One of the most notable differences between Pokémon and Cassette Beasts is their mechanics to capture monsters. In Pokémon, you catch the creatures by using Poké Balls, but in Cassette Beasts, you do not actually catch the monsters, but you record the essence of the monsters into a cassette tape.
-A common criticism of the monster-collecting genre is the ethical question of essentially enslaving creatures by catching, taming them, and make them fight each other, to the point that even Pokémon attempts to tackle it as the main theme of the story of Black and White (though whether the execution is effective or not is debatable). Cassette Beasts‘ method of recording monsters solves this moral dilemma of the genre because you are not actually catching the monsters.
+A common criticism of the monster-collecting genre is the ethical question of essentially enslaving creatures by catching, taming them, and make them fight each other, to the point that even Pokémon attempts to tackle it as the main theme of the story of Black and White (though whether the execution is effective or not is debatable). Cassette Beasts' method of recording monsters solves this moral dilemma of the genre because you are not actually catching the monsters.
Human characters in Pokémon interest me as much as the creatures themselves, because the Pokémon world is populated by both Pokémon and humans, thus I find the humans' relationships with the creatures and each other also an important element of the Pokémon world. Unfortunately, I often feel that human characters are an aspect of the Pokémon games that are underappreciated by the Western Pokémon fandom, who tend to focus more on the creatures themselves. Therefore, seeing a Pokémon-inspired game, especially one that is developed by a Western studio like Cassette Beasts, actually make effort in fleshing out human characters and relationships was the biggest pleasant surprise for me when I started playing Cassette Beasts for the first time.
-Pokémon has a spin-off game that focus more on human characters: Pokémon Masters EX, but the fact that it is a gacha game means it is a glorified gambling game that wants you to spend real-world money to gamble to collect the human trainers. However, that is not the case at all in Cassette Beasts, since it does not have any microtransaction. In fact, Cassette Beasts‘ companion and relationship systems prove that Pokémon can do more with their human characters without predatory monetisation mechanics.
+Pokémon has a spin-off game that focus more on human characters: Pokémon Masters EX, but the fact that it is a gacha game means it is a glorified gambling game that wants you to spend real-world money to gamble to collect the human trainers. However, that is not the case at all in Cassette Beasts, since it does not have any microtransaction. In fact, Cassette Beasts' companion and relationship systems prove that Pokémon can do more with their human characters without predatory monetisation mechanics.
They Did Not Need To But They Did It Anyway counter: 3
@@ -228,7 +228,7 @@The Pokémon player base has various methods of changing up ways of playing the games for fun or for a self-imposed challenge, with the most popular including the Nuzlocke Challenge and randomizers. These modes of playing Pokémon games are never part of the official games.
-Cassette Beasts include custom game modes that serve similar purposes as these fan-made game mods for Pokémon: permadeath modes, similar to Pokémon‘s Nuzlocke Challenge, and random, and randomizers. These custom game modes can be unlocked by completing the main story or through the debug console cheats.
+Cassette Beasts include custom game modes that serve similar purposes as these fan-made game mods for Pokémon: permadeath modes, similar to Pokémon's Nuzlocke Challenge, and random, and randomizers. These custom game modes can be unlocked by completing the main story or through the debug console cheats.
They Did Not Need To But They Did It Anyway counter: 9