New Pokemon Snap’s River Level Shows The Game Has Endless Potential

New Pokemon Snap is going to keep getting bigger and better

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New Pokemon Snap is one of the best Pokemon games I’ve played in years – five years, to be precise, because it’s not quite as perfect as Pokemon Go, but it’s pretty damn close. Unlike Unite, it’s also aware that Gen 2 was a real thing. Imagine including ‘mons from Gen 6’s Kalos and forgetting about the best Pokemon generation of all time – couldn’t be me.

Anyway, yesterday it was revealed that we’d be getting three new paths as part of a free update. While extra content was always expected, given that several major Pokemon were absent at launch, getting it so soon and for free is a pleasant surprise. What’s more, through the recently unveiled river pathway, Snap is yet again reinventing its creative approach to exploring the Pokemon world in new, unique ways.

The base version of New Pokemon Snap seemed to do everything. Enchanted forests, active volcanoes, icy blizzards, and the best cave Pokemon has seen in years. It didn’t let us go to space, but there’s still time – especially if the game becomes the live-service title it deserves to be. By letting us drift along a lazy river, New Pokemon Snap is doing what New Pokemon Snap does best – putting Pokemon in the spotlight.

Water was a big theme in the base game – unsurprising when you consider how many Water Pokemon there are. We had beach levels where we drifted along the coast and sea levels where we explored the depths of the ocean, while a couple of other maps even featured lakes or ponds in the middle of them. But it was only while hunting for Illumina Milotic that we actually ventured into these lakes, and even then, it felt like we were aimlessly drifting. The river route seems to make you a much more active passenger on the water, which lets us see yet another new and inventive angle from New Pokemon Snap.

In the trailer, we see Psyduck scooting off a mini waterfall, flailing in its adorable, clumsy way. Feraligatr meanwhile is drifting along casually, red spines spiking their way out of the clear blue to remind you it’s an apex predator, able to turn around and chomp the NEO-ONE to pieces if it so desired. You’ve survived an active volcano, so you should be able to survive this.

We also – finally – see Gyarados in the game, gloriously leaping out from the waterfall with style. Given the mythic origins of Gyarados being a little Magikarp that could, hopping its way up a mountain before transforming at its peak, this is an even more perfect introduction to the iconic ‘mon than if it had leaped out of the whirlpool we all reckoned it was in. Perhaps we’ll see more of this kind of thing in action here – we’re able to manipulate Pokemon in all sorts of ways in New Pokemon Snap, from making them dance to feeding them, as well as engaging in the more complex tasks of luring them close to each other or using them to open up new routes. We’re yet to see a live evolution, however, so it would make sense for the DLC to provide that.

Nobody is more deserving of that honour than Magikarp. It appears in several maps – we see it being carried off to a grim fate by Frillish, being scooped up by a Pidgeot, and hopping out of the aforementioned whirlpool Gyarados should have been in, which bafflingly hides a Blastoise despite Gyarados being the obvious choice. Good things come to those who wait, and perhaps Magikarp will be the first Pokemon we get to see evolve in the wild. This feature was present in the original game, although it was limited; Charmander was the only Pokemon you could make evolve twice, getting it up to a Charizard by the end.

It’s not just that there are new Pokemon though. The complex world building and interconnected storytelling of New Pokemon Snap means it needs to be on rails. This is the one part of the game that can feel immersion breaking – we’re supposed to be a nature photographer, an occupation where one of the core skills is the ability to remain still and patient, waiting for the perfect moment, yet we’re often zipped away just as the going gets good because we played our melody two seconds too late. By putting us in a river, and at the relative mercy of the currents, this constant motion is more easily explained away.

This isn’t the only major development of the new update. In Florio Nature Park, we’ll also be able to shrink the NEO-ONE, turning the pathway into the anime episode The Island of Giant Pokemon. Much like the river, this gives us a new angle on the familiar. Firstly, it allows us to get much closer to some of the smaller creatures, but it also allows us to travel without disturbing the Pokemon – something the river route should mimic by keeping us drifting along at a steady pace. The shrinking also introduces new ‘mons, with Snorlax and Shroomish appearing on this new shrunken route.

There’s likely more New Pokemon Snap DLC just around the riverbend. New Pokemon Snap is the best Pokemon game in years, and it’s only getting better. This free update is a great signal of how far New Pokemon Snap can still grow – and in spite of all the shrinking, eh?

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