A new era for James Bond games and Pokémon Champions’ mobile expansion | Week in Views
The games industry moves quickly and while stories may come and go there are some that we just can't let go of…
So, to give those particularly thorny topics a further going over we've created a weekly digest where the members of the PocketGamer.biz team share their thoughts and go that little bit deeper on some of the more interesting things that have happened in mobile gaming in the past week.
Paige Cook
This week I wanted to talk about something we haven’t covered, but it does sit alongside IO Interactive being named as one of our top 30 Nordic game makers.
The studio's latest release, 007 First Light, feels like such a natural fit. IO's approach with Hitman: World of Assassination- which, might I add, I was obsessed with - already showed how well they understand stealth sandbox design and so much of that DNA translates well to a James Bond game.
I’ve now finished 007: First Light, and it stands as my favourite piece of Bond media to date, so much so that I made sure to get the platinum trophy for it.
I wouldn’t say that I am a die-hard Bond fan, I’ve enjoyed some of the films, but the game really worked for me. The visuals are stunning, Patrick Gibson’s take on Bond feels perfect and the supporting cast were all really well done. At certain points I genuinely played with a huge grin on my face.
The magic behind this experience is IO’s expertise. The combat feels incredibly satisfying. I love how missions can be approached in different ways. The audio and visual design is stunning and I thoroughly enjoyed the story. To me, it cemented my earlier thoughts that IO were a perfect fit for this project.
It’s also off to a great commercial start, with around 1.5 million copies sold in just its first 24 hours.
So it’s interesting to me what happens next. In a recent interview with Polygon, Amazon Games’ GM Jeff Gattis noted that while IO self-published First Light, future sequels will sit under MGM and Amazon Game Studios.
This sounds like a shift just regarding publishing and I expect they can work something out with IO. But it still raises questions about future games and each company's role in them.
I hope things are kept simple. Keep IO as the core developer. After all, they’ve built the foundation and done so incredibly well, so don’t change what works.
Amazon’s wider involvement will likely mean more oversight from them and possibly some of the direction, but I hope IO maintains the strong creative lead.
Based on First Light, I think this could be the start of a fantastic James Bond video game franchise and it doesn’t need unnecessary change.
Aaron Astle
Pokémon Champions’ mobile release slated for June 17th
Pokémon Champions finally has a mobile release date, with pre-registrations open ahead of its launch on June 17th.
I’ve never been much of a competitive Pokémon battler, but as a big Pokémon fan, I couldn’t resist dipping my toes in once Champions released on Switch. I thought I might play for a few days and move on, but before long I was strapped in and stubbornly committed to reaching Master Ball Rank.
Learning that ranks reset each in-game season, as soon as I advanced from Poké Ball to Great Ball Rank I made my decision: I had a matter of weeks to work my way up to the top. The allure of the Master Ball was too strong.
I spent an unexpected number of hours into this game all about battling - finding an excuse to transfer in some old favourites, and a Shiny Pokémon or two. As battles got harder, I made constant tweaks to my team, learning more about how certain items, abilities and moves interact.
And, finally, I reached Master Ball Rank. I didn’t quite set my sights on becoming the best in the world like no one ever was, content with making it to the top tier. I’ve still been jumping back in more casually during season two, and with season three and the mobile release just around the corner, perhaps I’ll be taking Champions more seriously again in the weeks to come.
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