Not a traditional Pokemon game at all, but it'll keep us busy til Diamond and Pearl comes out for sure.
You start the game by anwsering a series of random questions which'll determine what kind of Pokemon you become. Yeah, you actually play as a Pokemon. That makes a nice change.
I got Mudkip. :p
Anyway, afterward you get waken up by a partner of your choosing and then soon after a hole opens in the ground, taking a Caterpie with it and it's mother, a butterfree asks you and your partner to go get him.
What follows is the first in a series of randomly generated dungeons which are filled with enemy Pokemon and small amounts of loot, ranging from berrys for healing and whatnot, to rocks to throw at your foes.
The randomly generated dungeons are decent enough, if not a bit bland.
And occasionally it generates them kind of stupidly, placing the enterance to the next floor right in the room you start in.
Battling is also quite simple. At it's simplest it's tapping the a button to preform a basic attack, but go into the menu and you can use various special moves and of course in Pokemon fashion you learn new ones as you level up. Theres a lot of battling for you and your partner to do on your rescue missions but there are a lot of moments where the partner doesn't pull his weight, occasionally he's litle more then a distraction while you take out your enemys, which while functional is not quite what a partner should be doing I feel.
The graphics are as decent as any Pokemon Game and sounds up there too, though I don't find the music as likeable in this one.
In anycase, some might be turned off by the departure from traditional Pokemon formula but it'll be a nice break and keep us busy hopefully long enough for Diamond and Pearl to come out.