Free-to-play games have been the source of criticisms since they soared in popularity in our smartphone era. Pokémon has joined in the bandwagon and created "Pokémon Shuffle." There are many of these types of games, which are just "waiting for death" according to James Tennent of The Independent.
"There is a sense that some work went into the game, so it didn't quite seem like bland cash-bait... This is helpfully streamlined for those who want to play entirely mindlessly thanks to an 'optimize' button that picks the best team for you," he wrote.
The fights take up the players' lives, which are hearts in the game. If you run out of hearts then you can opt to wait for your lives to be replenished or you can pay for "jewels," which can be used to buy hearts or coins in the game. "Costly addictions" as Tennent put it.
"Maybe it's unfair to brand this kind of free-to-play game as mindless death-bait. There are plenty of things we do to just pass [the] time in life... There's just much better things to do with your time."
The Mega Lucario event enables "shufflers" to defeat Mega Lucario in a ranked game and high scores are uploaded to the "Pokémon Shuffle" servers pitting it up with other players' scores. Featured in the update to version 1.1.3, the game will give Mega Lucario a stage in the "Special" section of the game and allows players to track their progress.
The event started on Monday, Mar. 16, and will end on Mar. 23. Highest scores will be given the Lucarionite to Mega Evolve Lucario which can only be acquired in the Expert levels. Furthermore, participating in the event will give players jewels and coins which will be handed out from Mar. 23 to Mar. 30.
"Pokémon Shuffle" was released on Feb. 18, 2015 for 3DS. The freemium game is Nintendo's first game that has a lives system and a monetization scheme similar to the popular mobile game "Candy Crush." The match-three puzzler can be downloaded free in the 3DS eShop. It has reached more than a million downloads since its release.
