General Pikmin Thread

Is anyone reminded of going to the bathroom whenever fruit juice is put into a jar?

.... [no longer hungry/thirsty]

I've always been a huge fan of assorted fruit, especially uncommon/exotic ones, so fruit being the main collectible in 3 was really fun to me.

You can collect mangosteens! And ume plums! And... avocado.

Mmm, avocado and grape juice mix.

Honestly, the way the colors of different juices mix and blend into each other is just stunning. An unorthodox use of a physics engine, but I'm not complaining!

Is that how that works? I wonder if there's videos listing them all.

Been trying Ultra-Spicy mode now that I've platinumed all of Mission Mode and Side Story.

It's pretty neat. Not only are you limited to 60 Pikmin in the field instead of 100, but the fruit all gives you only half the juice it used to give. Enemies also seem more durable, but that could just be my imagination.

I do believe that enemies get doubled health in Ultra-Spicy.

And that's Ultra-Spicy difficulty cleared. All fruits, all research notes, zero Pikmin deaths.

21 days. Could have bumped it down to 20 if I were more reckless in the Plasm Wraith fight, but I really wanted to maintain my zero deaths and didn't wanna redo the whole Formidable Oak, so I let the fight bleed over into next day.

Clearing Ultra-Spicy was also the final badge I need, so I've now 100%'ed this game.

Edited by Anomalocaris20 on Nov 12th 2020 at 11:46:54 AM

If you want to see it break, google "Juicy Gaggle Zest Bomb blend."

I was reading a Reddit post about desiccated skitterleaves and it made me realize I've probably lost more pikmin to sheargrubs, blinnows and those jackasses combined than I have to any of the big enemies other than bosses. I mean, sure bulborbs and wolliwogs are powerful and can get a lot of pikmin at once, but they're obvious and easily spotted, so you can prepare in advance and sneak up on them, and if things really go south they're not too difficult to outrun. These jerks, though? They're fast, they're always moving, they're hell to hit, and you only realize they're even there when they burst out of hiding and are already munching on your squad, and by the time you gotten around to aiming they've finished eating their first catch and are moving on to the second course.

That group of five Puckering Blinnows behind the bamboo gate in the Blue Pikmin area caused me to reset like four times in my deathless run.

It doesn't help that they ripple effects in the water make aiming for anything that much harder.

Unrelatedly, I had a bit of an adventure with the Quaggled Mireclops today. I'm not particularly good at judging distances there, apparently, and this got my squad in range of its tongue swipe more than once. The second time my captain gets caught as well, and as I learned on that occasion enemies have a fairly long animation where they swallow the captain, deal some damage and spit them out. As I also learned, pikmin do not actually die until the enemy's attack animation is complete, and in this case the Mireclops eating the captain caused the animation to extend for long enough for a small group of wings that were still latched on to its bulb to finish chipping away at its health, killing it the split second before it spat me out and completed the animation and saving quite a lot of pikmin.

Edited by Theriocephalus on Nov 14th 2020 at 12:37:07 PM

Mireclops is a nightmare to do deathless.

It's not just the tongue either, those hooves kill 'em real fast if you misjudge your positioning.

Needless to say, having both that squad of Blinnows and the Mireclops in a single day prompted me to just focus on building the path to the Mireclops on one day, then fight it first thing the next day, with a save in-between. Didn't cost me any additional days since I had to spend another day there anyway for the remaining fruit roundup.

Edited by Anomalocaris20 on Nov 15th 2020 at 3:46:49 PM

So this is late, but I did want to note that with the return of the Piklopedia, we learn some interesting things about the wildlife of Pikmin 3:

• Bearded Amprats being mammalian is unusual and Olimar notes it as the possible evolution of a whole new phylum of animals on PNF-404.
• Pyroclastic Slooches are instinctively driven not to start forest fires, somehow.
• The crystals that Skutterchucks carry and throw are the shed shells of Calcified Crushblats.
• Joustmites aren't just gameplay replacements for Cloaking Burrow-nits, they're actually in the same family.
• Arachnodes, Dweevils, and Beady Long Legs are all related, and the fact that Arachnodes have eight legs instead of four is highly unusual. That and the fact that they're apparently hermaphroditic supports a theory that it's actually two specimens mated together to the point of appearing conjoined, rather than a singular creature.
• The Sandbelching Meerslug's mouth is also its anus. That attack where it spits darkened globs of sand at you is technically, well...
• The Scornet Maestro is a hive queen.
• The Quaggled Mireclops might actually be two creatures, with the weird fruit thing being a parasite rather than a head.
• Olimar acknowledges the Plasm Wraith's similarity to the Waterwraith but declines to give it a scientific name. He also theorizes that hole in its head to be the manifestation of some sort of psychic "wound" of sorts.

I honestly love the Pikipedia precisely because of touches like that — that is exactly the kind of convoluted weirdness you find in nature, and it really makes the game's setting stand out as an actual world of its own. The bits like the skutterchucks using the shells of larval crushblats as ammo or the arachnodes, dweevils and arachnorbs being related also really help make everything feel more interconnected.

Also:

• Armored mawdads need to smash their shells open against rocks and trees to shed their exoskeletons and grow.
• Bugeyed crawmads can surpass fifty years in age and keep growing all the while.
• Desiccated skitterleaves use their mimetism to trick scavengers into carrying their eggs. How this works isn't explained.
• Calcified crushblats feed by absorbing nutrients through their skin, which is a fairly inefficient method of doing things and explains why they're so sedentary. Also, they're technically mollusks.
• A puckering blinnow's side patches turn bright pink during mating season.
• Red spectralids produce the ultra-spicy nectar they drop as a growth supplement for their eggs. They can also crossbreed with yellow spectralids, producing hybrids with orange wings with a single eyespot each.
• Skeeterskates feed on plankton they consume when they slurp up water to fill their bulbs.
• Sputtlefish live symbiotically with microscopic algae and can use limited photosynthesis.
• A waddlepus' resemblance to an octopus is only superficial — it's closer to starfish — and they use their bubbles to protect their eggs during spawning season.
• No dwarf or infant whiptongue bulborbs have ever been seen, which is noted as significant.

Edited by Theriocephalus on Dec 5th 2020 at 4:18:54 AM

Speaking as a natural history enthusiast, I absolutely love the Piklopedia. Detailed bestiaries in games are so fun when they’re done well. So glad it’s back - I really missed it in vanilla 3.

Edited by SapphireBlue on Dec 5th 2020 at 2:48:46 AM

It's also, of course, good to have Louie's notes too. Apparently the Skeeterskate's water resevoir makes for a good aperitif.

Louie’s notes were hilarious. Glad those are back, too.

So while there's no official news right now, there is some good news for the franchise overall. Pikmin 3 Deluxe is currently the fastest-selling installment of the franchise in Japan, and is close to being the best-sold entry in the series.

Gee, it's almost like being on an actually good selling console for once factors heavily into a game's sales, and not because people aren't interested in the franchise. Take notes, Nintendo.

Edited by TokoWH on Jan 8th 2021 at 3:56:00 AM

Pikmin's 20th anniversary is apparently coming up in October. Do you think we'll see anything for the franchise this year? Or do you think Nintendo's just gonna let it float by?

3 Deluxe sold 1.94 million units as of December 31st.

How's that compare to the other games?

Nintendo just announced a new project in collaboration with Niantic. Some kind of... Pikmin Go? No name for the project has been announced.

Edited by ShinyCottonCandy on Mar 22nd 2021 at 8:08:05 AM

Why are people talking as though this kill the chances of Pikmin 4?

Because people are idiots.