Detective Pikachu Returns review: "A sometimes charming, often lackluster experience"

Detective Pikachu riding a Galarian Darmanitan.
(Image: © Creatures)

12DOVE Verdict

Detective Pikachu Returns is more adventures with the charming electric mouse from the original, but the straightforward investigation mechanics can be incredibly frustrating in a game that wouldn't look out of place on the Wii U.

Pros

  • +

    Charming characters

  • +

    Campy tone

  • +

    Goofy animations

Cons

  • -

    Mechanically boring

  • -

    So much backtracking

  • -

    Rough-looking graphics

Why you can trust 12DOVE Our experts review games, movies and tech over countless hours, so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about our reviews policy.

After seven years, Pokemon has returned to the story of Detective Pikachu with the aptly titled Detective Pikachu Returns, but time away does not appear to have been kind to the original Nintendo 3DS game's formula. Pikachu in a little deerstalker is as charming as it ever was, but the underlying mechanics and graphics show their age even with a fresh coat of paint.

Fast Facts

Release date: October 6, 2023
Platform(s): Nintendo Switch
Developer: Creatures
Publisher: Nintendo

First and foremost, Detective Pikachu Returns is a game about detective work and investigations. It's a classic formula, but complicated here by the existence of Pokemon broadly, the fact that protagonist Tim Goodman is the only human that can talk with the eponymous Detective Pikachu, and the mysterious disappearance of Tim's father, Harry, as of the events of the first game that has still not been resolved.

But don't worry if you didn't play the 2016 original. The opening of Detective Pikachu Returns includes a quick, handy recap of the most important events that you really need to know in order to conceptually understand what's about to happen in the new game, and it's not like it assumes you already know how its mechanics work. There are a few tweaks compared to the original, which do seem for the better, but actually playing should feel relatively familiar to anyone with prior experience.

Grin and bear it

Detective Pikachu smiling and giving a thumbs up

(Image credit: Creatures)

The core conceit is compelling – who wouldn't want to find their missing father? – but the actual investigation work is full of drudgery, presented in a way that constantly made me reconsider my stance that all games are for everyone. Detective Pikachu Returns feels made for children, as opposed to being made also for children, in a way that is reminiscent of shows like Dora the Explorer or Cocomelon. It beats you over the head with solutions and looks oddly smooth, in a way that I typically associate with low-budget animated shows on streaming services.

If you're simply following along with whatever is suggested you do, it is nearly impossible to come to anything but the correct conclusion about a given caper. The first major case in Detective Pikachu Returns, "The Missing Jewel," essentially holds your hand and signposts every major development multiple times in a way that makes it increasingly obvious (as it should) who did it but that still requires several further steps to come to the mechanical conclusion you've already mentally reached. It makes for a frustrating experience.

Basically, once you've wandered around and collected enough clues, you can start to deduce how those clues actually answer a question as part of the larger investigation like, for example, how someone got access to the aforementioned jewel or where exactly a specific Pokemon was heading. It's a slow process that requires interacting with nearly every person or Pokemon you find in addition to various points of interest, and few are interesting enough on their own to hold the right amount of focus for the constant back and forth.

And there is a lot of back and forth. I frequently found myself butting up against just how fast Tim or Pikachu could move because it was never quite fast enough to make traversal across environments anything but time consuming. It's not that the spaces are particularly big or unwieldy; they are just largely empty and devoid of anything to do once you've been through once or twice, despite the fact that it feels like the game sends you through far more than that. It's a double whammy, in that it is just big enough to feel empty and annoying while not big enough to feel a real sense of place.

Haven't a clue

Detective Pikachu with a little mustache

(Image credit: Creatures)

There are still high points, however. If you liked the fact that Pikachu talked and went around helping solve crimes in the original game, or the wildly popular live-action movie Pokemon: Detective Pikachu for that matter, that vibe is absolutely still present. There's still a weirdly campy tone where an official Pokemon video game talks about characters wanting a divorce in stilted dialogue in shockingly close textual proximity to an entirely different conversation featuring others discussing how delicious it is to eat a Slowpoke's tail.

That's the part of Detective Pikachu Returns that works for me. I want more of Pikachu getting flipped up into the cold snowball on Galarian Darmanitan's head to ride around while shivering and punching boulders. I want more of him razzing Tim for not having/maybe trying to have a girlfriend. I want more jokes about how the canonical, in-game movie adaptation of Tim's greatest case didn't include Tim's mom and sister with a nod and a wink at the plot of the actual real-life movie.

My opinion of Detective Pikachu Returns is largely summarized by how I feel about Pikachu's little running animation. It's delightful to see him run pell-mell after Tim, hat flapping about, off to his little job that he finds such pride in. It's just the right amount of serious, which is to say only barely. But it's repetitive, and as charming as it is, the joy I initially found had diminishing returns. In the end, instead of chuckling, I only found myself wishing he'd run faster so that the busywork on the other end of his journey would be over all the more swiftly.


Disclaimer

Detective Pikachu Returns was reviewed using code provided by the publisher on a Nintendo Switch OLED.

More info

GenreAdventure
More
Rollin Bishop
US Managing Editor

Rollin is the US Managing Editor at 12DOVE. With over 16 years of online journalism experience, Rollin has helped provide coverage of gaming and entertainment for brands like IGN, Inverse, ComicBook.com, and more. While he has approximate knowledge of many things, his work often has a focus on RPGs and animation in addition to franchises like Pokemon and Dragon Age. In his spare time, Rollin likes to import Valkyria Chronicles merch and watch anime.

Read more
Pokemon Legends Z-A screenshot showing Mega Charizard
Pokemon Legends Z-A's visuals aren't "great" say former Nintendo marketing leads, but hope Switch 2 could allow Game Freak to "go back to the drawing board" and add more detail to future RPGs
Sheep-like creatures holding mounted machine guns in Palworld
Palworld has revealed what a Pokemon game should be capable of – here's everything we want to see from Gen 10
Omega 6: The Triangle Stars
Star Fox and F-Zero's legendary character designer brings plenty of charm to throwback adventure Omega 6: The Triangle Stars, but could use more bite
Pokemon Legends: Z-A screenshot
Pokemon Legends: Z-A just catapulted to the top of my most anticipated games thanks to its single-city setting
Majima sings karaoke in Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii
I spent 15 hours clearing a recycled map I'd already explored and loved every second – Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii is a greatest hits album and then some
Goro Majima takes the helm of his ship in Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii
Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii review: "Sun, surf, and treasure hunting takes the series to new places at the right time"
Latest in Adventure
Pokemon Go players brace for the worst as Niantic is sold off for $3.5 billion: "This game is entering its death knell"
Pokemon Go player trying to catch a Croagunk
Pokemon Go developer Niantic is being bought for $3.5 billion, CEO says it'll help its games be "'forever games' that will endure for future generations"
Lapras seen in the Pokemon anime.
Former Pokemon world champ uses a "stupid strategy" that "should never work" to transform a Lapras into an OHKO machine so powerful it can even take out enemies in alternate dimensions
Minecraft Diamond Armor
Minecraft Pocket Edition got its name because one of its devs was a big "Nintendo nerd" who wanted to pay homage to the Game Boy Pocket
an ai chatbot plays a modded verion of pokemon red and jumps down a ledge to talk to an npc
An AI's mission to 'teach' itself Pokemon Red is going as well as you think - after escaping Cerulean City after tens of hours, it went right on back
Pokemon Legends Z-A screenshot showing Mega Charizard
Pokemon Legends Z-A's visuals aren't "great" say former Nintendo marketing leads, but hope Switch 2 could allow Game Freak to "go back to the drawing board" and add more detail to future RPGs
Latest in Reviews
Lenovo Legion Go S with FlyKnight gameplay on screen featuring player character holding bow and arrow with enemy ant in backdrop.
Lenovo Legion Go S Windows 11 review: “my heart aches for this mixed up handheld”
Talisman 5th Edition game components
Talisman 5th Edition review: "The characterful imperfections of the original game remain clear to see "
WWE 2K25
WWE 2K25 review: "A colossal package even if you never go anywhere near Virtual Currency"
Altered: Trial by Frost booster box and packs on a playmat
Altered: Trial by Frost review - "Satisfying enough to offer highly varied gameplay"
Three SteelSeries QcK Performance mouse pads on a wooden desk
I didn't expect to prefer a coarser mouse pad, but SteelSeries' new QcK Performance range has changed my mind
Boro and Alta sit on a bench together in Wanderstop
Wanderstop review: "Exalting the transformative power of tea"