The core plot of the main series Pokémon games, except for Legends: Arceus, is about a child going on a journey and become the best Pokémon Trainer in their region by claiming the Champion title. However, the main plot of Cassette Beasts is about the protagonist finding their way back home after bring transported to New Wirral, an island that exists in a different dimension from Earth and where humans from various dimensions are also transported and strended on.
The protagonists of Pokémon games become the new Champion of their region by defeating Gym Leaders or Trial Captains, then the Elite Four and the current standing Champion. In Cassette Beasts, the closest thing to an equivalent to Gym Leaders is the Ranger Captains, and one of the main quests involves defeating all the Captains across the map, but even then, you do not beat the Ranger Captains and become a Captain yourself for the glory of becoming the best monster battler, but to prove your ability to help the Rangers Guild to protect New Wirral and support the island's community.
Cassette Beasts has a more mature and adult story than Pokémon. As a franchise primarily targetted at children, the main human characters in Pokémon are children, so the stories of Pokémon games are mainly about children's fantasy adventures to be the best Pokémon Trainer. On the flip side, the main characters in Cassette Beasts, including your human companions, are adults, and the game is not afraid to discuss topics and issues relevant to adulthood, particularly through the stories of your companion characters. The story of Cassette Beasts is also unabashedly left-wing with anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist messages, which I frankly doubt will get explored with such authenticity in a corporate-owned mega franchise like Pokémon.
-In addition, Cassette Beasts' story can get genuinely dark at times, most notably in the cosmic horror presented by the Archangels, the eldritch entities that you need to defeat in boss battles to gather clues about a way out of New Wirral and return home.
- In addition, Cassette Beasts' story can get genuinely dark at times, most notably in the cosmic horror presented by the Archangels, the eldritch entities that you need to defeat in boss battles to gather clues about a way out of New Wirral and return home. Towards the end of the main quest, it is revealed that Archangels are egregores created from humanity's desires and ideas. Aleph, the main antagonist and final boss of the main story, is an Archangel that is an incarnation of conquest, and his goal is to leave New Wirral and cause chaos across reality. While Pokémon has its own fair share of sinister villains, the threat the main villain of Cassette Beasts poses is even greater in scope than any Pokémon villain, maybe except for Rainbow Rocket Giovanni from Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon, who shares the goal of ruling the multiverse. Moreover, even though the player character and their party are able to defeat the main villain in the end, the game makes it clear that since Archangels are not flesh and blood and born from human ideas, as long as humans are interested in conquest Aleph will return at some point. This reflects our world in that defeating a tyrant does not magically solve everything, especially when the system that enables tyrants' rise to power still exists.Major Story Spoilers for Cassette Beasts
Pokémon is not known for explicitly canon LGBTQ+ representation. The franchise does not have a single confirmed canon same-gender couple. In the shipping side of the Pokémon fandom, particularly among LGBTQ+ fans, some same-gender pairings are popular, but it does not change the fact that there is no character in the Pokémon franchise who is officially confirmed to be attracted to the same-gender.
-On the flip side, Cassette Beasts has canon LGBTQ+ characters. For characters who are attracted to the samge gender, the most notable ones are the human companions, who can be romanced by the player character regardless of gender, meaning they are canonically bisexual. Furthermore, the game also has a pair of NPCs who are revealed in-game to be a gay married couple.
- On the flip side, Cassette Beasts has canon LGBTQ+ characters. For characters who are attracted to the samge gender, the most notable ones are the human companions, who can be romanced by the player character regardless of gender, meaning they are canonically bisexual. Furthermore, the game also has a pair of NPCs who are revealed in-game to be a gay married couple. To be specific, this pair of NPCs in question are Leader Ianthe and Ranger Wilma, members of the Ranger Guild. After you defeat all 12 Ranger Captains, and you challenge Ianthe to a battle, Ianthe will reveal that she will fight alongside her wife, who is none other than Ranger Wilma, the woman in charge of the Ranger Guild store. Yes, Cassette Beasts has a canon married lesbian couple.Minor Quest Spoilers for Cassette Beasts
As for transgender and non-binary representation, Pokémon has a few ambiguously canon ones, namely Beauty Nova, a minor female NPC Trainer from X and Y who is heavily implied to be a trans woman, and Blanche from Pokémon GO, who is not referred to by gendered pronouns in the English version of the game and official social media accounts. Some other human characters are also commonly interpreted or headcanonned as trans by LGBTQ+ fans, but none of them are officially confirmed to be trans or non-binary.
In Cassette Beasts, not only that the player can chose to go by they/them pronouns via the character creator, but there is also a Ranger Captain named Skip who is canonically non-binary and uses they/them pronouns.
In addition to having canon LGBTQ+ characters, Cassette Beasts's voice cast also includes multiple openly LGBTQ+ voice actors, such as Allegra Clark, J. Michael Tatum, Kayleigh McKee, Liz Morey, Marin M. Miller and Risa Mei. In fact, both Captain Skip and their voice actor Marin M. Miller are non-binary and go by they/them pronouns.