It’s not hard to understand the allure of the Pokemon Mystery Dungeon spin-off series. There’s just something fun about becoming a Pokemon instead of simply training one and going on adventures with a group of pocket monster friends. It’s been a while, though, since the dungeon-crawler series last let fans do so, but with the release of Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Rescue Team DX this week, they’re now free to scratch that itch once again.

The first entry since 2015’s Pokemon Super Mystery Dungeon, this new game is actually a remake fusing the series’ first two games, the Game Boy Advance title Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Red Rescue Team and the Nintendo DS title Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Blue Rescue Team, into a single HD experience. As such, it’s a perfect entry point for anyone curious about the series’ Pokemon-flavored spin on the roguelike genre and its randomized dungeons.

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The question now is does it offer them enough incentive to jump in? Let’s see what the reviews have to say about Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Rescue Team DX.

GameSpot (Cian Maher)

Whether or not you're an old-school Mystery Dungeon aficionado or a total newcomer to the long-derelict spin-off series doesn't necessarily matter: Mystery Dungeon on Switch improves upon the originals with some valuable quality-of-life tweaks, making it a worthwhile play regardless of your familiarity with the series. It features a distinct combat system that provides an intriguing alternative to the mainline Pokemon formula with tile-based strategizing, humanizes the Pokemon you've fallen in love with over the years, tells a riveting and emotional story that will make you view the franchise in a totally different light, and does so with a stylish suite of visuals and music.

Score: 8/10

IGN (Travis Northup)

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Rescue Team DX is a remake that feels like putting a bandaid on a flawed game that badly needed major surgery instead. While the story and presentation have been drastically improved with fun characters and an impressive new art style, its core is still painfully dull. Key areas like dungeon crawling and combat are as monotonous and repetitive as ever, leaving Rescue Team DX a truly unremarkable, grindy experience.

Score: 6/10

God is a Geek (Chris Hyde)

Ultimately, Pokémon Mystery Dungeon Rescue Team DX does enough to warrant its remake status. The visuals, in particular, look gorgeous and with the music, really bring it to life and exude optimism and joy that feels wholly Nintendo. The gameplay still has some missteps in some of its decisions and restrictions at certain points. But despite this, it’s quite addictive and I enjoyed playing it through to the end. And it’s also worth mentioning that after the credits roll, the amount of end-game content here is commendable. There is a lot to get your teeth into, and plenty of excuses to continue expanding your rescue team.

Score: 7/10

Eurogamer (Chris Tapsell)

The problem, though, is that above the warm and fuzzy feeling it might give you, there isn't a huge amount more that Pokémon Mystery Dungeon DX has to offer. The complexity of its dungeon crawling is undoubtedly the big selling point but there's as much frustration to be had there as there is depth.

Score: Unscored

Nintendo Life (Chris Scullion)

When you get to the stage where you’re hitting dungeons with 80 or 90 floors, it takes a special type of patience to stay entertained for that long without your eyes glazing over a tiny bit. This new Auto mode only confirms this better than we can: the whole point of this game is exploring dungeons – it’s in the title, after all – and if one of the main selling points is “hey, you don’t have to actually explore the dungeons, we'll play the game for you”, there’s no better confirmation than it can be a chore at times.

Score: 6/10

pokemon mystery dungeon rescue team dx dialog

Metro (Reviewer Not Named)

Perhaps the most damning element of the game is that there’s an ‘Auto’ option that you can turn on to basically let it play itself, with you only having to take over manually for battles. That tells you all you need to know about the game’s depth and complexity, and the fact that the developers realise you might want a respite from the tedium of having to play it yourself. There are a few other minor points of note (combining moves together at the Link Shop is something that would be fun to see in the mainline games), but really Mystery Dungeon is not a very interesting game, and never was. There are far better roguelikes and far better Pokémon games available on the Switch, and we’d take any of them over this entirely unwarranted remake.

Score: 4/10

USGamer (Joel Franey)

Though still imperfect, Mystery Dungeon more than makes up for its stumblings through one of the most sweet-hearted stories in the Pokemon franchise, backed by a solid dungeoneering system and a gorgeous aesthetic. If all Pokemon games were as forward-thinking and adventurous as this one, who knows what the franchise could be by now?

Score: 8/10

In conclusion, it looks like opinions so far a little more mixed than, say, Pokemon Sword and Shield, and it looks like plenty of fans might not welcome the grind that comes with Rescue Team DX’s more old-school dungeon-crawling, even with new additions like Shiny Pokemon. Still, if the general consensus is any indication, there’s enough charm that players who can stomach some repetition can find something worthwhile here.

Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Rescue Team DX is available for the Switch.

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