New Pokemon Snapis definitely one ofPokemon’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 Snapis one ofthe biggest releases of April 2021, with manyPokemonfans 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 developingNew Pokemon Snap,but rather Bandai Namco. According to a recent interview withNew Pokemon Snap’s director Haruki Suzaki this involvement came about due to Bandai Namco’s previous work onPokken Tournament.
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The interview comes by way of IGN’s Rebekah Valentine, who interviewed Suzaki about various topics surrounding Bandai Namco’s involvement with thePokemonfranchise. First, Suzaki talks about how the team’s involvement withNew Pokemon Snapbegan, confirming thatthe company’s work onPokken Tournamentwas a catalyst due to the game utilizing “Bandai Namco Studio’s strengths” makingPokemon"appealing in a new way." Suzaki even confirms that the team working onNew Pokemon Snapwere able to talk with the developers of the originalPokemon Snapover at HAL Laboratory to help form the direction of the sequel.
Next, Suzaki talks about what the team is able to do withNew Pokemon Snap22 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 aPidgeot snatching up a Magikarpfrom 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 inNew Pokemon Snap, Suzaki recently told Game Informer that it was over 200. Already,New Pokemon Snaphas a lot more Pokemonavailable to see when compared to the original, which only featured 63 Pokemon in total. ThoughNew Pokemon Snapalso features only a fraction of the available 800 Pokemon in the mainline series of games, it’s still a very large chunk ofPokemon’s enormous catalog.
Finally, Suzaki speaks about the overall amount of fan excitement to the announcement ofNew Pokemon Snap, considering it’s a very long-awaited sequel to one ofPokemon’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 manyquestions left surroundingNew Pokemon Snap, players thankfully won’t have to wait too much longer to have them answered.
