Reviewing Monsters - Pikmin 3, Part 3 (Bosses)

And this will round up my coverage of Pikmin 3, which will involve most of the minibosses and bosses. This has been a fun ride! I'll be back, I think, whenever Pikmin 4 is out and all the bestiary has been uploaded to the fan-wikis. I really did feel like Pikmin 3 pushed a lot of the enemy design to feel a bit more different from the first two games, at least in terms of the new enemy designs. 

Again, it's always fun to see the wacky scientific names assigned to these creatures, as well as the large amount of thought that went into the speculative evolution of these critters. I do really think that there's something a bit missing in Pokemon and especially Zelda's bestiaries because we don't quite have something anywhere as thorough as Olimar's amateur-biology-student observations about these creatures. There's also always the knowledge that the planet PNF-404 is actually a post-apocalyptic Earth, so these creatures are actually descendants of our modern-day critters, giving these monsters an extra 'oomph' of creepiness, whether the designers intended it or not!

It's also always interesting to talk about the bestiary of a game that I have never played as of yet, only seen gameplay footage online. Maybe I'll finally get to playing the franchise with Pikmin 4? With how long it's taken me to complete Persona 5, though, I highly doubt it'll be any time this year...

_________________________________________

Bug-Eyed Crawmad (Camabarus subterranid)

We've had the Hermit Crawmad in the previous game, but this member of the Camabarus genus is instead subterranean, as its name implies. It looks a lot like the Hermit Crawmad, but it's got two gigantic eyeballs with pink eyelids, connected to the main crustacean body with eyestalks. The end result does look like a weirdly modified Spore creature that someone wants to make look as uncanny as possible. Which... actually makes the Bug-Eyed bastard look very creepy when it stalks your characters! Olimar notes that the gigantic, overdeveloped eyes helps it to detect prey in cloudy water or low-visibility mud. Like its partial inspiration, the mantis shrimp, these Bug-Eyed Crawmads allow it to see polarized light, ultraviolet, and infrared light. 

The Bug-Eyed Crawmad will pop in and out of its interconnected underground tunnels, and grab Pikmin and gobble them up. As with any Nintendo enemy, the gigantic eyes are the weak spots, and hitting them enough will cause it to show off its weak underbelly. This guy is quite huge, which Olimar notes is a sign of its repeated shedding and a marker of its age!

Shaggy Long Legs (Pseudoarachnia capillum)

We get a couple more variations of what's still my favourite boss from the franchise, the Beady Long Legs family. A lot of what I said about the original Beady Long Legs still applies here -- what a unique 'spider' the creature is, with the distinctive planet-like orb and four 'sci-fi spider-walker' legs jutting out of it. Lots of spiders are hairy, of course, but they normally manifest in fur-like coverings, and not this... this whatever the hell is going on with Shaggy Long Legs here! Its joints are in puffballs, but the central orb is just a mass of hair that reminds me of Cousin It or Sadako or something. It's so gloriously dorky!

Apparently these hair are actually protective, shielding Shaggy here from the frosty weather as well as the Pikmin attacks, and you have to get rid of the hair to expose the core. The game actually has several coloured variations of the Shaggy Long Legs, and Olimar suspects that this is merely due to 'regional characteristics', and not caused by stress or age.

Baldy Long Legs (Pseudoarachnia calvitium)

Yet another variant that only appears in certain game modes is the Baldy Long Legs, which is... basically the Shaggy Long Legs, but bald. Alph wonders if this is a Shaggy that's born bald, or if it already lost its hair in a previous fight, but its species name marks it as a separate species to the Pseudoarachnia capillum... or is it? Olimar notes that "this is merely a Shaggy Long Legs that has lost its hair", but it's classified as a separate species and classified separately because 'the hair never grows back'. It really does depend on whether the Baldy lost its legs through... the course of evolution over several generations (at which point there's argument in making it a breed or a subspecies) but if it's lost its leg in its current life, then it's just a bald Shaggy! Olimar, just because someone goes bald doesn't mean it's a completely different species!

Armoured Mawdad (Tuberclipeum rex)

Huh! From the name, I assume this is meant to be another monster based on the crawdad, and so probably the big boss versions of the 'Crawmad' enemies? What a much cooler-looking face, though! I think it's those creepy, almost dinosaurian eyes embedded into the side of a much more monstrous head. The base silhouette is really all this thing has in common with an actual crayfish, because everything other than it looks significantly more creepy. Instead of two giant clackety claws, it's got what appears to be tentacles. We've got the aforementioned almost dinosaurian eyes. The mouth looks like it's transplanted from an angry ape. And those legs are like teeny-tiny little creepy legs that the wiki compares to a gecko and knowing what they're supposed to be makes me even more creeped out. And of course, the main body of this critter is enveloped in admittedly a rather natural-looking exoskeleton... but it's so pale and slimy looking. I didn't think much of this design initially when I skimmed through the wiki, going 'cool, lobster boss', but the more I look at it, the more I appreciate how nasty this thing looks. 

The Mawdad is described as being able to scuttle across the ceiling and the walls with its dozens of (ew!) gecko legs, which is honestly something that I wouldn't think too much about if it had regular centipede or lobster legs, but tiny gecko legs! God, I don't know why that little detail bugs me so much. To make this thing feel even weirder, Olimar notes that the Mawdad makes its home inside the 'hollow stumps of enormous trees'. Weirder and weider!

As noted by Alph, the exoskeleton is actually made out of crystal, and it's kind of a common theme through some of the enemies in this game to be weak to the brand-new Rock Pikmin. Olimar even notes that the Mawdad still moults like a regular crustacean, but its crystal shell is so hard that it has to keep slamming itself into rock walls to shatter the exoskeleton before forming a new one. Obviously, the underbelly of this thing is its weak part. 

Vehemoth Phosbat (Tectupervus pteromys)

And this is the adult form of the Phosbat we saw before and... hoo, what a difference! Obviously the same colours and the fuzzy texture is the same, and I guess from a distance this thing could pass as a 'moth' or a 'bat'. But man, that gigantic mouth and the layout of its face looks like they belong more on a Star Wars alien or something! A lot of random features are packed into this thing, and I'm trying to dissect what it is. It's got four fleshy wings and a giant fleshy tail, four stumpy legs, a gigantic screaming-baby mouth, two eyes located on a fuzzy dorsal side, and a mass of what appears to be parasitic/symbiotic stalk-like fungus growing from its top. What a weirdo! 

It's normally perfectly camouflaged in the dark, showing only its fuzzy black upper side, but when approached, it will light up all of its pink extremities that glow brightly, and its primary method of attacking is to inhale really powerfully, sucking in everything in front of it. It's like a fleshy, disturbingly realistic version of Kirby or something. Also, like its near-namesake Venomoth, the Vehemoth Phosbat is able to flap around and unleash toxic dust from its hairs that choke and cause the Pikmin to panic. Olimar identifies this as 'mildly toxic scales' that paralyze small insects and make them vulnerable to the sucking motion... a common misconception that is associated with 'scale dust' from moths, which aren't actually poisonous. 

Interestingly, Olimar's comments notes that the Phosbat is 'forced to live in the darkness' due to its extreme photosensitivity, though I'd say that it's more of a case of the Phosbat being so well-adapted to the darkness. Apparently, the Phosbat doesn't just camouflage, it actually turns transparent by having its chromatophore cells 'absorb faint light sources'. I do like that Olimar notes the irregularity, noting that highly-specialized cave-dwelling creatures are normally troglodytes (they have atrophied eyes and albinism) but presumably the Vehemoth Phosbat's chromatophore adaptations compensated for that. 

Sandbelching Meerslug (Gastropoidae anguilii)

What a name! Sandbelching Meerslug! It's apparently one of the biggest bosses in the series, being a giant fat slug creature. It's got gigantic, disturbingly human lips, spines down its body, and tiny bright-blue beady eyes above those pale-white circular structures that I assume is meant to resemble a slug's pneumostome. Being a homage to the many, many giant sand-worms in fiction, the Meerslug burrows through the ground and causes waves of sand to wreak havoc in the battlefield, while also creating sinkholes like an antlion. It can also spit out balls of sand. 

It's rather interesting -- slugs (and the genus does identify this as a gastropod) aren't really a creature that I'd associate with sand. It's very interesting that they wanted to portray some kind of Dune sandworm but instead of going with a regular worm, they decided to do it with a giant fat slug monster with swollen purple lips? Or, well, lip-butt, because Olimar identifies the main orifice as 'both mouth and anus', which isn't something that applies to slugs (they have regular anuses at the other end of the body) but to some species of sea cucumbers. 

He sure is a different kind of boss than I'd expect, but... I'm not the biggest fan of this one? I'm normally all for giant worms, giant slugs, and giant antlion-style desert bosses, but the Meerslug is a weird combination of all of those that just didn't click for me. 

Scornet Maestro (Spourgitis advenus)

We saw the regular Scornets that this thing commands, and what a weirdo! Unlike the Meerslug, I feel like the Scornet Maestro is a great combination of seemingly random features that work. The whole theme is that this thing is a beehive commanding little bees, but with music instead of pheromones. It's also a bird for some reason, with a giant beak that also doubles as a harp, which it plays with two gigantic hands (which gloriously end in insectoid tarsi!). The general shape of its body also resembles a beehive and simultaneously the plumage of a bird, and the whole package is just such a bizarre, insane creature that would feel at home in a setting like Alice in Wonderland or something. 

The Scornet Maestro is part of the 'huntinpeck family', and Olimar describes its rather interesting life cycle. The Scornet Maestro wanders around and doesn't have a particular nest, waking up from hibernation in the spring and traveling with a male partner towards areas with plentiful food. We never actually see the male, but Olimar describes it with the typical sexual dimorphism that many insects exhibit. According to Olimar, the male is smaller, with a white body and blue extremities, and no wings. It's interesting that while we only really see that the Scornet Maestro uses her music to control the tiny Scornets, Olimar still identifies the Maestro's musical cues as something to 'issue pheromones' to control the sterile workers. 

I really don't have much more to say here beyond the acknowledgement of what an utter weirdo the Maestro is, and yet the design all somehow gels together so well. It's such an abomination of different features that manage to still 'feel' like a fantasy creature, if you get what I mean!

Quaggled Mireclops (Trestripods gigahenum)

Huh? Huh! Every game, we get a weird non-biological weirdo. Discounting final bonus bosses, it was the Mamuta in the first and the Waterwraith in the second one. And now we've got the Quaggled Mireclops here, which looks like something out of Shadow of the Colossus or Dark Souls or something, though knowing the scale of this game the Mireclops is probably the size of my foot. I really do like the design of this thing, being just a rock overgrown with moss, with spidery knobbly legs jutting out on all sides, and a mass of plants that serve as its 'head'. I also appreciate that they didn't quite go for a typical spider or crab layout, making this thing look positively alien.... though I suppose there is room to argue that this thing is mimicking (or is based on?) the Beady Long Legs. It's not just a plant and rock monster, however. Those star-like 'flowers' on the top of the fruit is actually its eyes, and there's a part of the rocky body that opens up like a cartoonish clam mouth, complete with a tongue that it swallows up your buddies with! Click here to see the creepy enemy here!

The titular 'clops' part of the Mireclops is the gigantic fruit-like head, which isn't just a fruiting body but its 'core' of sorts. Again, it's a bit hard to see from this full body shot, but those two flower-like bulbs are actually eyes on eyestalks. Alph identifies it as a 'fruit-like protrusion', and I assume that our heroes probably mistook this thing as a regular fruit (the plot in Pikmin 3 involves them coming to planet 404 to harvest fruit to feed their overpopulated planet). Olimar theorizes that the 'fruit-like growth' is actually a symbiotic parasite that feeds off the nutrients gathered by the giant rock body. Brittany is a bit confused on the true nature of this, whether it's a plant or an animal, but good ol' Louie insists that the fruit part is glorious.

As usual, Olimar's notes are what explains the most about the weirdness of this creature, because the Mireclops is so huge and has to consume a lot of food to support its mass. In addition to its gigantic mouth that presumably just consumes anything that wanders too close like a mollusk or a trapdoor spider or something, those massive legs are actually 'roots' to drain nutrients from the environment. Olimar also notes that the Mireclops hoards so much nutrients within its stony body that it's actually a detriment to the environment around it, and killing the Mireclops will actually transform the in-game terrain and create a small garden. A weirdo! I like him.l 

Mysterious Life-Form / Plasm Wraith

So our final boss is another member of the 'Wraith' family, who we previously saw as the Waterwraith in Pikmin 2. It's first encountered as a Mysterious Life-Form, the amorphous blob-thing on the left, before it transforms into the Plasm Wraith -- explicitly called a nyudo, a type of yokai, in the original Japanese. And... not the most impressed with the Plasm Wraith from a design standpoint. it's a mass of distorted humanoid shape with a single hole in the middle, a pot belly and squiggly legs, as well as nubby limbs sprouting on either side of his head. It sure is a creepy, distorted humanoid, made of gold. Creepy and different, but it doesn't feel any more special than the Smoky Progg, Mamuta or Waterwraith.

The game, however, delivers a great accompanying lore and story that makes this unexplained creature a bit more unsettling than just being an unexplained gold blob baby out of nowhere. The Plasm Wratih has taken a disturbing infatuation with Olimar, constantly trying to 'rescue' Olimar back and having some kind of sick attachment to Olimar. Whether it's love, mistaking Olimar as its young, thinking Olimar is some kind of precious item or pet... there's just an extra bit of creepiness about this very unexplained behaviour compared to if it was just a giant monster that goes rawr and demands you fight it. It's not trying to eat your guys or be territorial, but as Charlie points out, it wants to keep Olimar but not hurt him. 

The Plasm Wraith's whole deal is that it's mutable, and it can morph into whatever it needs to be. In practice, it has a bunch of wacky attack patterns that I won't list, as well as able to bud parts of itself off to create facsimiles of previous enemies you've faced. Olimar compares the Plasm Wraith to the 'ectoplasmic incarnation' that was the Waterwraith, but concludes that Plasm Wraith is different. Olimar doesn't elaborate on what the Plasm Wraith, though he acknowledges that it might be involved with the strange evolution of the creatures of the planet. That's more on the world-building and lore-theory side, but I do appreciate that amount of thought given to a creature in a setting!

_________________________________

And with that, I'm done with Pikmin 3! That has been a wild ride!