Pokémon Pokopia Bubbly Basin review: a wonderful, watery sequel

Pokémon Pokopia‘s Bubbly Basin is a wonderful DLC chapter, well-rounded in how it expands the base game, and the sheer array of new Pokémon to find across its vast ocean.

Bubbly Basin is defined by clever choices all around, particularly in the decision to set the entire DLC underwater. Where Pokémon Pokopia explored many grounded regions – rocky caves, beaches, grassland and islands in the sky – this DLC submerges you in an underwater post-apocalyptic town.

And not just any town, but the iconic former Cerulean City, where gym leader Misty would previously challenge trainers to battles against her flock of water-type Pokémon.

Pokopia reimagines Cerulean City as a flooded wonderland filled with coral and natural reefs, where water Pokémon unable to meaningfully take part in the action of the base game are given the opportunity to swim freely and play games through the ocean tides.

Stepping into this world using a new ‘dive’ mechanic, our hero Ditto is tasked with gentrifying this ocean landscape and restoring the natural wonders of the ocean while making new and extravagant homes for fishy friends.

Diving into the world of Pokémon Pokopia Bubbly Basin

Bubbly Basin starts simply enough. You get a visit from a curious Popplio, which asks you to follow it through a new ocean gate to the ruins of Cerulean City. Then, it asks you to fix up the town to allow all of its friends to reappear – a noble goal that will have you venturing through wrecks and ruins and trying to create the best possible environment for new Pokémon to thrive.

Bubbly Basin really is a mess, and it needs your help.

There are scattered ruins of old homes that can be fixed up to provide some simple accommodation. There are structures and spaces that lend themselves to building new homes and decorations. But there are also lots and lots of empty spaces, dirty spaces and caverns with unbreakable walls to work around.

It’s a complicated world to work within, and its bounds and challenges make building feel layered. You’ll need a vision to ensure your town doesn’t become cluttered, and some ingenuity to connect up its many underwater spaces, as well as its upper islands.

For those who’ve already plowed through the base game, there will be some familiarity in the loops that Bubbly Basin sends you through. You’ll need to spend your time on various quests while also collecting resources, building habitats to attract Pokémon and spelunking to find new and hidden secrets.

Bubbly Basin marks itself out as different with its mix of new Pokémon, its brighter and more colourful aesthetic, and the arrival of new collectables and discoverable habitats that’ll keep you journeying for yet more hours.

The timing is also wonderful – it’s been a few months since the release of the base game, and many players will likely have wrapped their journey with enough time to be nostalgic about the experience and longing for a return.

For those players, Bubby Basin offers a bright sandbox to enjoy, with a strong array of quests to make the action feel fresh once more.

Pacing the oceans of Bubbly Basin

The pacing here is another strong side of Bubbly Basin. From the moment you meet Popplio, you’ve always got something to do. At first, it’s a simple task of raising the environment level by building habitats and homes to attract a new cohort of Pokémon.

You get layers added right as you feel on top of your tasks, which is great for those who love direction. While you can spend your time wandering and discovering, a connecting string of ever-growing quests also adds purpose and framing to your journey.

You’ll be Rock Smashing-away great pillars of sand and rock for the fun of discovery, but you’ll also be excavating a new and grand building at the same time, creating an identity for Bubbly Basin and a world for your new friends to play within.

Spend time clearing seaweed and coral from the ocean floor, and you’re actually collecting resources to build a new Clock Tower or another bright and shiny monument. It’s all connected, and it all drives the action forward.

For a DLC, there would be some expectation of a shorter length in this journey. But Bubbly Basin is actually very feature-rich, and allows for hours more exploration and hunting for dozens of rare Pokémon. If you thought Pokopia was big, then Bubbly Basin is an indication of how much bigger it’s soon to get, with more DLC content set to drop in future too.

Bubbly Basin proves that Pokémon Pokopia could expand forever

There are over a thousand Pokémon now available to catch across dozens of Pokémon games. Over a thousand! So far, there are only a few hundred available in Pokopia – and you know what that means.

In future DLC chapters, it seems likely we’ll get an influx of new Pokémon of all types, from all terrains. Having this particular DLC so focused on one type is a benefit to Bubbly Basin because it has such a clear sense of its own identity and intention.

It helps that water Pokémon are among the coolest in the entire franchise (although other folks may argue this point). Wandering Bubbly Basin is a silly joy when you can find ridiculous Pokémon like Luvdisc or Bruxish – or when a complex terrain build reveals a Corphish, a Cloyster or a Wiglett.

Like the base game, Bubbly Basin invites players into a rewarding cycle of building and exploration, as efforts to gentrify and rebuild the Bubbly Basin area consistently reveals new Pokémon pals, all with their own needs and wants, and some with their own unique and funny quest lines.

Pokémon Pokopia was a five-star delight on launch. Its Bubbly Basin DLC is an extremely good next chapter that allows players to expand on their original journey, and meet a whole new cast of very loveable characters.

A code for the Pokémon Pokopia DLC Expansion Pass was provided to ScreenHub for the purposes of this review.

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