Today’s Pokémon are Game Freak’s most recent addition to the “cute fuzzy Normal-type” pool: Minccino and Cinccino, the chinchilla Pokémon.  Now, I’ve expressed irritation in the past that there were already quite enough of these, and summarily executed Audino on those grounds since, let’s face it, she’s Chansey 2.0.  Minccino’s odds are, to put it mildly, not looking good.

Upon closer inspection, however, a lot of the things that bug me about Audino don’t really apply to Minccino.  Audino was another pink, vaguely-humanoid, fairy-looking thing along the lines of Wigglytuff, Chansey and Clefable.   Minccino and Cinccino aren’t conspicuously similar to the earlier Pokémon in the way that Audino is; really the only major commonality is that they’re cute.  They’re more naturalistic, more like the animals they’re based on, which is something of a trend in the more recent generations of Pokémon.  I’m not sure whether I like it or not.  Here, however, it does succeed in creating quite a different flavour, so this time I’m happy.  Continue reading “Minccino and Cinccino” →