Official Nintendo Pokemon Battle Revolution Player’s Guide

Review by Lee G. Gilman for Official Nintendo Pokemon Battle Revolution Player’s Guide Rating: In the past, it used to be that the official Nintendo Power Player’s Guides were a cut above Prima’s Pokemon guides. With the whole fourth generation of Pokemon DS games, however, those roles have been reversed.

As far as battle strategy, there are essentially two “rounds” of play, as once you beat every colosseum the first time around, you can face them again with new rules. Nintendo only details the first round of challenge and gives brief blurbs about the second round challenges. Now, I understand that when you replay the game’s challenges, most of your opponents’ teams are selected randomly, but some have certain preferences for types that Prima points out but Nintendo does not. In addition, the final, “masters” tournament has fixed teams. Prima gives you the lowdown on their teams and strategy. Nintendo does not, only telling you about the tighter rules and the fact that you’ll face legendaries like Dialga and Palkia. Not all that helpful.

Nintendo hates trees. Why else would they waste 116 pages of this thing putting in 3-D pictures of the Pokemon? Pretty, yes. Useful? Not really, as the “entries” are bare-bones and you’d be better off consulting a Pokedex guide.

The guide is rounded out with item lists and prices, which is about the only thing this guide has going for it- you can see what the various character outfits look like.

Don’t waste your money. Get the Prima guide or use an online FAQ.

What’s going on, Nintendo? Your guides are letting me down, man!