Chapter 1456 1374 — Zemitsu Sudden Review 3

Zaboru continued flipping through the special issue, still amused by how consistently high the scores had been so far. The next few reviews covered ZAGE Kart, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, Z-Sports, Pokemon Colosseum and finally Monster Hunter, and by this point Zaboru was almost expecting the pattern to continue. Most of the launch lineup had landed somewhere around nine out of ten or higher, and considering how carefully ZAGE had prepared the first wave of games, that did not surprise him too much.

The first page belonged to ZAGE Kart, and Zemitsu gave it another 9/10. The review described it as one of the easiest games in the launch lineup to understand and one of the hardest to stop playing once friends became involved. On the surface, ZAGE Kart looked simple enough: familiar ZAGE characters racing across exaggerated crossover tracks while throwing items at one another. But the magazine praised how polished the handling felt and how much effort had gone into making every racer feel distinct without making the game unfair. Lightweight characters accelerated quickly and recovered well after mistakes, heavier characters pushed through collisions more aggressively, while certain racers favored tighter turning or higher top speed.

What impressed Zemitsu most, however, was the multiplayer. Local play remained chaotic in exactly the way players expected, but online races through ZAGE Network had already become one of the most popular casual multiplayer activities during the first week. Matches filled quickly, latency remained surprisingly low inside Japan and nearby regions, and larger races could descend into complete insanity without the console struggling to keep everything synchronized.

One reviewer wrote, "ZAGE Kart is the kind of game where being skilled helps right up until your best friend ruins your entire race with one item and laughs in your face."

Zaboru immediately chuckled. "Yeah, that sounds exactly right." He remembered designing the game around that philosophy from the beginning. ZAGE Kart was not supposed to replace serious racing games or even something like Need for Speed. It existed because sometimes people simply wanted to sit together, curse at each other, and destroy friendships for twenty minutes.

The magazine also praised how naturally the game pulled characters and locations from across ZAGE's absurdly large catalogue. Mario, Sonic, SpongeBob, Bomberman, Pokémon characters, and countless others could appear without the roster feeling completely disconnected because ZAGE itself had already spent years normalizing these crossovers. Zemitsu described it as less of a traditional racing franchise and more like "a celebration of ZAGE itself disguised as vehicular warfare."

Zaboru grinned. "That's actually a pretty good description."

He turned the page.

POKÉMON COLOSSEUM

The score underneath immediately made him smile.

9/10

Zaboru leaned back slightly. "Heh. Nice."

The review opened by focusing on the most obvious change: Pokémon was finally fully 3D on a home console. For players who had spent years experiencing most major Pokémon adventures through handheld systems, simply seeing the creatures properly modeled, animated, and battling inside large three-dimensional arenas already made Colosseum feel special. Zemitsu praised the visual personality of the Pokémon in particular. Larger creatures genuinely felt heavy, smaller Pokémon moved with much more energy, attack animations had far more impact than the sprite-based games, and subtle idle movements helped each species feel more alive instead of simply standing in place waiting for a command.

The battle presentation received especially strong praise. Because Colosseum focused heavily on Double Battles, nearly every major encounter forced players to think about two Pokémon at once rather than simply sending out one overwhelmingly strong favorite and brute-forcing everything. Move combinations mattered much more. One Pokémon could support another, weather effects could influence both sides of the field, status conditions could disrupt carefully planned strategies, and certain moves became much more interesting when two opponents were present at the same time.

Zaboru nodded while reading. "Yeah, that was one of the reasons I wanted doubles to be the standard here. Makes the party actually feel like a team instead of six Pokémon waiting for their turn."

Zemitsu agreed. The review specifically praised how much more tactical Colosseum felt compared with more traditional Pokémon adventures. A powerful individual Pokémon was still useful, but team composition mattered much more. Players needed to think about which two Pokémon worked well together, what weaknesses overlapped, which moves supported a partner, and how to deal with enemy combinations rather than one opponent at a time.

But surprisingly, the magazine spent almost as much time talking about the story as it did the battles.

The reviewer admitted that this was not what they had expected from a Pokémon game.

Colosseum began with a protagonist who already felt dramatically different from the usual young Pokémon trainer setting out on a cheerful adventure. Wes was older, more experienced, and introduced with a past connected to the criminal organization Team Snagem. Rather than beginning in a peaceful hometown and receiving a starter Pokémon from a friendly professor, Wes entered the story already carrying baggage, already knowing how dangerous the world could be, and already possessing skills that made him feel much less innocent than previous Pokémon protagonists.

The setting itself also helped establish the darker tone. Orre was rougher, more desolate, and noticeably less comfortable than the colorful regions players were familiar with. Towns could feel dusty, isolated, or outright dangerous, while criminal organizations operated much more openly. The absence of traditional wild Pokémon throughout much of the region reinforced the feeling that something was fundamentally wrong with the place.

Then came the concept Zemitsu considered the game's strongest story hook:

Shadow Pokémon.

The idea that Pokémon could have their hearts deliberately closed and be transformed into aggressive tools immediately gave the story more emotional weight than the reviewers had expected. These were not simply enemy Pokémon that needed to be defeated. The player was actively taking them away from criminals and gradually purifying them, restoring the personalities and emotions that had been suppressed.

Zemitsu praised the Snag Machine system for connecting the narrative directly with gameplay. Wes could identify Shadow Pokémon being used by opponents, then attempt to capture them during battle rather than simply knocking them unconscious. That changed how players approached certain encounters. Suddenly the goal was not always to defeat everything as efficiently as possible. Players had to weaken a Shadow Pokémon carefully, manage the other opponent, and create an opportunity to capture it without accidentally eliminating it first.

Zaboru chuckled. "Yep. Nothing hurts more than landing a critical hit on the Pokémon you were trying to steal—well, rescue."

The reviewer also liked how purification gave captured Pokémon their own progression arc. A newly snagged Shadow Pokémon did not immediately behave like a normal party member. Its heart gauge needed to be gradually opened through battle, travel, interaction, and other methods before it could finally be purified. Zemitsu argued that this made the player feel more personally connected to certain Pokémon because obtaining them was only the beginning.

The relationship between Wes and Rui also received praise. Rui's ability to identify Shadow Pokémon gave her an actual role in the story beyond simply following the protagonist around, while Wes's quieter personality created an interesting contrast with her more expressive reactions. Zemitsu noted that the two did not need constant dramatic dialogue to establish chemistry; their partnership naturally grew as they traveled through Orre together and confronted increasingly dangerous opponents.

The review also appreciated that the villains felt more threatening than the usual cartoonish criminal organizations. Team Snagem and Cipher were still unmistakably Pokémon villains, but the Shadow Pokémon operation made their actions feel genuinely cruel. The idea of deliberately stripping away a Pokémon's emotions to create an obedient fighting tool gave the conflict a much darker edge without turning the game into something inappropriate for younger players.

Graphically, Zemitsu praised the game heavily as well. The ZEPS 4 hardware allowed battles to feature much more detailed Pokémon models, smoother animation, richer environments, stronger lighting, and larger effects than anything players had previously associated with the franchise. Moves such as Surf, Thunder, Flamethrower, Psychic, and Earthquake suddenly looked much more dramatic when performed by fully modeled creatures inside 3D arenas.

The magazine did criticize a few things. Because Colosseum focused so heavily on its structured story and Shadow Pokémon system, players looking for the broad exploration and traditional catching structure of the handheld Pokémon titles might initially find it unusual. The available Pokémon selection was also more controlled, and the game deliberately did not try to replace the main ZGBA adventures.

But Zemitsu actually considered that distinction a strength overall.

The review concluded:

"Pokémon Colosseum succeeds because it does not simply recreate the handheld games in 3D. It builds a different kind of Pokémon adventure around Double Battles, Shadow Pokémon, a harsher region, and a surprisingly engaging story."

Zaboru smiled.

"Exactly."

That had always been the point.

If ZAGE wanted nothing more than ordinary Pokémon with better graphics, they could simply make a traditional game and put it on ZEPS 4. Colosseum existed because the home console gave them an opportunity to experiment with Pokémon in a way the main handheld series did not need to.

He looked once more at the final score.

9/10

"Yeah. I'm happy with that and Pokemon is always popular heheh."

Then his eyes landed on the next review.

METAL GEAR SOLID 2: SONS OF LIBERTY

The score appeared almost immediately.

9.5/10

Zaboru raised his eyebrows slightly. "Heh. Kojima is gonna love seeing that." He paused for a moment, then chuckled to himself. "Well… maybe not exactly the Kojima from my previous world, though." That thought amused him more than he expected. In his previous life, Hideo Kojima had been the creator most closely associated with Metal Gear itself, practically inseparable from the franchise in the eyes of players. Here, however, the circumstances were completely different. Metal Gear had not originally been Kojima's creation in this world, yet somehow he had still become deeply involved in the project once ZAGE began developing Metal Gear Solid 2.

And Kojima had not treated it casually either.

Once he became interested, he had thrown himself into the project with the same obsessive energy Zaboru remembered from his previous life. Cinematic direction, camera placement, character presentation, pacing, enemy behavior, radio conversations, environmental storytelling—Kojima kept finding areas he wanted to refine even though he had not been the person who originally created the series. In a strange way, that made the entire situation even more entertaining to Zaboru. Somehow, even in a completely different world where Metal Gear's history had developed through ZAGE rather than through the path he remembered, Kojima had still ended up attached to it.

"Heheheh… some things really don't change," Zaboru muttered.

The funniest part was that this world's Kojima did not behave as though he were merely helping with someone else's franchise. He genuinely cared about the project and had gradually become one of the strongest creative voices around it. Zaboru allowed it and he could remember several meetings where Kojima would start discussing one small scene and somehow turn it into a thirty-minute explanation about framing, player expectation, military tension, or how a character should pause before delivering a line. Other developers occasionally looked exhausted, but Zaboru usually found it hilarious because it felt painfully familiar.

So seeing Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty receive a 9.5/10 from Zemitsu gave Zaboru a strangely satisfying feeling. It was not simply about the score. It was the fact that Kojima, despite arriving at Metal Gear through a completely different route from the one Zaboru remembered, had still found a way to become deeply invested in it.

"Yeah," Zaboru said with a small grin as he looked down at the review again. "He's definitely going to be happy about this one."

The review focused heavily on presentation. Zemitsu called Metal Gear Solid 2 one of the most realistic-looking ZEPS 4 launch games, not because it attempted absolute photorealism, but because of the sheer amount of detail in faces, animation, lighting, clothing, environments, and cinematic direction. The ZEPS 4 version had pushed the visuals far beyond what the project originally targeted. Character expressions changed naturally during conversations, subtle facial movements made dialogue more believable, rain reacted against surfaces and clothing, reflective materials behaved convincingly, and environments contained enough small details that players frequently stopped simply to look around.

Zaboru nodded slowly while reading. "Yeah… MGS2 benefits a lot from this hardware." Previous life Kojima's games had always depended heavily on presentation, and giving Team NOVA more hardware power had let them push much harder without sacrificing performance.

Zemitsu praised the gameplay just as strongly. Stealth remained the core, but enemies no longer behaved like simple patrol obstacles waiting for the player to walk behind them. Guards could communicate, investigate disturbances, coordinate searches, discover missing allies, react to footsteps, inspect suspicious areas, and call reinforcements. If the player made a mistake, the game could rapidly transform from careful infiltration into panic.

The reviewer specifically mentioned one situation where a guard noticed footprints leading away from a wet area, followed them, discovered the player hiding nearby, and immediately alerted others. Zemitsu described the moment as both impressive and infuriating.

Zaboru laughed. "Yep. That's Metal Gear."

Another section praised how the game encouraged experimentation. Players could shoot radios, distract guards, hide bodies, use environmental objects, and exploit enemy behavior rather than simply memorizing one correct route. The artificial intelligence made even repeated areas unpredictable because guards could react differently depending on what the player had done earlier.

Zaboru leaned back slightly. "Good. That means they actually understood what makes the game special instead of only talking about graphics."

The magazine did note that the heavy cinematic focus would not appeal equally to everyone and that some players might find the long conversations excessive, but Zemitsu argued that this was part of Metal Gear's identity rather than a flaw that could simply be removed.

Zaboru just smile

He flipped again.

Z-SPORTS

Then he saw the score.

10/10

Zaboru blinked.

"…What?"

He looked closer as if expecting to find a printing mistake.

Still ten.

"Huh." A grin slowly appeared. "I expected people to like it, but a perfect score?"

The review explained the decision immediately. Zemitsu did not give Z-Sports a ten because it had the deepest mechanics in the launch lineup or the most elaborate story. It received a ten because the reviewers believed it introduced a genuinely new way of playing games.

The Z-Remote changed the experience completely.

Baseball asked players to physically swing. Tennis responded to direction and timing. Bowling translated wrist movement into ball release. Boxing required the player to punch and defend. Golf used the player's motion to influence the swing, while fishing turned simple controller movement into a surprisingly physical activity.

Zemitsu praised how quickly people who rarely played games understood it. One reviewer had apparently taken the game home and watched his parents learn bowling within minutes without needing to understand traditional controller layouts. Another tested tennis with several coworkers who normally avoided games and ended up playing for hours.

The article described Z-Sports as "a game that removes the controller barrier without removing the game itself."

Zaboru smiled widely. "That's exactly what I wanted."

He had never intended the Z-Remote to replace the standard controller. That was why ZEPS 4 still came with a traditional wireless pad as the primary input. Motion control was supposed to create different kinds of games, not force every developer to wave their arms for no reason.

Zemitsu apparently understood that distinction too. The review specifically praised ZAGE for making Z-Sports a dedicated showcase rather than forcing motion controls into every launch title. It ended with a request that immediately made Zaboru laugh.

"We hope ZAGE and other developers continue exploring the Z-Remote instead of treating Z-Sports as a one-time experiment."

Zaboru grinned. "Oh, don't worry. We will."

Then he turned to the final major review which really surprised him… "Huh..?".

To be continued.