If Pokémon Pokopia is not in my prime 5 video games of 2026 come December, we may have had an astonishing 4 months. At launch, this recreation had me in a chokehold and refused to let me go till I discovered myself weeping at its finale. It is heartwarming and artistic and immensely in style, a lot so {that a} sequel feels inevitable. However I do not know that I actually need a ‘Pokopia 2’.
This can be a thought that sprang to thoughts as I dove into the Bubbly Basin DLC final week. The growth is great, tweaking some small niggles I had with the gameplay (storage does not totally drive me up the wall anymore) and throwing in a completely new biome for me to enter with large desires earlier than inevitably abandoning my aspirations down the road after three hours of laying paths.
The DLC’s upcoming ‘Half 2’ feels far much less formidable on the time of writing, with the bonus equipment possibly solely holding my consideration for a day or two, however ‘Half 3’ guarantees to go giant once more with one more new city to discover.
What began as a recreation that I might already play endlessly has one way or the other taken on much more content material, and I could not be happier with it — increasing the bottom recreation by 40% inside a 12 months isn’t any imply feat. The large query is, what comes subsequent?
The reply appears fairly apparent to me: It is a sequel, is not it?
I might wish to see Ditto go and repair up a special Pokémon area as a lot as the following fan, however the central theme of regrowth and improvement simply would not hit the identical.
Pokopia has been in every single place since launch, pulling in 5 million gross sales in “simply over 4 months” (making it the second most-popular Swap 2 recreation, with roughly a 21% set up base), sitting in fourth place on Metacritic’s best-rated video games of 2026 listing, and turning into the best-selling Pokémon spin-off of all time. There isn’t any approach that The Pokémon Firm goes to disregard cash on the desk like that.
Although the DLC has received me occupied with whether or not we actually want a ‘Pokopia 2’ within the first place. Think about with me, for a second, what a sequel would even appear to be. A recreation nearly equivalent to its predecessor, mechanically, however with some new biomes and Pokémon thrown in for good measure, proper? Does not that sound… quite a bit just like the DLC?
And what would ‘the identical once more’ do to Pokopia’s story? I do not need to get slowed down within the ‘lore’ of a comfortable crafting recreation, however Pokopia’s narrative felt so very self-contained, and intricately tied to the gameplay, that it’d really feel improper to do it yet again. I might wish to see Ditto go and repair up a special Pokémon area as a lot as the following fan, however the central theme of regrowth and improvement simply would not hit the identical.
There are positively components of Pokopia that I might nonetheless wish to see improved — a greater map sits proper on the prime — however these really feel like tweaks quite than game-changing additions to hold a sequel off of.
There is a large a part of me that thinks it is perhaps higher for Pokopia in the long term to embrace the Minecraft college of thought: avoiding a straight, iterative sequel and happening the growth route as an alternative. If Omega Power can preserve churning out these DLC packages, with new cities, Pokémon and objects in addition, then ‘Pokopia 1′ (as we’ll all someday inevitably name it) might final endlessly. Higher that than plonking us proper again at first in 5 years’ time with one other introduction to Water Gun.
Positive, it may not be fairly as interesting from a enterprise perspective. Why not cost everybody one other 60 quid each few years for principally the identical recreation once more? Loads of different collection get away with it. However morally, in my coronary heart of hearts, I can not see what a sequel might convey to the desk that would not be simply as simply applied in one other growth.
In fact, I am no recreation developer, and there is each probability that the geniuses over at Omega Power are already cooking up an concept for the sequel that is much more imaginative than my pessimistic little mind can muster. It managed it with Dragon Quest Builders 2, in any case. If the center continues to be there with out feeling like a money-grabbing retread, I will little question be there on day one to lap it up.
Heck, the Pokéfan in me is so robust that even when it’s the similar recreation once more with a ‘2’ slapped on the top and that includes Bidoof this time, I might seemingly nonetheless be there to sing its praises. Wait, am I the issue right here..?
