Paul RobertsOctober 23, 2023Maxi Geek Review, Pokemon Scarlet, Pokemon Violet, Switch, NintendoComment

Pokémon Violet: The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero Part 1: The Teal Mask - Review

Paul RobertsOctober 23, 2023Maxi Geek Review, Pokemon Scarlet, Pokemon Violet, Switch, NintendoComment

Long gone are the days of a third Pokémon game released the year after the main game versions were released. Pokémon Violet and Scarlet have The Hidden Treasure of Area Zero, broken up into two parts. The first DLC expansion is The Teal Mask, with The Indigo Disk yet to come. Let’s see what hidden treasure lies in store for Pokémon fans.

The expansion starts with you as one of the few lucky students offered to go on a field trip to the city of Kitakami. Joining you for the adventure are two students from Blueberry Academy; Keiran and Carmine. Carmine is the fiery and a-bit-abrasive-at-times rival trainer, with her quieter younger brother Keiran in tow. Their story is part of the larger story for this DLC, involving the new Pokemon Ogerpon. The town has a legend of the mysterious Pokemon, and an incident involving a trio of Pokemon called ‘the loyal three’. As you join Kieran in finding the different parts of the legend you’ll uncover the truth about Ogerpon.

What struck me as unusual compared to usual Pokemon adventures is that your character is put in situations where you are a cause of drama. I found it surprising as it’s out of character when the responses are usually no stakes. It does have a purpose in the story for the sake of moving things forward, but it feels awkward to have the story rely so much on you going along with these moments.

The story of Ogrepon involves a mix of running around the map, to the point it feels like it’s padding out the time. Other times the moments between the siblings and the tragic backstory to Ogerpon’s situation are worth the time, seeing a somewhat more focused story play out.

By the end, the story is not over and you’ll even get a ‘to be continued’ . I’m looking forward to seeing where they’re taking some of the character development for Carmine and Kieran in The Indigo Disk.

The story can take a few hours as you explore this new town and the surrounding areas, with a few hours more to complete the local Pokédex and scour for battles left undone. It’s not a giant map, however, there is a lot of verticality to it. If you’ve got your fully upgraded Miraidon (in Violet) you can bypass a lot of the journey whenever you want to get up that mountain. Once you have the points of interest as fast travel it also trivialises a lot of the locations unless you’re hunting for specific Kitakami Pokédex Pokemon.

Ogerpon is quite a unique Pokemon. They have the ability to hold masks that alter their Terastal state to the corresponding type. They’re also a cute little Pokemon that has had a rough time and will make an interesting addition to your party.

Along with Ogrepon, there’s a handful of new Pokemon, including the loyal three; Munkidori, Okidogi, and Fezandipiti. There’s a bunch of returning Pokemon from previous generations and some new regional versions.

You will need to be mindful when jumping into this new addition, if you haven’t completed the game the Pokemon levels are pretty low (for the most part). For those continuing after the ending, you’ll have a harder challenge. However, it still keeps everything around the level you’d likely be finishing the main game at.

One thing I noticed in this expansion, and actually the main game as well, is that performance appears to have taken a hit. I’m aware that others have had that kind of issue from launch onwards. Being unable to recreate it previously outside of some odd battle camera angles, it is more noticeable now. I much more frequently encountered vanishing backdrops, clipping, and single-digit framerates in a cutscene. The mountain that sits next to the town is full of such bland environments, devoid of much detail.

Given there has been some time since the main title was released, it now appears less and less likely that there will be any meaningful upgrades. By the release of this DLC, you’d hope that they have had the opportunity to make some improvements to performance or even just spruce up the visuals. It’s such a disappointment that the game is actually running worse now. It doesn’t help that GameFreak or Nintendo are still sticking with making the DLC version exclusive. Not that everyone is buying both versions, but it still sucks stinging people for two lots given they’re already buying the main game twice.

There is still part 2 of the Area Zero DLC to come, which part 1 is leading up to. From the trailers so far it appears to offer more in the way of varied environments. I really hope they fix up the worsening performance.

The Teal Mask is an alright adventure within the world of Pokemon Violet and Scarlet. The story goes in some interesting directions with a fun legendary Pokemon. Given the main games came out just under a year ago, it’s disappointing that the game still has such performance issues. In some cases, it feels like the performance has taken a further hit! I am looking forward to The Indigo Disk to see how the story plays out, but it’s still hard to not feel Violet/Scarlet are limping to the finish line at this point