Pokemon Rangers: Guardian Signs is the third in the Pokemon Rangers installation. It's all about the Pokemon Rangers; a group of individuals whose sole duty is to make sure that relations between Pokemon and humans are going well and that Pokemon aren't being mistreated. An altogether perfect set up for a role playing game involving Pokemon. Throw in some bad guys called 'Pokemon Pinchers' who have a secret, nefarious plot that includes kidnapping Pokemon from their homes and you're all set for a great game.

The game starts you off by allowing you to pick your Ranger, a male or female, as well as naming them. Then it begins you in a flying sequence, following by a swimming sequence. I was a little confused at first, because I had thought that the majority of the game took place on land with you capturing Pokemon, not avoiding blast attacks and chasing down silly creatures who've stolen your handy dandy 'Styler' device, your main tool in the game. Not to worry too much though, the mechanics they introduce in the beginning do get revisited. Not too long after this I was treated to the main core of the game, the islands of the Oblivia region. Through a series of tutorials it was explained to me how I needed to convey my feelings of trust and friendship to the Pokemon around me in order to get them to help me.

Now, I have to say this. Stop snickering. No, really, stop snickering. Pokemon is a series designed more for a younger audience, it just so happens that a lot of adults like it to. So back to the trust and friendship part.

Capturing Pokemon is done relatively easily, by drawing circles around them on the touch screen. The 'styler' leaves a blue tail behind that's only so long and it has to be a complete circle that encloses them, so you have to make small enough circles to make it close completely. Each time you make a circle, it conveys some of your 'feelings' to the Pokemon. Your goal is to do this quickly, while avoiding the panicked Pokémon's attacks on your styler tail. Every successful attack reduces the styler's health, which of course means game over if attacks reduce it down to nothing. Over the course of the game you have the chance to upgrade your styler, making it easier to capture the Pokemon. And each Pokemon you capture has a purpose; there are objects in the game map that only certain Pokemon can interact with, so you use the ones you've captured to clear objectives and continue with the story. And you can use your captured Pokemon to more easily convey your feelings to potential new Pokemon friends by calling on their help in a fight.

This game also includes several Legendary Pokemon who are bigger, badder and harder to capture than the regular ones. Once you've conveyed enough of your feelings of friendship to them, they show you their 'Sign'. By copying it into your styler, you can then draw it again later and call on that Legendary Pokémon's help to complete objectives. Need to clear a bunch of rocks that are blocking the villagers' paths? Call a Legendary Pokemon! His dash attack can clear that right up. Need to use a broken bridge to go back and forth between islands? Call up another buddy and he'll jump right over that bridge until the villagers can get up and fix the bridge for you.

Overall, I found the gameplay mechanics to be very simple and easy to learn. There isn't much difficulty in learning to draw a circle; the challenge comes in doing it quickly and without getting the line broken by attacks. I found myself carefully waiting to see what the Pokémon's attacks were going to be and trying to draw around them if they happened to leave dangerous puddles or objects that would hurt my styler. I enjoyed being able to capture them quickly and with a minimum of damage. And while moving around the game field, I had a good time running around and capturing at least one of every kind of Pokémon that I saw. After all, once they're captured, their information gets stored in your glossary. And the next time you have an obstacle that needs a Pokémon to assist with it, you can click on any of the nearby field Pokémon and find one that has the skill you need to help you, so long as you've captured it before and recorded its data.