Pikmin 3 Deluxe - Review

While the Wii U may not have done as well as its predecessor, it carried an enjoyable library of games that are still getting ported to the Switch. This time it’s Pikmin’s turn. Since the series debut on the GameCube, I have been a fan of the Pikmin games. It’s wild to think that it has nearly been 20 years since the series launched, hell it’s nearly been a decade since Pikmin 3 originally came out! After all this time can a Deluxe upgrade bring Pikmin back to the masses.

The planet Koppai is in desperate need of food to feed a booming population. They have found a suitable planet with harvestable food; the planet PFN-404, which happens to be the same planet that Olimar (protagonist of Pikmin 1 & 2) had travelled to all those years ago. Intrepid explorers Alph, Brittany and Charlie crash land on the planet, just like Olimar had. The crash scattered the crew across the region, and the Cosmic Drive Key has been lost. It’s not long before they discover the mysterious creatures we know as Pikmin.  Ever-helpful, the crew will need the Pikmin’s assistance to regroup, gather fruit and get back home. It’s not that easy as the world is a dangerous one, filled with large animals who are happy to eat Pikmin, all of the Pikmin. The story is straightforward, reuniting your crew as you collect fruit and try to find the key. There isn’t much I can say about later in the story to keep it a surprise for newcomers, although it feels like it’s over before it's really begun. It’s not a short game by all means at around 12-15 hours, especially playing on Normal difficulty, but the pacing in how the different Pikmin are introduced can feel like you don’t get much time with the full group.

Pikmin 3 has you out in nature controlling a group of up to 100 tiny Pikmin. They’ll follow you around the area and can be thrown at obstacles or at enemies. The crew themselves can’t directly attack creatures or pick up fruit or other items, so you need to control the Pikmin to do all the hard work for you. You need to be careful in the great outdoors though, most Pikmin will drown in water if you don’t watch for puddles. The three main Pikmin types are resistant to an element, whether it’s fire, water or electricity, but chances are those elements will make short work of the rest of your group. You only have so much time in each day to gather fruit and work on the main story objective, so it’s important to make sure you harvest the creatures you defeat and look for coloured pellets for the Pikmin to take back to their ‘onion’ ship. When creatures and pellets are fed into it, new Pikmin are generated - planted into the ground for you to pluck out. Because you never know when a freak accident could wipe out a chunk of your group, it always pays to keep boosting the number of Pikmin stored in the Onion. 

Over the course of the game you get to know Alph, Brittany and Charlie through short cutscenes and through logs entered at the end of the day. There are also entries in the Piklopedia, with cute commentary from each of the crew. I did miss collecting the treasures like in the previous games, just to see what knick knacks Nintendo would have you uncover, but they do continue the tradition of silly names for everyday items when naming the fruit

Pikmin 2 has easily been my favourite Pikmin game. It removed the stress-inducing time limit that the whole game hinged on and let you enjoy it at your own pace. Pikmin 3 on the Wii U didn’t click with me initially because the story once again has a finite amount of time. It is alleviated by the ability to keep adding more days through collecting enough fruit, but fruit is also a finite resource. Thankfully I never struggled to keep my crew supplied with juice, but it takes a few days in to realise that it’s not an issue. Although you do want to collect as much as you can if you want to ensure the citizens of Koppai don’t starve.

Pikmin 3 still looks gorgeous. It may not be a graphical showcase, but Nintendo knows how to make nature look nice on screen. The oversized world of Pikmin has always been well realised by Nintendo from the very beginning, the cartoony characters help hide that the game is a decade old. For a game where you have tiny Pikmin running around with you, I never had an issue seeing enough on the Switch’s screen.  

This time around the game introduces rock and flying Pikmin. The rock Pikmin are great heavy hitters, vital for smashing through glass barriers. The flying pink Pikmin are handy for getting to new heights and fly over obstacles. Don’t expect to see the purple and white Pikmin from Pikmin 2 in the story (they are in the Mission Mode), although it could be for the best as it would risk juggling too many different types. I found both the rock and flying Pikmin to be vital components of my group, although it takes a little too long to get the flying Pikmin. The Red, Yellow and Blue Pikmin are as you might remember them - red is good at fighting and resistant to fire, yellow conducts electricity, and blue are the only ones who can go underwater. It’s not until the last stretch of the story that you find the last type which is a shame, at this point of the game you’re unlikely to go back to use them in the non-story related areas.

Having the three crew members you’re now expected to split up into groups to progress in the world. Some areas are out of reach until you can throw your fellow crew there, along with some Pikmin to help out. You can even multitask! Want one of the crew to go get some fruit? Off to the ship while you explore the area better, just open the map and select where you want them to go.

For the majority of the game you can get by without splitting up the crew, but it’s definitely worth getting used to as you will hit points in the game where it is vital. Doing well in the extra missions and side story content also requires a decent grasp of utilising your Pikmin in squads.

Nintendo have made the game easier to control, the lock on button being one of the most helpful additions. As with a fair few Wii U games, Pikmin 3 made clever use of the gamepad, in this case serving as an in-game PDA. The Switch doesn’t work the same way so it is all just displayed on the same screen, it’s a feature that was unique to the Wii U, just a reminder of some of the cool things the Wii U did.  

There are several difficulty modes, Pikmin veterans might want to start on Spicy difficulty as the Normal mode is a bit of a pushover. If you just want to experience the story then Normal mode will help ensure you get there without many obstacles. If you’re a Pikmin veteran and you just want to jump right in, you need to complete the story in Spicy difficulty before you get the Ultra Spicy option. You could also just download and play the Pikmin 3 Deluxe demo that will let you unlock it in the full version, so you don’t have to put in all those hours. 

The Pikmin AI can still be frustrating. For example, finding out that a group carrying fruit and items didn’t go back along the cleared path you took and instead went right through an unexplored area only to get wiped out. While the game is clearly set up to make the most of being able to split your group across the three crew members it’s tedious having to manage it all. It could have made a world of difference if there was the ability to divide the Pikmin evenly, anything to help transfer some of the group between crew members.  

There’s a mission mode for additional challenges, so once you beat a boss you can take them on again. I wasn’t really drawn to the missions, the time-based score attack nature of this mode wasn’t what I wanted from the game. There will absolutely be people who are interested in this, and it gives you more to keep working through once you’re done with the story. There are also side stories that become accessible at certain points of the main story. There are familiar faces here that make it worthwhile progressing through them. The only downside being that they are essentially more mission mode levels, it feels like DLC that gets tacked on with the promise of the tiniest amount of story. 

Bingo Battle is a multiplayer mode where crews race to collect fruit and defeat enemies from a bingo card. You can also tackle the Story and Mission Mode in co-op if you don’t mind the split screen, this was previously unavailable in Story Mode. With a game like Pikmin it helps to be able to see as much of the area as possible, but the split screen restricts that. It’s really a trade off, you can have a friend help to coordinate everything, but you have to share the screen.  

Pikmin 3 Deluxe might not be the game people were expecting in October from Nintendo, but it's a pleasant little adventure. As always. Pikmin remains one of Nintendo’s charming quiet achievers. Hopefully the Switch can give the series a boost before the inevitable Pikmin 4. If you struggled to enjoy it on the Wii U, the changes do make it a more enjoyable experience and gives you some new content to check out. For people new to the series, don’t let the 3 in the title keep you from jumping in, you’ll get up to speed in no time. While it has its flaws, Pikmin 3 Deluxe is a good Nintendo comfort game for 2020.

The Score

7.5

Review code provided by Nintendo

The Pros

+Pikmin never fails to be endearing

+Updates to the controls help a lot

+Comes with all the previous DLC and then some if you want more Pikmin 3

The Cons

-The Side Stories could’ve done more

-The story is over before you know it

-The series is still finding its footing nearly 20 years in