Pokemon Mystery Dungeon – Rescue Team DX: Here we crawl again!

 

I totally meant it when I swore that game off last year; deep in my gamer’s soul, I was absolutely convinced that I would never, ever want to play it again. Yet here I am, with a second run under my belt, all happy and sated! This goes to show that my gaming instinct is a fickle yet loyal beast; and that it’s wiser not to discard a game I love, lest I find myself forced to purchase it again to satisfy the reawakened urge to replay said game.

 

 

As far as Rescue Team DX is concerned, I went above and beyond the call of duty: not only did I replay the game, but I also replayed it with the exact same characters — Skitty as my MC and Pikachu as my partner-in-crawl — and gave them the exact same names as during my first run. 

 

 

However, that’s as far as similarities between my two runs go. I ended up with different Move pools and Rare Qualities without even trying, but that’s only the tip of the iceberg; the most important change is that this time around, I didn’t fall prey to the Early Endgame trap. I knew that main story dungeons were few and far between, that the Sky Tower was the last dungeon, and that it would come much sooner than expected, because huge postgame; and so, I tackled missions to my heart’s content between each main story dungeon, and went through a massive grinding spree right before the Sky Tower. 

 

 

I actually ended up over-levelled as a result, with Sakura boasting a hefty lv.55 and Pika-Cute a no less hefty lv.45. This made the Sky Tower a cakewalk, and final boss Rayquaza a pushover; however, I didn’t mind. I was playing that game to crawl and grind like a beast, and that’s exactly what I did. Ah, to tackle batches of missions in these lovely dungeons! I had forgotten how gorgeous RTDX looks, with its hand-drawn art style and bright colours. 

 

 

Long story short: I had a blast replaying that game for 20 delightful hours, and it’s not going anywhere. Good thing I hadn’t sold it before my gaming instinct claimed it again!