This article was originally posted on the r/Kirby and r/Pokemon subreddits, and has been back-dated to reflect its post time there.
First things first: I’m aware that comparing these two games is a bit like comparing apples to oranges; after all, one is a racing game, and the other is an action/adventure game. However, they’re both Nintendo-published titles that are technically spin-offs to their main series, but are being given the main-line title treatment in the form of development time and marketing. (And both are sequel spin-offs, to boot!) And both are the newest games in series that I’ve been big fans of since I was a kid, and both of which I was really looking forward to seeing what they would be doing.
However, I will say that as I haven’t gotten my hands on either game at the moment, I will NOT be commenting about the actual gameplay; JUST the marketing surrounding both games.
So, given I just woke up after seeing the second Air Riders direct, I wanted to ramble on a bit about their differences and how I feel that reveals how the teams behind them view their games.
In short, I really, really prefer how Kirby Air Riders presented their game over Pokemon Legends Z-A did during their airtime in their corresponding Directs. The short explanation is that when I watched the Air Riders Directs, it felt like the message they were trying to convey was “hey, we made this game, and here’s everything about how the game will play!”
But when I watched the Z-A Directs, it felt like they were saying “hey, sure, we did make a whole new way to battle, and we did offer new movement options to explore the city, but… let’s show the new Mega Evolutions instead!” In short, if I was a video game-loving alien who had never heard of either franchise, the Directs for Air Riders would make me pick it over Z-A every time. Air Riders’ marketing feels like it is being marketed as a game first, while Z-A’s marketing makes it feel like it’s the game equivalent of a tv show tie-in made to sell toys–like Bakugan or something.
Now, that’s not to say that appealing to your core fanbase is a bad thing–you can and absolutely should do that. But let’s look at an example of how this is done from each game’s presentations:
Mega Dragonite has been a long-requested evolution of a beloved character. And it was revealed in the Direct to be coming to Z-A, and in a big reveal the design was shown for a bit in the trailers. And that was that.
With Air Riders, Sakurai talks about how Top Ride was a popular request to be included in a potential Air Ride sequel. Then, he reveals that it will indeed be back. And then–and this is the crucial part–he talks about exactly how it plays, what items will be in there, how to play/different control schemes, the various stages, and accessibility features, etc. He confirms for the fans that it’ll make a return, and then tells everyone directly what you can expect if you buy the game.
Z-A didn’t really do this; with Dragonite, what ability will it have? What stats, heck, will abilities even be in this game? How will mega evolution work? How, exactly, will battling work? What about catching Pokemon? Or the parkour mechanics? Are you going to go into depth about those?
The answer, of course, was no, not really, and to me, that’s a big problem. There’s nothing wrong with editing a flashy-but-shallow trailer to garner hype for the game, but I think there is something wrong with never talking about how the game actually plays. After all, why should I buy a game if I don’t know how it plays?
Overall, I feel like Air Riders really respected me and my time by presenting me with exactly what the game was, and then letting me decide whether I want to pick it up or not. But Z-A seemed to just be like… “meh, it’s Pokemon. It’ll sell whatever we do, and even if it doesn’t, we’ll more than make our money back on the added plushie/figurine/TCG sales fueled by Mega Staryu alone.”
And you know what? I think they might be right.