Nintendo unveiled New Pokemon Snap a couple of months back to the excitement of many fans eager to once again capture Pokemon on film instead of in Pokeballs. New Pokemon Snap comes more than twenty years after the original's release back on the Nintendo 64, and with its first entry in the modern gaming landscape, how Nintendo implements online play will be a big part of the game's success and longevity.
Recently, Nintendo announced the release date for New Pokemon Snap, with it set to release in April 30. The original game changed the way players could interact with and capture Pokemon, as it featured on-rails gameplay leading players through stages where they are able to see Pokemon in the wild. Each stage was filled with hard to find and harder to photograph Pokemon and fans largely loved the departure, and fans can expect this structure and more in the new version.
Filling the Photodex with Friends
The product page for New Pokemon Snap was recently updated to include the tag for online play, leading many fans to speculate about what those features might be, as Nintendo does not elaborate on them specifically. The product page also still describes the new game as a single-player experience. With the lack of clarification so far from Nintendo, some fans are left wondering what the features will be.
If the game does end up being a purely single-player experience, the online features would just likely be the inclusion of leaderboards and some kind of way to share images with other players. These would both be great ways to show off all the different Pokemon that players have captured throughout New Pokemon Snap. Fairly easy to implement, it seems likely that these features will make their way into the new game. Being able to compare Photodexes with other Pokemon photographers would be a fun way to show off collections and inspire some friendly (and passive) competition.
New Pokemon Snap: Beyond the Obvious?
As far as the possibilities for other features, the options are vast. With New Pokemon Snap's inclusion of many more Pokemon than the N64 original, many players would be glad to have the option for cooperative play to help capture shots of as many Pokemon as possible. Co-op play has been a big focus of Nintendo's big games on the Switch like Luigi's Mansion 3, Super Mario Party, and Yoshi's Crafted World. It's worth mentioning that Yoshi's Crafted World lacks online multiplayer, but it's the exception. This focus on cooperative play has been successful on many fronts for Nintendo, so it would make sense for it to include the feature for a big release like New Pokemon Snap.
The similarities of Pokemon Snap's gameplay to traditional on-rails shooters also lends itself well to competitive play. It's not difficult to imagine two players on the same track competing to get the best shots of the most rare Pokemon in each stage, and battling with other players in the new Lennar Region for high scores and rare shots could go a long way to improving replayability for New Pokemon Snap. Simple Mario Party style abilities to interfere with the other player could be fun for competition, such as using bait to attract a rare Pokemon to one player's side of the track or rocks to scare them away outright similar to the Safari Zones.
On the more speculative side, the success of raid battle systems in Pokemon Go and Sword and Shield could be levied into the system of play in New Pokemon Snap. Players could theoretically work together to help draw out some of the legendary Pokemon that will likely be included in the new game, again using bait to draw "mobs" of less rare Pokemon could clear an area for a legendary Pokemon that is more reclusive to appear.
While purely speculative, the possibilities for including larger-scale multiplayer have been proven to work for the Pokemon brand, and it would be interesting to see them implemented here. 25 years of Pokemon later, few new gameplay conventions seem too far-fetched for the franchise.
New Pokemon Snap releases April 30, 2021 for Nintendo Switch.