The Best Nintendo Game Every Year 1983 - 2024
14. 2011 - Pokémon Black & White
Returning to the DS, and we’re back to the world of stuffing cute critters into spheres and then forcing them to take on cults, criminals and that next door neighbour you have weird feelings about.
And there were more of those cute critters than ever by 2010’s Black & White versions, which added a stonking 156 designs. With the series perpetually trying to find the right place to draw the line between new and nostalgic, the fifth generation of games outright did away with the latter, populating the gorgeous United States-inspired Unova with all-new Pokémon. This, in itself was a bold and controversial move.
But whilst the quality of the Pokémon will always be up for debate, Black & White received universal praise for its story that actually posed questions about the morality of stuffing cute critters into spheres. Its characters asked its players shockingly poignant philosophical questions, which built up to one of the best final acts in the series.
Every Pokémon fan will have a different ranking of the games, and Black & White to many were already a step-down from the previous year’s HeartGold & SoulSilver remakes, but they should be commended for what they did right.