the Yo-Kai Watch series from Level 5 got written off by so many gamers - especially in the West - as just another "Pokémon ripoff," when in reality, it's one of the most charming, funny, and uniquely creative RPG franchises out there.
i mean yeah, it’s easy to assume Yo-Kai Watch was designed to ride Pokémon's coattails. You’ve got a young kid, they befriend supernatural creatures, those creatures help them solve problems or fight other creatures. It even launched with toys and an anime, like Pokémon. But this shitty surface comparison misses the heart of what makes Yo-Kai Watch special; and anyway, if you want to cite superficial, genre-based similarities as a sufficient reason to not try a game out, you could probably apply that same wobbly logic to many other beloved franchises
when Nintendo brought Yo-Kai Watch to the West, the timing couldn’t have been worse. The first game launched on 3DS in 2015 — right at the tail end of the system’s golden age and just before the Pokémon franchise hit full mainstream saturation again with Sun & Moon and Pokémon Go.
Combine that with a localization that struggled to translate the very Japan-specific charm and humor, and the game was basically fucking sent to die overseas. Didn't help that Hasbro bungled the toyline by failing to communicate which stores the collectible medals were being shipped to and when, making finding them a crapshoot for collectors.
It ALSO didn't help that marketing leaned so heavily into the "it's the next Pokémon!" narrative, which raised expectations to impossible heights (and also made Pokemon fans defensive and avoidant of the series on principle). People wanted battles with deep strategy and tournament-ready meta, but Yo-Kai Watch was always more about vibe, humor, and light social satire.
Yo-Kai Watch deserves a second chance, especially with the rise of "Pokemon-likes" like Cassette Beasts, Dokimon, Dragon Quest Monsters, SMT/Persona, Monster Hunter Stories 2 and Palworld
Absolutely loved those games. I never played all the way through 2, but I beat the first game, including wobblewok and milked 3 for more playtime than anyone should reasonably put into any videogame. I am still mourning the loss of ykw3 pvp. It was almost dead for basically the full run, but it was such good shit that I'd just hop on and leave it searching for a battle and do something else and usually someone else would get on an hour or so later. Might have been the most fun I've had playing any game. I hit S+ but was stuck there for the last couple years before nintendo shut down the pvp. I almost 100%ed that game, the only things I couldn't get done were getting to S++ on ranked battles, getting the last orignyan voice that was a prize for reaching S++, and getting the trophy for finding pandanoko or starry noko in the VIP room (very rare streetpass, almost impossible to get legitimately without living in downtown Tokyo to be nearby a lot of people who have the game).
Here's the hexbear post I made on yo-kai a year ago.
I loved how weird Hazy Lane was, amazing feature. I think the infinite tunnel in 2 was essentially the same thing, but I never did much of that one.
Also one time I was trying to look up how a game mechanic worked and I stumbled on a twitter post that was like five months old about being really impressed with a creative strategy someone used in pvp and they gave a screenshot of my profile and finding that might be the biggest high I've ever gotten from a video game.