I’ll never forget the first time I played Pokémon Snap. A neighbor kid, Sam, had spent days telling me all about the new Pokémon game he’d gotten for his Nintendo 64, but I hadn’t really been paying much attention. I had no idea how the actual Pokémon trading card game was played, though I’d gathered that it involved battles — something nine-year-old me was wholly uninterested in — so I’d mostly been tuning him out.
As a kid with no consoles of my own, my experience with video games was limited. But I knew from that limited experience that most games involved pressing buttons really fast in a hopeless attempt to defend yourself before ultimately getting your ass kicked, either by a horde of AI enemies, or by the character your older cousin was controlling. I had exactly zero interest in fighting Pokémon, or making them fight each other, which was surely what this game entailed. As far as I was aware, video games were about combat. What else was there?
It took some time, but Sam eventually picked up on my distaste for watching adorable monsters beat each other up. (Pokémon battles always felt a bit wrong to me, even in the TV show. Watching felt like participating in some sort of illegal dogfighting ring full of Pidgeys instead of pitbulls.) Thankfully, Sam graciously informed me that there was absolutely zero combat involved in Pokémon Snap. Instead, it was a game about riding a very slow roller coaster and taking photos of Pokémon for Professor Oak. Despite Sam’s assurances, I was still skeptical. In a world where all anyone wanted to play was Mortal Kombat or Goldeneye or Ocarina of Time, I struggled to imagine a game that didn’t require me to wield a gun, sword, or fists.
Armed with this new information, I finally took Sam up on his offer, and we settled in for some Pokémon Snap after school. Instead of being faced with a horde of enemies I had no hope of besting in combat due to lack of experience, I was greeted by Professor Oak, who just wanted me to snap some photos for him. The player-character (who I recently learned has a name: Todd Snap) climbed into a little train cart on the beach map. As the cart began to inch forward on the track and Pokémon started popping out of bushes, I started snapping away.
The next thing I remember is Sam’s mom calling me upstairs. The streetlights were coming on, and it was time to go home. We’d spent nearly four hours photographing Pokémon, and nothing had tried to kill me or lure me into a fight. As I walked back across the street to my house, my thoughts were scattered, as they often are when I emerge from a multi-hour video game blackout. But one thing was clear: I had to play more Pokémon Snap. And I did! Sam and I spent many more afternoons photographing Pokémon for Professor Oak, and frequently made bets on who could get the best shot of a specific creature.
I recently picked up Pokémon Snap for the first time since my adventures with Sam in the late 1990s, and was surprised by how challenging it is. I’ve been playing the Nintendo Classics version of the game on my Switch, so perhaps it’s the Switch controller that’s tripping me up. Or maybe I just don’t have the reflexes I used to. But despite the apparent degradation in my Poké-photography skills over the years, I still have a huge soft spot for Snap. Not having a console to practice on at home meant I tended to get stomped in short order on the rare occasion I got to play games at a friend’s house. As I got older, I obviously warmed up to combat in video games, but I credit Pokémon Snap for getting me there. It gave me a chance to practice aiming and get used to using a controller without the pressure of imminent death or defeat constantly looming over me. But it also proved that games don’t have to be action-packed to be fun.
Kids today have tons of games to choose from, and while combat is obviously the heart of many titles, “cozy games” like Animal Crossing, Stardew Valley, and Hello Kitty Island Adventure have carved out their own niche in the industry. Naturally, Nintendo is still capitalizing on players’ desire for relaxing gameplay, too. Its latest slow-paced, cozy title — Pokémon Pokopia — has received as much glowing praise as Resident Evil Requiem, which is no small feat for a game with virtually no “action.”
But you can see Pokémon Snap‘s fingerprints all over games outside the cozy genre, too. Pokémon Snap didn’t just prove that low-stress games without combat can be fun. It proved that photo modes are a valuable feature worth putting effort into. Even games with darker themes and intense combat like Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 have implemented photo modes so players can capture in-game memories (or create total monstrosities) to their heart’s content.
Nintendo released a sequel to Pokémon Snap in 2021, creatively titled New Pokémon Snap. While it’s a charming game and the controls aren’t nearly as janky, I never really managed to get into it aside from a few brief play sessions. It just lacks that 1990s nostalgia. What I really need is for Nintendo to announce a Pokémon Snap remake with a better camera and motion controls, because I have no idea how nine-year-old me could snap a better shot of Pikachu on an N64 than 34-year-old me can on a Switch.
