Beast of Reincarnation Review Scores Prove Game Freak Clearly Has a Lane

The scores for Game Freak’s action RPG Beast of Reincarnation are officially in, and it’s not looking as good as early previews and anticipation expected it to be. At the time of writing, Beast of Reincarnation is sitting at a metascore of 73 on Metacritic and a 76% on OpenCritic, which doesn’t mean it’s a bad game, by any means, but it does suggest one thing about Game Freak: the Pokemon developer clearly has a lane. This experiment certainly wasn’t a failure, and calling it such is an ignorant take. However, it’s presumably not what the developer was hoping for, and with players already canceling their pre-orders after seeing reviews and claiming they’ll wait for a sale, that’s never a good first impression for any game, regardless of hype.

Beast of Reincarnation was supposed to be Game Freak’s big break outside Pokemon—a chance for it to prove that it’s more than the creature-collecting phenomenon it’s known for. Unfortunately, despite an average score of 7 out of 10 actually being a good score for a game to receive, many modern gamers don’t see it that way and generally feel that a game is only worth purchasing when it’s at least an 8, preferably a 9, out of 10. To make matters worse, Beast of Reincarnation‘s mixed Steam reviews point to a game that is unoptimized, bland, and visually stunning but empty and clunky. This doesn’t have to signify the end of Game Freak’s journey beyond Pokemon, but it is, at the very least, a sign that the developer may inevitably end up back in its own lane again when all is said and done.

Beast of Reincarnation’s Review Scores Prove Moving Beyond Pokemon Won’t Be Easy

To be fair, some critics have actually enjoyed—or, at least, appreciated—what Game Freak is trying to do with Beast of Reincarnation, going so far as to give it a 9/10. Vice’s review, for instance, treated it like an outright masterpiece, scoring it at 9.5 and framing it as one of the best action RPGs the reviewer had played in years, with praise directed toward its hybrid combat, build synergy, and visuals. GamesRadar+’s review was similar, though it was especially enthusiastic about the game’s combat depth and storytelling—two elements that were, ironically, what many other critics disliked. Still, Beast of Reincarnation clearly isn’t the most divisive game, as most critics, including GameRant, feel it was a massive missed opportunity for the Pokemon developer.

Beast of Reincarnation Review Scores

• Vice – 9.5/10
• GamesRadar+ – 9/10
• But Why Tho? – 9/10
• Famitsu – 35/40
• TechRadar Gaming – 4/5
• DualShockers – 8/10
• RPG Site – 8/10
• Siliconera – 8/10
• Push Square – 7/10
• Giant Bomb – 3.5/5
• IGN – 6/10
• Game Informer – 6/10
• Noisy Pixel – 6/10
• Eurogamer – 6/10
• VGC – 3/5
• ComicBook – 5/10
• GameRant – 5/10

GameRant’s review of Beast of Reincarnation, written by Dalton Cooper, called it an “intriguing detour for Pokemon developer Game Freak,” but one that “sadly doesn’t live up to expectations.” And that, in a nutshell, is really the problem here. With Pokemon, Game Freak proved that it could make a global phenomenon and even sustain it for decades. As such, there were naturally high expectations for Beast of Reincarnation, as many saw it as an opportunity for the developer to truly show what it’s made of with a starkly different experiment than what it’s associated with. Perhaps, if Beast of Reincarnation were Game Freak’s first game, it might have been received a little differently, as “great game made average by hype” is a story as old as time at this point.

If nothing else, what Beast of Reincarnation has done is it has proven that moving beyond Pokemon toward something else won’t be easy for Game Freak. Sure, the developer hasn’t exactly knocked it out of the park with every Pokemon game or franchise decision, but it has had more than enough successes to create a certain degree of expectation with anything it does, even if that thing is a drastic U-turn from what it’s familiar with. If it can figure out a way to continue this experiment while keeping expectations in check, it might have a shot at two futures, but it will no doubt be exceedingly difficult.

Beast of Reincarnation Isn’t Dead on Arrival as a Franchise

All things considered, it’s important to note that Beast of Reincarnation‘s average reception doesn’t automatically make the franchise dead on arrival. Plenty of excellent franchises have gotten off to a rocky start, only to eventually find their footing in their second entry. For example, the original NieR received a 67 Metascore, with critics admiring its story, music, and strange ideas but criticizing its repetition and rough gameplay. NieR: Automata later reached an 88, pairing those distinctive ideas with PlatinumGames’ significantly stronger combat and presentation. Kill Zone and Just Cause are two other examples, among several others.

Franchises That Had Rough First Entries But Later Became Hits (Metascore)

• NieR (67) – NieR: Automata (88)
• Killzone (70) – Killzone 2 (91)
• Red Steel (63) – Red Steel 2 (80)
• Just Cause (73) – Just Cause 2 (81)
• Assassin’s Creed (81) – Assassin’s Creed 2 (90)
• Borderlands (81) – Borderlands 2 (91)

In the same way, Game Freak doesn’t necessarily need to abandon Beast of Reincarnation after one attempt. If anything, the game’s review scores have given the developer a fairly clear roadmap for what a sequel would need to improve, from performance and enemy variety to pacing, combat depth, and a world that feels more alive. The foundation is apparently there, at least according to the critics who responded most positively to it, and history has shown that an average first entry can become something special once a developer understands which ideas are worth preserving and which ones need to be left behind. Beast of Reincarnation may not have been the breakout Game Freak wanted, but it could still become the rough first chapter of a much better story.

For now, though, Pokemon remains Game Freak’s lane, and Beast of Reincarnation‘s review scores have only made that more obvious. The developer has every right to continue experimenting outside the franchise that made it famous, and it arguably should, especially if those experiments help it grow in ways that eventually benefit Pokemon as well. But until Game Freak produces something beyond Pokemon that can stand alongside its greatest successes, every new project will inevitably be measured against the series it knows best. Beast of Reincarnation has proven Game Freak can leave its lane, but it hasn’t yet proven that it can thrive outside it just yet.

Released

August 4, 2026

Publisher(s)

Fictions