"Gotta catch 'em, gotta catch 'em all!" I happily hummed as my brand new copy of Pokémon Ruby landed in my lap. I'm completely new to the Pokémon games but have heard how much fun they can be and have also enjoyed the cartoon from time to time. So it was with great anticipation that I plugged in the lovely Ruby Red cartridge into the back of my brand new Gameboy Advance SP.

Now, I understand that many of you will have played at least one of the Pokémon games before and probably know what they're about, what you have to do and the things involved in doing them. However, for the uninitiated I'll give a quick run through. You play as a new kid in town following his father's footsteps as a great Pokémon Trainer, with the dream of someday becoming the absolute Pokémon Champion! Pokémon is apparently short for Pocket Monsters and the land within which you play is littered with about 200 different types. As a wannabe trainer you have to catch them in your Pokéball, train them and then pit them against the Pokémon held by Trainers and other wannabes. This involves exploring the beautiful island of Hoenn, making friends, hunting Pokémon, having duels and ultimately beating the Trainer you find in each town.

So, does such a simple premise make for excellent gameplay? Let me tell you, I have been playing it absolutely non-stop since I got it three days ago and driving those around me to absolute distraction! The gameplay really is so involving. It starts off very quickly and easily, where you are introduced to a few characters and locations. You are shown very briefly how to use Pokémon to fight, how to capture them, how to train them, where to take them when they get tired, how to store more than the six you can carry at any one time and so on. After that you're pretty much on your own!

The amount of freedom you have is great and is very similar to the style of play in such games as Zelda. You wander around towns chatting to people, picking up hints and tips, sometimes performing the odd rewarding task, or exploring areas highlighted for you by friends and other trainers. There always seems to be something new to look into, something extra worth examining and some other thing that can aid you in your overall quest. This could be anything from checking out what items are available in the mall to chatting to old timers who have ways of making power-giving berries grow, to learning how to run through tall grass to make Pokémon leap out at you!

The little puzzles and tasks start out simple but, as the game progresses, they become tougher and tougher. For example, I had to find a character called May and help her catch a Pokémon. Easily done - she was just up the road from my house. However, later on in the game I had to deliver a letter to Steve, who lived on a small island slightly offshore. That was a lot tougher and involved helping an old sea dog recover his Pokémon from an evil trainer, then riding on his boat to the island and finally finding my way through some darkened caverns crawling with powerful untamed Pokémon until I found this Steve guy! That was quite an adventure, and kept me engrossed for quite some time. [Who'd have thought being a postman could be so dangerous! - Ed]

So, what about the Pokémon then? As I said before, there are about 200 different types to catch, train and watch evolve. Each Pokémon increases in skill levels when involved in sparring matches with other Pokémon. They can also be taught new moves, attacks, defences and 'out of fight' moves that help you with your quests. The fights they get into begin without much competition and you can use these minor bouts to help train them up quickly before moving to the tougher surrounding towns. These matches are simple turn-based combats in the same vein as Golden Sun but without the complexity. How you use them in a fight also determines how they evolve and their feelings towards you as a trainer. If you use them to the point where they faint with exertion each time they are soon going to come to resent you. However, pull them out and let another Pokémon step into their place mid-battle and not only do you allow the exhausted Pokémon to save face, you also share an equal amount of the skill points earned with the tired one and the one that stepped in to complete the battle. Nice one! This allows a steady increase in the number of trained Pokémon you have, without them hating your guts for working them too hard.

The Pokémon are absolutely at the core of the game, so not surprisingly there is more to them than winning battles. You can train them to use skills outside of fights, such as chopping down tree stumps. I've come across several tree stumps but only recently trained Lizzy, one of my favourite (and he knows it!) Pokémons, to chop. Thus far this new skill has allowed me to access an area not open previously and has also given him a valuable skill in his battles. You can have your Pokémon assessed and doctored by various people you meet and everyone is keen to either do battle, discuss Pokémons, use their Pokémon in various ways (you move into your new house with the help of removal Pokémon) and generally just exist for the sake of capturing, playing, training and fighting your Pokémon.

This interactivity extends to playing with your friends via the Gameboy Advance link-up cables. Not only can you fight your hand reared Pokémon against your mates, you can also trade them. This comes in very handy when you play against someone with a Sapphire Cartridge, as they will have been able to capture Pokémon that only appear on their version but can happily be transferred to yours via a trade. This makes finding friends with Pokémon Sapphire a must if you absolutely have to 'Catch 'em all'.

With so much to do, see, learn, overcome and battle, this is one of the most addictive games I have ever played. I can't put it down! I want to stop typing and go back and play the game again, but unfortunately [or fortunately for the sake of AceGamez - Ed] I wore the batteries of my SP right down and have to wait three hours for it to charge before I can play it again. I understand people who have played Pokémon games before think this gameplay is just more of the same but for people coming to it for the first time it's a real eye-opener! I can't help but give a fantastic and resounding ten out of ten for playability.

I do have some gripes with the game though and the graphics are one of them. Why are they so plain? Don't get me wrong, they are nice and colourful, easy to make out and not detrimental to any other facet of the game but you can't help feeling they could have been better on such a great console as the Gameboy Advance. In searching the environments you get swaying flowers, blocky looking buildings and simplified and slightly samey kinds of characters. Also, when the Pokémon do battle it's not that spectacular to watch. Their special moves seem to have a token graphical appearance and their combat moves are more like little shudders or jerks than anything that could be interpreted as a strike. When it is compared to such lovely looking games like Golden Sun, an RPG of a similar ilk, it really does put this to shame. However, where it wins over a game like Golden Sun is in the variety. At the end of the day there are over 200 Pokémon who each have a signature move or power-up, where Golden Sun only has about 50 different types of beast that come at you. I suppose squeezing in the character graphics as they stand at the moment must have been quite tough.

I have a similar problem with the sound, knowing that the Gameboy is capable of much better. The noises made by the Pokémon are okay and fairly distinctive but not overly impressive. The tunes you encounter between villages and different stages work well and keep the mood of the area you are in constant, but again, it's nothing brilliant. I feel that the sound has been compromised a bit to allow room for the sheer scale of the game, it's characters and it's surprising complexity.

Although both the graphics and sound do leave a little to be desired, neither detracts from the overall playability of the game. The variety of things you can do, the number of Pokémon you need to catch, the multitude of things you can train them in, the amount of places to explore and the different people you can interact with makes for a game that is going to keep you amused for hours on end. To give you a rough idea, the game clock on my saved position shows I have been playing it for a solid five hours. In that time I've only captured nine of the 200 Pokémon, only been able to get two of them to evolve, have explored only four of the many towns and cities and only beaten one of the ten Trainers. All that and I still have to enter my Pokémons into some contests if I want to start them on the path to the Championships, I have to find plenty of other hints and tips to help me on my quest and I have many tasks and puzzles ahead of me. The game just seems endless and there's always something new to do around the corner. I predict easily fifty hours of gameplay out of this game if not more- excellent value for money, whichever way you look at it.

Pokémon Ruby has something to offer everyone, even the most casual of gamers. You can't help but get sucked in by the gameplay and soon you become completely addicted. Even though the simple graphics and sound irk you at first, you get so absorbed in the game and storylines that evolve that you just don't care! When you combine this addictiveness with the hours of pleasure you know you're going to get from the game you know that it's £35 very well spent. The only reason I don't give this game a full ten out of ten is that there is plenty of room for improvement in the sound and vision department. If these are made then future versions will be must haves for every GBA owner. As it is, this is still pretty much an essential purcase.

Reviewed by Dave Wynn for AceGamez (All Rights Reserved).