It’s not just the DS’s touchscreen which changed the game; its clamshell form brings an additional bit of tactile magic. Open it up and a world inside comes alive. By the time the UK got Pokémon Diamond and Pokémon Pearl, Nintendo had already showed in Japan that they could build a new entry in one of their big series around the DS’s unique features, with the ultra-charming The Legend of Zelda: The Phantom Hourglass. In many ways, Pokémon was even more ready for that approach. It is a concept which centres the wonders of technology and its ability to transport wonderful things with you. Open the two halves of a Pokéball and its inhabitant comes alive.
Game Freak and Nintendo did not take that route for Pokémon Diamond, Pokémon Ranger left to provide the only gestures towards it. Instead, the conservatism of Pokémon Ruby is baked in further still, to an extent which challenges my approach. More than any other game so far, I was able to play it for ten hours without it really giving up much of what made it distinctive. The things it would be judged on by long-time Pokémon players are the small details and tweaks which take a lot more than that to show up. No matter how big the DS was starting to get, Pokémon was still bigger and committed to a specific form that would be refined but not more. The GBA had received Pokémon FireRed and LeafGreen, remakes of the original game with improved graphics, and the new games did the same thing in less literal terms.
Pokémon Diamond’s graphical updates actually feel less significant than the previous generation’s. There is just enough of a 3D element to its top-down view for the first gym to involve searching for people hidden behind trees who you can only see from a certain angle, but outside of such contrivances it doesn’t change much. The DS’s touchscreen is used for menus to free up screen estate for battles, but they otherwise play out much the same as ever. Placing accessories on my Prinplup ahead of its cool contest was as touchscreen specific as the controls ever got.
One thing which did come across from as far as I got was that this was a slower and more methodical game than ever, putting more linear plotline encounters in the way of the usual progression of badges. That’s not all bad, and not just for playing weighing games by the hour. Diamond is a step back from Ruby’s assumptions that it would only be played by Pokémon veterans, and gives a friendlier path in without wasting much time bogged down in details. The maps of each town with lines and Pokémon centres and shops marked as red and blue dots are a brilliantly helpful minimalist touch. The automated diary which appears when you haven’t played for days, reminding you what you last got up to, is an even more welcome bit of thoughtfulness.
The standard pokémon formula still works fourth go round. The set of Pokémon type weaknesses and strengths is just complex enough to give a pleasing puzzle element to each battle; the randomness hits a sporting sweetspot. Pokémon Diamond expands nicely on Ruby’s underused duo battles, giving you companions for several travel sections which have every battle fought that way. Assembling a team with complementary strengths and weaknesses is an endlessly engaging strategic proposition, and desperately running through your tail-end pokémon makes for wonderful moments of improvised tension. From a desperate start in the second gym leader battle, I came so close to winning thanks to my last under-levelled Zubat confusing my opponent – one more hurting itself in its confusion and I would have done it.
Even when the battles are more routine, the scope and invention of the world remains impressive. I encountered nothing as spectacular as some of Ruby’s best moments, but just encountering a cast of vividly sketched characters is a joy. I loved the kid who wants to be a pokémon when they grow up, and found a wonderful puckish humour in the fisherman who lines up against you with six pokéballs only to slowly reveal that they are all useless magikarps. Much of the best of Diamond is a tribute to the easily-iterated strength of the original formula, but what a formula.
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