You're going to require two things to enjoy Nintendo 64's 3D poke-opus: one of the three pokemon Game Boy games and a general interest in pokemon. Without both, Pokemon Stadium is a game that will quickly move to the back of your game rack.
It's disappointing. After months of riding the World's Hottest Kids Trend hype, the fans should have received a game with more meat and less fluff. Stadium, truth be told, is little more than the repetitive attack-battles of the Game Boy versions... re-tooled under a nice 3D display.
The game's first problem is the stupid menu system. After the game senses your game Boy cartridge(s), you get a pre-menu screen with Options, Gallery, Battle Now! and a button for the actual game. Why split Gallery and Battle Now off onto this separate menu screen? Just put them on the Stadium screen where everything else is anyway. The pre-menu menu is like a brick wall, denying you the visceral thrill of diving directly into Stadium.
Once you're in the game, you can choose among a myriad of ways to do the same thing: battle. You can fight your way through all the Gym Leaders. You can fight against other players. You can fight your way through 4 different 3 stage full length pokemon tourneys. Each battle option lets you import pokemon from your Game Boy pak, or create a team using "rental" pokemon. I've got a level 53 Articuno who has single-handedly taken me through the tourneys. Another ice beam attack, Artie. Yawn.
A nice feature for the die-hard Game Boy pokemon fan is the storage system. Your N64 can now act as additional storage space for all the junk you pick up while wandering from Pallet Town to the Indigo Plateau. Also, your can play your pokemon Game Boy games on the big tv screen by way of a simple little emulator. (Unfortunately, you can ONLY play Pokemon Red, Blue or Yellow. Bastards! How much better if you could play any Game Boy game! Or at least Pinball and TCG! Another missed opportunity, Nintendo.)
Here's another hint at What Could Have Been: the Stadium mini-games. Confusingly titled as "Kids Club," there are nine fun little Mario Party-style four player games. If only thay had built in a game board as well. It would have been great to have a pokemon-themed miniature Mario Party as a bonus game.
And why don't these pokemon talk? How about some sound samples from the cartoon, instead of the unconvincing Game Boy electronic sound effects? They went to such pains to give each pokemon realistic Snap-style movements and different fainting animations... and then they make them mute! What a rip off! Kids everywhere will be jumping right off the poke-bandwagon!
This game is almost solely for Game Boy fans... those who have been all the way through and have raised their own pokemon. It is a nice bonus for the portable pokemon masters, and the included Transfer Pak better be a sign of things to come in terms of cross-cooperation between the N64 and the Game Boy. Pokemon Snap (as short as it is) is more fun.
Happily, the almost-guaranteed success of Stadium will green light more pokemon projects... so we won't have this bad taste in our mouth for long.
