Nexomon anyone?

I've never played Nexomon, but this thread asks about other monster-catching games, so I'm going to go off on a side tangent about something completely different. Back when I was in elementary school or so, I had this game called Mino Monsters on my tablet. I'm not sure how many people here would have downloaded it, but apparently it was decently popular. Also note that my memory may be spotty in some areas.

The game was a Pokémon clone at its core: recruit monsters (i think they're called minos but can't remember so i'll call them this for simplicity sake) and beat up bad guys. The monsters themselves had pretty mediocre designs on average, at least when compared to the official Pokémon ones. That in itself is not a bad thing, but the fact that I myself have made better designs kind of is. They didn't try to do anything too different from Pokémon's sort of "style," but they really didn't feel unique or seem to have any major inspiration behind them, with a few exceptions. This is especially apparent with the main villains. They're called Grublings, and they just seem to be smaller, cuter-looking orcs(?).

The combat is honestly not bad, from what I remember of it at least. You have three stats - Attack for your basic attack, Defense for taking all forms of incoming damage, and Special(?). I think HP was determined by Level but can't remember. For special attacks, you get a meter that you charge up for doing damage with your standard attack, and depending on how much charge you had, you could do one of two special attacks based around your typing. Standard attacks are typeless, special attacks match your type. It's not the most deep combat system, but it's a mobile game, so it doesn't really need to be.

As I just mentioned, the game has typings. Every monster (minus I think some Grublings) have one of five types - Air, Earth, Electric, Fire, and Water. All five of those types were strong to and weak against exactly one type, so the type chart looked like this: Earth < Fire < Water < Air < Electric < Earth. Another thing that's kind of simplified from Pokémon, but it's a mobile game, so I can't really blame it for that.

Something I remember liking about this game is its animation. This is where my memory gets especially bad, so bear with me and keep in mind that this may not be 100% accurate. I mentioned each monster had one standard attack and two special attacks, and from what I remember, they were all animated pretty well. At least, much better than the average 2011 mobile game.

The thing I appreciate the most about this game is its implementation of legendary monsters. When I played the game, there were two, but I know there ended up being more than that which got added later on. Both of the two I remember seeing were much more unique and interesting than the average monster; these were the "exceptions" I was talking about earlier. You had to collect five different stones to get the ability to fight a legendary monster, and once you did that, you got to fight the legendary monster once a day or so. Only after you've beaten it are you able to obtain it. The RNG aspect may not be good in hindsight, but I remember that they actually felt somewhat elusive and difficult to get, something that even Pokémon has never been good at.

In order to obtain a monster, you have to defeat any one of its species, and then you'll be able to buy it with the coins you get after every battle. You also need these coins to level up or evolve monsters. The catch? You can only battle a certain amount of times before having to wait, and in order to skip the wait, you have to pay. This is a mobile game at its core, so of course this is a thing.

And that last part sums up a lot of my thoughts on this game. It is a mobile game. Mobile game developers kind of have a different design philosophy when making something. Things like the simplification are justified, although I hate that waiting is a mechanic in any of these, especially since you can change the time on your device and exploit it competely. All it does in the end is turn it into an inconvenience over something I don't see the point for to begin with, aside from getting extra money off of children, which is something I especially despise.

Apparently a sequel to this game came out as well. A few months ago, I looked into it just a tiny bit, and there were some striking differences. The game attempted to have a bit more of a story and more dialogue, but it all flopped on its face by making its characters really "quirky snarky and charming" and not really compelling at all, which is something that a lot of mobile games have done.

Interested in trying either of them? Well, unless you have a time machine or know of some torrent website for mobile games, you can't! In around 2016, their Twitter account made its last post, and the two main developers behind the game have kind of ignored the games' existence. Kind of sucks, because I remembered about the first one a few months ago and became somewhat interested in replaying it to see if it held up and to look back on it in general. I probably will never end up finding out though, which is kind of a shame.

I don't know what all here is typical of mobile Pokémon clones or mobile games in general aside from what was stated, so I'm sorry if this felt bloated or unnecessary. This is just what I remember.

 

I have paid for the full version of Nexomon, and played it for quite sone time. There were quite a few Nexo that looked either too similar to Pokémon, or didn't look quite right. I didn't like the aspect of having to pay for in-games items, after purchasing the game. I like a solid price, that unlocks everything.

Micro-transactions aside, if the sequel has a much better story-line than a thief main character and the busy-body robot; then I might play it. Especially if they don't add too many more Nexos.

 

Thank you for sharing the link, I will be reading it now. Despite the time that has passed.

I think you had made a valid point for each of my complaints, and I would agree with you on the basis of preference.

I'm excited to see what you have discovered.