 2 was artificially stretched to 20+ hours because of those endless caves.

Pikmin 3 has a 10-15 (or more) hour story mode, depending on your desire to get 100% or not. The additional challenge stages still exist, multiplayer still exists. Now there's online leaderboards that encourage replayability.

Calling this pretty short and lacking in content is simply wrong.
 

Tathanen

Get Inside Her!
With as much as they've talked about the campaign being designed to be replayable for the score, and the mission mode explicitly built for exactly that, I think any of this "time to completion" talk is largely gibberish. The shorter the campaign the better, if you're gonna be score-attacking it. You just gotta know what you're getting into with a Pikmin game. There is a significant score-attack component that renders time estimates null.
 

Farmboy

Member
The numbers cited are probably for start-to-credits runs. 10 hours is realistic if you focus on reaching the boss of each area as quickly as possible, picking up only some of the additional fruit along the way.

No-one will be able to 100% the game in under 20 hours on their first try, except perhaps if they're using a guide from the get-go. I spent over 25 hours scouring the game and while I got all all the fruit at around the 20 hour mark, I still need to locate a couple of well-hidden secret items. Granted, I didn't rush through the game, but I wasn't overly wasteful with my time either. I suspect ~25 hours will turn out to be a pretty average time for a (near) 100% run, sans guide/FAQ.

And that's counting story mode only.
 
The numbers cited are probably for start-to-credits runs. 10 hours is realistic if you focus on reaching the boss of each area as quickly as possible, picking up only some of the additional fruit along the way.

No-one will be able to 100% the game in under 20 hours on their first try, except perhaps if they're using a guide from the get-go. I spent over 25 hours scouring the game and while I got all all the fruit at around the 20 hour mark, I still need to locate a couple of well-hidden secret items. Granted, I didn't rush through the game, but I wasn't overly wasteful with my time either. I suspect ~25 hours will turn out to be a pretty average time for a (near) 100% run, sans guide/FAQ.

And that's counting story mode only.

That would be great, but I don't believe you :(
 
You lack some perspective. Pikmin 1 was an 8-ish hour affair. Pikmin 2 was artificially stretched to 20+ hours because of those endless caves.

Pikmin 3 has a 10-15 (or more) hour story mode, depending on your desire to get 100% or not. The additional challenge stages still exist, multiplayer still exists. Now there's online leaderboards that encourage replayability.

Calling this pretty short and lacking in content is simply wrong.
Pikmin 2 took under 10 hours to complete, I'm not sure where this 20+ number came from. Unless you're referring to 100% the title which did take a bit longer but when people have been posting completion times it has been 15 hours without 100% completion.
 

Because almost every reviewer says that they could complete the game in around 10 hours without 100% but more or less half of the total fruit. I think it's almost impossible to reach the 20-25 hours with that base, that would mean a +10 hours of extra content and secrets, which is the main game length.

Are there any other collectible items in addition to fruit?
 
A friend just gave me a $25 GameStop gift card, guess I'll use it on this. It's gonna be hard though because I've bought almost every game lately under retail price. Good thing about it is that I don't need to buy every game that comes out, maybe I'll use this on Killer is Dead.

EDIT:

Any deals on this game?
 
Because almost every reviewer says that they could complete the game in around 10 hours without 100% but more or less half of the total fruit. I think it's almost impossible to reach the 20-25 hours with that base, that would mean a +10 hours of extra content and secrets, which is the main game length.

Are there any other collectible items in addition to fruit?

Where's this "almost every reviewer"? You're arguing without any hard facts or personal experience, which is incredibly silly.
 
Because almost every reviewer says that they could complete the game in around 10 hours without 100% but more or less half of the total fruit. I think it's almost impossible to reach the 20-25 hours with that base, that would mean a +10 hours of extra content and secrets, which is the main game length.

Are there any other collectible items in addition to fruit?

I wouldnt consider the time it took reviewers to beat the game as the best way to get an idea of its length. They do this for a living and im sure some rush through the game.

Someone on here mentioned it took them around 15 hours to beat it before getting 100%.

Plus theres an incentive to replay the game with online leaderboards. You can restart sections of the singleplayer if you want to master them.

Same goes for mission mode.

Dont forget about bingo mode(if you got someone to play with). 12 stages, each with three variations.

It wouldnt be unreasonable for me to think id put at least 80 hours into this game.
 

Farmboy

Member
Because almost every reviewer says that they could complete the game in around 10 hours without 100% but more or less half of the total fruit. I think it's almost impossible to reach the 20-25 hours with that base, that would mean a +10 hours of extra content and secrets, which is the main game length.

The way I approached the game was: every day, I'd generally attempt to come closer to the area's boss (which is shown on your radar screen and which unlocks the next area), but I'd allow myself to be distracted by any fruit I'd find along the way or happened to spot during general exploration.

Playing this way, it cost me around 20 hours to reach the credits, but I did have around 40 pieces of fruit which I think is probably slightly above average for a first run (it is certainly way more than strictly necessary).

That left around 25 pieces of fruit for 'post-game content', which took me an additional 5-6 hours to gather. So that's significantly less time per piece of fruit. That's not just because I'd gotten the hang of the game by then, but also because I was less likely to restart a day to maximize efficiency (and minimize Pikmin death) than I was during the intial run. I also spent much less time on growing my Pikmin population (obviously, as the intial run includes the introduction of each new Pikmin species, along with short tutorial-like bits for each of them).

Of course, the quicker you rush towards the area bosses and on to the next area, the sooner you'll see the credits roll... and the more fruit you'll leave for the post-game phase. And I'm sure most people will play through the post-game phase in a similar, faster fashion, so I guess the more fruit you leave for that phase, the quicker you'll finish the game with all 66 pieces of fruit. But in general, I honestly beiieve 20-25 hours is a pretty good indicator for the average time spent to 100% the game. Many people will be faster, others will be slower.

Are there any other collectible items in addition to fruit?

Yes.
 

Kai Dracon

Writing a dinosaur space opera symphony
The problem with scientifically estimating game length in Pikmin is everybody will have a different experience due to how they think. And luck.

Some people will figure out how to get certain collectibles immediately, others won't find them for half an hour. This is why Pikmin 2 can be completed 100% in 10-12 hours but a lot of average playtimes are 20-25.

It is however a fact that Pikmin 2's length is stretched out by the dungeons.

Aren't there six primary overworld locations in Pikmin 3 (one for each main boss) as opposed to the 3 primary areas in Pikmin 2?
 
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