New Pokemon Snap is definitely one of Pokemon's most surprising announcements in recent years, considering it is a sequel to a game that came out over 20 years ago now. As such, New Pokemon Snap is one of the biggest releases of April 2021, with many Pokemon fans having quite high hopes for this spin-off title.
However, many eagle-eyed fans may have noticed that it is not Game Freak or HAL Laboratory who is developing New Pokemon Snap, but rather Bandai Namco. According to a recent interview with New Pokemon Snap's director Haruki Suzaki this involvement came about due to Bandai Namco's previous work on Pokken Tournament.
The interview comes by way of IGN's Rebekah Valentine, who interviewed Suzaki about various topics surrounding Bandai Namco's involvement with the Pokemon franchise. First, Suzaki talks about how the team's involvement with New Pokemon Snap began, confirming that the company's work on Pokken Tournament was a catalyst due to the game utilizing "Bandai Namco Studio's strengths" making Pokemon "appealing in a new way." Suzaki even confirms that the team working on New Pokemon Snap were able to talk with the developers of the original Pokemon Snap over at HAL Laboratory to help form the direction of the sequel.
Next, Suzaki talks about what the team is able to do with New Pokemon Snap 22 years after the original released on the Nintendo 64. Suzaki says the main focus of the game's direction was to "build a world where wild Pokemon actually live in this game." Already these elements have shone through in various pieces of promotional material, such as the recent video of a Pidgeot snatching up a Magikarp from a stream and flying off with it. Suzaki explains the steps the team took to achieve this, first crafting the environments that Pokemon would live in, then creating detailed scenery, and utilizing the Switch's hardware as best they could.
Suzaki goes on to say that another key focus of the project was increasing the number of Pokemon available for players to encounter and photograph. Though we still don't know the exact number of Pokemon in New Pokemon Snap, Suzaki recently told Game Informer that it was over 200. Already, New Pokemon Snap has a lot more Pokemon available to see when compared to the original, which only featured 63 Pokemon in total. Though New Pokemon Snap also features only a fraction of the available 800 Pokemon in the mainline series of games, it's still a very large chunk of Pokemon's enormous catalog.
Finally, Suzaki speaks about the overall amount of fan excitement to the announcement of New Pokemon Snap, considering it's a very long-awaited sequel to one of Pokemon's most celebrated spin-offs. Suzaki confirms that Bandai Namco was keen to the global fan interest in the spin-off title, but says the Switch's capabilities were key to the game's announcement now instead of on the Wii U. Though there are still many questions left surrounding New Pokemon Snap, players thankfully won't have to wait too much longer to have them answered.
New Pokemon Snap releases for Nintendo Switch on April 30th, 2021.
Source: IGN, Game Informer