A new name is entering the creature-capture scene, though it’s one that some may be familiar with after 16 years of making waves in China, and Roco Kingdom has something special in store for shiny-hunters.
The concept of rarer variants to capture in the genre is widespread, ranging from beloved Shiny Pokémon in the Nintendo franchise to the lucky Pals in Palworld, and Roco Kingdom is no different.
While exploring the open world in Roco Kingdom and capturing new Jinies to add to your collection, you might stumble across an extremely rare variant, but you won’t know it immediately.
‘A Layer of a Surprise Gift’
Speaking to Insider Gaming at Gamescom, Roco Kingdom’s narrative director Xiaoye explained how the system of chromatic Jinies works, keeping a final reveal under wraps.
‘It’s a system that is encouraging repetitive catching,” Xiaoye said, “We don’t want players having to grind for the depth of the growth, but then it will be so easy to complete everything, so there’s no sense of completion and ownership.
“If they are all the same, what’s the point? We want a certain type of randomisation, not just in the stats, but in the appearance.
“In the appearance, whenever a chromatic comes out, you know it’s a chromatic, and you catch it. We want the process to be surprising, so we’ve added a layer of a surprise gift, so that you only know after you beat it in battle, it reveals itself as one of the kinds of variants. If it’s a chromatic, you’ve hit the jackpot.”
During a preview session, I got a first-hand experience of how this works. While exploring, I stumbled across a ‘nightmare’ variant and immediately initiated a battle.
The ‘nightmare’ title, it seems, is just a mask, as once I had defeated the Jinie and it was ready to be captured, the full reveal of the variant came. Sadly, it wasn’t an extremely rare chromatic Jinie, but it was still different to its standard form.
The non-chromatic variants in Roco Kingdom come alongside state adjustments, providing major differences like the move set and ability that a standard form may not have.
I wasn’t told specifics on the odds of encountering a chromatic Jinie, but it was clear they won’t be a common presence, and, given the MMO-lite aspects of the title, I wondered what this meant for those playing with their friends, and whether it would be a desperate race to capture a rare Jinie when it appears.
“If you are in the same session, you can enter battle together. If you catch it while in co-op mode, you can give it to another player. It’s not a race to get it, we have specific systems to prevent stealing,” Xiaoye explained.
Exactly how that system works remains to be seen, but it sounds like you won’t be able to capture the same Jinie as your friends, though this does make sense, given the push to make each Jinie as unique as possible.
The additional layer of secrecy when encountering a rare Jinie variant certainly adds another level to the ‘shiny hunting’ in the title, and I’m intrigued to learn more about the mechanics.
Check out the Roco Kingdom trailer below.
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