Chegou a hora de falar de Pokémon Scarlet & Violet, esses jogos prometeram tanto...

Não é uma surpresa pra quem vê minhas reviews que sou fã da franquia Pokémon e que fiz a review de todos os jogos da série principal do Nintendo Switch então fazer uma review da Nona Geração seria inevitável, todos nós sabemos que Pokémon está super polêmico desde que entrou no Switch e Scarlet & Violet colocam mais lenha na fogueira mas apesar de tudo isso ainda são bons jogos não é ? Não é ?

Uma das partes mais polêmicas são os gráficos e realmente são estranhos, o que eu quero dizer com isso é que os cenários são realmente feios  principalmente as texturas que estão borradas, pelo menos os personagens são bons, principalmente o modelo dos Pokémon que dessa vez possuem texturas próprias como por exemplo o Magnemite que agora ele parece que é de metal mas ainda no geral tudo podia ser BEM mais bonito, pelo menos são mais bonitos que Sword & Shield o que não é difícil.

A principal novidade do jogo é o Mundo Aberto em Pokémon, diferente de Legends Arceus que apesar das áreas serem razoavelmente grandes não é considerado como um jogo de Mundo Aberto por causa que os lugares são separados e não conectados, Scarlet & Violet possui um único mapa conectado e realmente é incrível, explorar Paldea foi uma sensação bem diferente e divertida porque aonde eu andava sempre tinha alguma novidade e gostei bastante do tamanho do mapa, não é muito grande mas também não é muito pequeno.

Ao contrário dos jogos anteriores agora existem 3 Histórias principais:

1- Victory Road: a experiência clássica de Pokémon, derrotamos 8 ginásios e no fim enfrentamos a Elite Four e o campeão da região mas dessa vez podemos escolher a ordem dos ginásios e isso muda bastante porque agora temos várias possibilidades e isso é um bom fator replay !

2- Operation Starfall: claro que também a clássica equipe vilã está de volta e dessa vez é a Team Star, os membros da equipe são compostas pelos estudantes mais rebeldes da Academia de Naranja/Uva (a escola da região de Paldea que muda dependendo da versão que você escolhe), assim como na Victory Road você que decide a ordem de enfrentar cada membro da Team Star.

3- Path of Legends: você junto com um novo personagem chamado Arven precisam pegar a Erva Mística (Mornak foda se) porém os Pokémon Titãs são os guardiões dessas ervas e teremos que derrotar todos eles, também podemos escolher a ordem.

Eu adorei esse sistema de escolher a ordem das coisas, você pode fazer qualquer uma das histórias na sua ordem, o único problema é que o Level dos adversários é fixo, ou seja apesar de você ter a liberdade de escolher o seu caminho ainda o Level possui uma ordem mesmo não sendo obrigatório. Quando concluir as 3 Histórias uma nova e última história será liberada chamada Area Zero, no fim das contas Pokémon Scarlet & Violet são novos jogos do Sonic na Era Adventure, não vou falar nada por motivos de Spoilers mas é um final muito bom.

A história em si por incrível que pareça é muito boa, as histórias de Pokémon no geral são simples mas aqui em Paldea é boa e diferente por causa que são temas que você se identifica tipo Bullying, ausência dos pais e até mesmo amizade com seu cachorro ! E todos os jogos anteriores a história era mais surreal já que tínhamos equipes vilãs querendo dominar o mundo, criar uma galáxia nova, acabar com a água ou a terra, libertar os Pokémon e etc mas aqui em Scarlet & Violet as coisas são mais "realistas" mas claro que temos as partes mais insanas que é impossível acontecer na vida real, só que essa parte é apenas na reta final da Area Zero.

Outro ponto super importante são os lendários da região de Paldea ! Koraidon (Scarlet) e Miraidon (Violet) são os lendários dos jogos e eles são incríveis, porque eles são considerados como personagens de verdade e não apenas Pokémon que você encontra no final do jogo, eles estão presentes na aventura inteira e possuem uma grande importância principalmente na reta final, no começo eles são bem fracos mas cada vez que você avança eles ficam mais poderosoe, eles também servem como montaria, no Legends Arceus tinham várias montarias mas cada função era para uma montaria já em Scarlet & Violet o nosso lendário tem todas as funções do Legends Arceus e isso ficou bem mais dinâmico já que você não precisa mais ficar trocando o Pokémon, a história Path of Legends é bem importante porque cada vez que um Titã é derrotado o lendário ganha uma nova habilidade, resumindo nós criamos uma conexão com eles e possuem uma função na história que deixa eles únicos de qualquer outro Pokémon lendário.

Assim como em toda região nova de Pokémon  existem novos Pokémon ! E depois de tantos anos finalmente temos uma Pokédex com mais de 100 Pokémon novos e também é a região que finalmente temos o Pokémon de número 1000, eu gostei muito da Pokédex dessa região, de longe é a melhor Pokédex da Era 3D, interessante também é que existem duas novidades sobre os novos Pokémon:

1- Formas Convergentes: Pokémon que são parecidos com outros mas não são da mesma espécie, Diglett e Wiglett são parecidos mas são considerados como Pokémon separados.

2- Formas Paradoxo: uma das temáticas do jogo é o Passado e Futuro, esses Pokémon são versões do Passado e Futuro de espécies antigas, Great Tusk é a forma do passado de Dolphan e Iron Moth é a forma do futuro de Volcarona por exemplo.

Meu time foi um pouquinho diferente dessa vez porque eu sempre escolho o inicial de água mas dessa vez eu achei o Fuecoco (inicial de fogo) tão foda que escolhi ele, meu time ficou assim:

-Skeledirge
-Kilowattrel
-Palafin
-Cetitan
-Anihilape
-Farigiraf

A nova mecânica se chama Terastal, ela pode alterar o tipo do seu Pokémon, vou dar um exemplo: o Pikachu é do tipo Elétrico mas com Terastal podemos alterar ele pro tipo Água mas se usarmos um Terastal elétrico pro Pikachu ele aumenta o dano de golpes elétrico (ou seja é um STAB 2.0), eu gostei da mecânica mas ela é melhor aproveitada no online, no modo história não é tão necessário assim e muitas vezes os adversários não alteram o tipo dos Pokémon.

A trilha sonora é muito boa como sempre, aqui estão as minhas favoritas (vou tentar não spoilar muito aqui):

-Tera Raid Battle
-Final Boss
-Team Star Boss
-Champion Nemona
-Treasures of Ruin
-Gym Leader Battle
-South Province
-Area Zero

E assim termino mais uma Review, Pokémon Scarlet e Violet são jogos super injustiçados, só porque são feios não quer dizer que são bons, enfim a comunidade de Pokémon é uma merda mesmo... Espera aí, eu ainda não falei dos problemas do jogo...

A otimização desse jogo é um CU VIRADO DO AVESSO, é incrível que Pokémon Scarlet & Violet é todo fodido, vou ser sincero no começo da minha jornada eu não tinha nenhum problema de quedas de FPS mas depois de muitas horas esses problemas começaram a ficar mais evidentes, quando tinha muitos Pokémon no mapa o meu jogo simplesmente diminuía os FPS assim ficando mais devagar e na água esse problema era pior ainda, porque o FPS tava menor ainda.

Eu também tive muitos bugs como meu personagem ficar invisível na hora de capturar um Pokémon, meu Pokémon ficar escorregando, atravessei em uma cachoeira de sem querer e ficou todo bugado os gráficos, Pokémon aparecendo na parede assim não podendo capturar, a câmera nas batalhas eu conseguia ver dentro do chão e etc.

O online também é outra coisa no mínimo duvidosa, online da Nintendo no geral não é lá essas coisas mas jogo tem umas decisões muito estranhas de online, você pode explorar o mapa do jogo junto com outras pessoas no online porém é muito difícil fazer isso com pessoas que não são seus amigos, porque pra explorar no online você deve ter um código e com amigos é bem mais fácil do que com pessoas random, você não pode entrar em mundos de outras pessoas na hora que você quer, apenas se tiver um código e isso pra mim foi bem difícil porque eu não tenho  que tem Pokémon Scarlet & Violet e tive que usar essa feature para evoluir um Pokémon que só é possível evoluir por causa dessa porra de online.

Para evoluir meu Pokémon eu tive que entrar em vários servidores do Discord de Pokémon para encontrar uma alma viva pra eu poder evoluir e depois de um dia eu consegui encontrar um cara, muito obrigado P3DROS4 sem você eu nunca teria pego meu Palafin.

Outra coisa tenebrosa são as Tera Raids Battles,  uma mecânica que voltou do Sword & Shield, resumindo são batalhas que 4 pessoas enfrentam um Pokémon poderoso e no final se ganharmos conseguimos pegar ele, a Raid está melhor e pior, melhor porque as batalhas são muito mais dinâmicas já que agora não existe mais um turno pra cada jogador agora todos podem batalhar sem um interferir no outro porém estão piores por uma série de fatores, coisas básicas como a porra do gráfico da barra de vida do Pokémon inimigo não descer, isso mesmo o jogo quase nunca diminui o gráfico de HP do inimigo ou seja você não sabe se está conseguindo derrotar o Pokémon ou não, isso é muito ridículo, outro Bug é quando perdemos, tive uma partida que perdi e a tela ficou branca por um bom tempo e eu podia ouvir o Cry dos Pokémon repetidas vezes, enfim eu tive mais bugs mas esses são os principais.

Engraçado que a primeira vez que comentei desses bugs foi na minha lista dos 20 Jogos Favoritos de Switch e nesse tempo nada foi consertado kkkkkkk

Até o Pokémon Home sofreu com esses problemas porque eu lembro que eles adiaram a compatibilidade de transportar os Pokémon por causa dos bugs.

O jogo não ter dublagem no começo não me incomodava mas depois de ver os TRAILERS eu foi convencido que ter vozes para os personagens deixa uma experiência bem melhor.

Foi lançada recentemente a primeira parte da DLC chamada The Teal Mask, eu ainda não joguei então por isso que não vou falar nada dela, mas ouvi dizer que os problemas de otimização ainda estão presentes.

Pokémon Scarlet & Violet tinham muito potencial de serem os melhores jogos da franquia mas por conta dos bugs, otimização cagada e o prazo curto de desenvolvimento impediram desses jogos de serem incríveis, eu fico muito triste com isso porque eu adorei esse jogo, mesmo com os bugs foram um dos jogos que mais me diverti com Pokémon e desse vez eu não posso passar pano porque isso envolve dinheiro e gastar um jogo de 300 reais com inúmeros problemas de desempenho não dá.

Something that has become increasingly common in online discourse is the idea that if a studio makes a game with a certain feature or quality, another studio with a lot of money can easily, and is in fact expected to, replicate that success, delivering on a product with that and more. It's a truly baffling take, for a variety of technical and creative reasons, but more fundamentally, that viewpoint ignores that money isn't the only resource at play in the games industry: time is also in short supply. Between console cycles, trends, holiday seasons, to name a few, it's rather common for a project to be more pressed for days than it is for dollars.

No series demonstrates that better than Pokémon: it is the largest media franchise in the world, which proves to be both a blessing and a curse. Not only are they bound to all the aforementioned time constraints, but also, new generations are tied to new anime seasons, new card game packs, manga, all sorts of merchandise... All of which led to the puzzling decision to release the ninth generation on November 2022. That's less than a year after Legends: Arceus, with whom the new games share most of their staff, making it highly likely that they had less than a year of full-steam production.

The result was the most chaotic release in series history, games that were clearly unfinished, with broken features and a myriad bugs ranging from funny to game-breaking at release. There's still some lingering issues months later as Game Freak no doubt shuffle to manage patching and live ops while working on the DLC. This situation, understandably, led to a lot of frustration, but since Pokémon has been the internet's favorite punching bag as of the last couple of years, it got blown way out of proportion, with every texture and animation scrutinized and even emulator glitches farmed for clicks, not unlike what happened to Legends: Arceus.

It's that vitriol that kept me from writing about the game for several months now, the discourse surrounding the series having become exhausting to take part in (and puzzlingly, frequently dominated by people who haven't played Pokémon in years). But hey, if only to get this off the way, please indulge me as I get into why I'm personally disappointed in Pokémon Scarlet. As you may have noticed from the score, it's not "this is bad and this series is dying", it's "this game had so much potential and it pains me that it will never fully realize it".

SV introduces an open world to the mainline series: a real open world this time, unlike Legends Arceus, which had a series of open maps to explore. Paldea is a contiguous map that can be explored from edge to edge, no loading screens at all. It's also... barren. It features rather bland environments, defined only by the color of the ground and vegetation density (ranging from sparse to none). That it looks nothing like the actual Iberian Peninsula is a given, but that wouldn't matter much if not for a lack of natural beauty and a near total absence of landmarks. It's hard to even understand what Paldea's areas are meant to be, not to mention remember them in the long run.

That said, even though the map is clearly the weakest part of the game, it's possible to see some positives. The biggest irony is that, because so much of the world feels generic, it's very easy to get lost in, which is a feeling I hadn't had since the sprawling caves of Johto. It's common to take some random detour and wind up somewhere entirely different where there's something cool to find, with no idea how you got there -- a situation that yields a sense of adventure that was slowly lost as the series' graphics improved and its design became more focused and linear.

Of course, because this is Pokémon, exploration is almost always rewarded, if not with some useful TMs, with new Pokémon. The Paldean dex has a nice 400 of them, a regional dex count that has been more or less stable since Alola and that mixes old favorites with new mons at a ratio of about 3 to 1. These 400 mons are spread around the region in a way that you'll be finding uncaught creatures all the way to the end of your adventure, but also, because there's no linear path to follow and multiple areas close to the starting area, there's also unprecedented variety of Pokémon to catch while still in the opening hours. I suspect this will earn SV a higher replay value in the long run.

It's clear there was a vision to the map design, as even though biomes are not well defined, the shape of the terrain is, with the idea behind the game being to navigate that with your partner, Koraidon. Koraidon is introduced still in the prologue, and it also joins the player's party at that point, serving as a mount that is the main mode of transportation for the entire journey. As the game progresses, Koraidon gains more abilities, from jumping higher, to swimming, to flying, meant to open up new areas and change how the player approaches the map. And it works: the map feels daunting at first, but later on, Koraidon feels unstoppable. Revisiting locations from earlier on is also made rewarding as there are plenty of optional areas and items that can't be reached at first but become accessible the right abilities.

Because this design is successful, Koraidon is also a success. In fact, due to being so inseparable from the way the game plays, as well as being deeply tied into the narrative in a way that's almost poetic, and having lovable and expressive body language, sound design and overall behaviour as a creature, Koraidon is the best cover legendary to ever grace the franchise, and it's by a long shot. For many of the series' entries, cover legendaries feel bolted onto their entries and/or not developed past "whoa, it's the legendary thing!". Nebby, then later Zacian and Zamazenta, attempted to remedy this by being present from the beginning of the story, but this little sandwich-loving, drooly, motorcycle fellow won over my heart in a way none of the others ever did.

Cover legendary is not the only category SV achieves a best of in: it's also home to the best rivals in franchise history. There are three of them: Nemona is an enthusiastic young woman who's been successful as a trainer and is eager to have a new rival to battle with; Arven is the son of the region's Professor Sada, and also has a penchant for cuisine; finally, Penny is a young introvert who, along with you, gets pulled into the fight against Team Star. Nemona, Arven and Penny are my precious children: they're well developed characters that help propel the narrative forward and make the time in Paldea all the more worth it.

Each of the three is tied to one of the main quests, which you are free to pursue in any order, but are most likely to do more or less concurrently. The most prominent story is the Victory Road, the traditional eight gym gauntlet before facing the Pokémon League. Nemona keeps an eye out for you as you travel the region gathering your Gym Badges, with the occasional battle here and there to keep you on your toes. Much has been said about Paldea's Pokémon League and its Chairwoman being boring and bureaucratic, but that's actually the point: SV's take on the League is that of an exam, a bureaucracy, with the real spark being your growth alongside your friends. It's a refreshing take that nevertheless does not change much about the rest of the quest, with Paldean Gym Leaders being a diverse and fun bunch, ranging from cheerful artists to soul-crushed criticisms of our result-obsessed society.

Speaking of criticisms of society, since the flop that was Team Flare, Game Freak has been upping the ante when it comes to their antagonist teams, giving them a deeper meaning than just grunts to fight with. On that note, Team Star is up there as one of my favorites. Starfall Street is another main quest that has you visiting the strongholds of Team Star and fighting their five leaders in intense contests of strength, leaders who are not only extremely noteworthy character designs in a series known for having excellent ones, but are also, much like the rivals, fascinating characters on their own. Team Star's story is a relatable and emotionally charged one -- just as much as the third main quest.

Arven's Path of Legends closes out the starting trios of quests with his pursuit of Titan Pokémon around Paldea and the rare spices that supposedly made them that way. During that quest, you'll get to learn more about Arven's motivations for his search, his history with his mother and the origins of Koraidon, the latter of which is also the focus of the endgame. Once the other main quests are complete, Path of Legends gives way to The Way Home, the final quest, that looks into Professor Sada's research and how Koraidon came to be loose in Paldea. The Way Home is the best endgame questline we've had in a Pokémon game since at least the Delta Emerald arc in ORAS, cashing in on some setups that had been enacted still in the prologue. I won't detail any of it because it deserves to be experienced blind and firsthand.

And I didn't even get into how the faculty at Naranja Academy all get their own sidestories, or how much resolution is offered to other characters even after The Way Home is complete. The harm done by the evidently rushed quality of the titles does not stop SV's plot and characters from being unforgettable... but it has to be said, it's felt regardless, and one has to wonder just what heights could have been reached in a truly polished game. A similar feeling pervades the postgame content, i.e. raids and competitive play, and to talk about those, let's first discuss yet another best of achieved by SV in with Terastalization.

Since Gen VI, every generation has had its own battle mechanic, and Gen IX is no different, with Terastalization allowing a trainer to change the type of any of their Pokémon once per battle. Like with Dynamax, I had no faith in Terastalization from the moment it was announced, thinking it looked gimmicky and stupid. Like with Dynamax, boy was I wrong: Terastalization might not look as exciting as some of its predecessors, but it is the best generation mechanic we've had yet, adding unprecedented flexibility and strategic depth to Pokémon battles. It can be used offensively or defensively, it can make unusual picks completely viable, and it has kept the meta shifting constantly since the games' releases.

Terastalization also contributed to making raids much more interesting, though this is also owed to other changes more suited for a PvE mode. No longer can you just Zacian your way to victory every single time, with each raid demanding specific strategies and typings, motivating the player to keep a roster of different Pokémon builds. On that note, Scarlet and Violet have the most accessible Pokémon training yet, further enhancing the improvements brought by SWSH on that front. Almost every relevant competitive item can now be bought with in-game money or exchanged for easy to find items, from TMs to held items to even Nature Mints and Bottle Caps -- for us who suffered through Gen III/IV breeding, getting competitive or raid ready mons is unbelievably fast.

It would have been the best era for online play... but of course, it wasn't that simple. Raids were flat out unplayable at launch. They have since been patched, but event raids still have issues due to bad raid configurations being pushed to players, signaling a lack of a forced update mechanism as well as deficient live ops tooling -- yet another consequence of development crunch. On the competitive front, PvP battles are even more unstable than SWSH -- an accomplishment, no doubt -- leading to serious issues during tournaments that in themselves already suffer from the lack of a spectator mode. Let's not even mention the complete fiasco conducted by TPCi with the Asian region tournaments, which will no doubt further sour large swathes of the player base towards the game.

And that-- that's what hurts so much about Gen IX. Pokémon Scarlet and Violet were meant for the favorites' list. Had they been given six more months, maybe a year had Legends: Arceus gotten pushed forward too, these versions would have been set up to be the best Pokémon games yet. Instead, they're just... fine. Excellent ideas marred by an execution that came way too short, that will probably harm the franchise in the long run. I have no doubt about the creative vision behind it nowadays, but their technical roadmaps and release schedules need to be reviewed if the franchise is to be remembered by the young players of today as well as it is by us adults that started with earlier gens.

Final team, I think the most enjoyment I got out of this game was the different setups I could do with each team member. Everything else just felt tedious. I'm not a fan of open world Pokemon, and I honestly much prefer the set random encounters in just regular patches of grass. Instead, I found myself, on multiple occasions, running laps around specific areas over and over again just to find the one thing I was looking for, made extra arduous by the smaller Pokemon that would tend to be show up in inconvenient spots, making it real damn difficult to see them in time.
Battles are also unnecessarily long, with the removed options of turning off animations, as well as removing the Set style of battle, which ?????? I cannot for the life of me find any reason as to why they would do that?? That combined with the slow text boxes, mid-battle dialogues that don't pass until the opponent has completely finished their talking animation (still unvoiced), and the animation that plays every time a Pokemon terrastalizes.
Pokemon Scarlet & Violet are just slow as shit, and it makes the entire game a chore. But at the very least, the battling, outside of the new mechanics (and several of the mechanics that they removed for whatever reason), is still fun. I enjoyed my team and what I could do with them, even if most of my wins were from toxic stalls and weather abilities boosting evasion. 6/10. I really don't see myself coming back to it any time soon.

Genuinely the worst Pokemon game of all time and it's not close. The frame rate hovers around 10 for the majority of the overworld, Pokemon clip through the world and the world itself is completely bare. The new Pokemon designs are uninspired and boring outside of the starters and regional forms. If the game had a stable framerate it would still be garbage, just functional.

Extremely disappointed and this should be the hint to fans to never buy from this series again until Gamefreak guts the entire department and hires competent programmers, animators and designers.

por baixo de todos os defeitos técnicos existe o melhor jogo de Pokémon já feito

no estado que isso tá esse jogo é uma Merda

time:
Quaquaval - o samba gay - lvl 66
Goodra - meleleleuca - lvl 65
Scovillain - zombies - lvl 69
Garganacl - Saul - lvl 62
Tinkaton - tora - lvl 66
Tatsugiri - buddah - lvl 68

Esse jogo foi uma enorme decepção! Até pouco tempo antes de seu lançamento, nem sabia sobre sua existência. Quando descobri fiquei super animado para poder jogar, pois parecia ser incrível aos meus olhos. Enfim o jogo lançou e eu só pude jogar um tempo após lançar. Tive inúmeros problemas durante minha gameplay e fiquei super decepcionado vendo que eles pouco se importaram com ele. Texturas feias, muitos bugs, coisas faltando, save corrompido, quase tudo aconteceu comigo. Quando finalmente consegui jogar e aproveitar oque conseguia do jogo vi que ele tinha um enorme potencial e que poderia ter feito muito mais sucesso de forma positiva, mesmo que seu lançamento fosse um pouco adiado. Apesar de tudo gostei do jogo de certa forma, porém poderia ter sido muito melhor.

There's a lot to like and a lot to dislike about this. I feel like it's not a strict upgrade of Legends: Arceus like people are saying. It feels more like a side step. Arceus was meant to feel empty, this game isn't supposed to yet it feels just as vapid. You can take on anything in any order, yet there's definitely an order since there's no level scaling. So many good ideas that fall somewhat flat. That being said I love the new mons, the new Pokedex, and the rivals. They're all characters I enjoyed interacting with throughout the playthrough. The ending is also EXTREMELY strong. Crazy ending, crazy final boss. Unfortunately I can't let that detract from all the short comings I experienced throughout the bulk of my time with this game. Frame drops, terrible graphics, un-inspired non-linearity, lack of personality. Wish the strength this game showed me in the last hour was present through all of it. If I could give halves it would be a 6.5/10 but since I can't, I just can't see it as a 7. Too many issues, but I still had my fun with it.

Easily the best Pokemon game we have ever gotten, especially in terms of story. Pokémon's story has always been super simple with characters being memorable more so by their visual style rather than their personalities. SV manages to give us new characters and rivals that have defined goals that are independent from the main character.

Open world does end up suiting Pokemon well and I hope this game is essentially the blueprint going forward. What drastically holds this game back is the lack of optimization. It is plagued with framerate drops and unloaded textures.

It is in no way the worst Pokémon game we have gotten and people do judge this game too harshly. But the technical issues around the visuals and the clunky online Raid battles are unacceptable with a budget like Pokémon.

I enjoyed my time with it, playing it for over 100 hours to complete the pokedex, but after that, it is so hard to get back to or replay. The technical flaws are awful, but honestly, the gameplay was sub-par too, with the nail in the coffin being the levels of story objective battles.

The flaws prevent me from enjoying it anywhere close to how much I had the first time. It had novelty, but will not stand the test of time. It's hard to be interested in the DLC at all. I had an incredible time with it on a first playthrough, and I think it's really a shame.

its very upsetting that this game came out the way it did because if you look past the awful optimization issues, bugs, glitches, bad graphics, and frame rate issues (which is a LOT to look past i know) the game is genuinely pretty fuckin good

it has its issues still like i dont care about the team star story like at ALL, some of the gym challenges fucking blow, and some of the story beats couldve had more build up without going out of your way to find it. But outside of that you have a good mainline pokemon game with probably the best story since gen 5's black and white.

i wish i could say its a home run for the series but sadly it is extremely held back from being fully complete.

✔
GameFreak cooked, but they probably should've left it in the oven a little longer. That's precisely how I'd describe this title. This is gonna be a longer one than usual, so grab a snack and get comfy.

Pokémon Scarlet is probably best described as my Cyberpunk 2077: a video game broken at launch that I had such a fun time with, even though the flaws are so obvious to me that I won’t be defending those. I’d like to preface that the bugs I dealt with were minimal at best. I didn’t get any crazy glitches or anything. I just got graphical bugs and the occasional weird goofy thing. The Switch could absolutely run this game no problem, but the fault is with the developers who didn't give the game enough time to get properly optimized for the system it was running on.

The gameplay is largely the same as most Pokémon titles. Catch, battle, and do what you have to do to be the very best. One of the big hooks is that you're running around in a big open world. While I do like the freedom this allows, I think this also causes the routes and paths the game takes you on to lose some of that Pokémon sparkle. Even Generation 8, as bad as Sword and Shield were objectively, had unique areas that stuck out in the mind (Ballonlea, as an example). Scarlet and Violet had maybe two or three places that stuck out in my mind and for a game with many places you can go to, that isn't great. The game feels less "free" and more "unrestricted" at times, if that makes sense. You're able to go wherever you want, but you can only do the things you want if you do them correctly.

The other big hook is Terastalization, the Mega Evolution/Z-Moves/Dynamax of this generation. This is where things get a bit spicier (even though I hardly used Terastalization during my playthrough). This mechanic essentially allows you to change a Pokémon's type during battle. This has a LOT of potential both casually and competitively (I hear, because I'm not in the competitive scene that much, admittedly).

However, the gameplay is where my bigger complaints come in. The Pokédex grind still sucks and in order to have a seamless 100% experience, you need one of three things to be true. You have to have both versions, you have to know someone who has your opposite version, or you have to get extremely lucky with raids (which is really difficult when the raids don't have Pokémon you need). This also becomes a problem when the online functionality for raids requires payment for an online service. The game is also fairly easy, with battles not really scaling to your level if you're going in order (and if you're not, there's a good chance you'll die your first time around). Despite that, I really think that some of the battles in this game are amazing. When you get to the late-game, the battles may not be hard, but they go hard.

You know what else goes hard? The music. This is in no small part thanks to Toby Fox coming on to compose the best tunes in this game. There's a certain theme in the postgame that rocks so hard that he composed and I'm listening to it as I write this. Despite the bangers on this OST, there is one weird song choice that was by someone you probably wouldn't associate with Pokémon normally. You'll know it when you hear it, but it's in the main story.

Speaking of the main story, let's talk about that for a second. It was the one thing that caught my attention. I know not a lot of people come to Pokémon for the story (and I also don't to an extent), but ever since I played Mystery Dungeon, I wanted to see the main series hit that stride. I'm happy to say that while Scarlet and Violet still have the usual Pokémon story, they manage to pace it a lot better than in most of the 3D era (Generation 6 onward).

One more small complaint. I really don’t like how the shiny sound and sparkle from Legends: Arceus is gone. It’s such a small change, but it’s the feature I miss the most. They’d better bring that back in a patch or in the next generation because it’s so easy to unfairly miss a shiny Pokémon now.

Missing those shinies is even more of a shame since I really liked a lot of the Pokémon this generation. Koraidon, the mascot of Scarlet, is a doofy lizard that I adore. Quaxly, one of the starters, is in the running for my top 10 favorite base form starters. Oh, and who could forget Clodsire? My bumbling muddy boy makes me smile every time I see him. There weren't as many misses this time in comparison to things like Dhelmise or Bruxish from Alola for example.

On the whole, I liked it a lot, but it is 100% not without its shortcomings. The bugs can be annoying, the Pokédex grinding was pretty annoying, and some of the online components were less than ideal. None of that bothered me enough to hate it.

Also, yes. I 100% completed the Paldea Pokédex. I'll take my trophy now.

pokemon scarlet is a mess. it runs like garbage, somehow worse than SW/SH AND legends arceus, which is a feat. the intro is 2 hours of straight dialogue, half the characters are either rebelling rich kids, a felon, or a guy with mommy issues, with consistent glitches throughout.

yet somehow, i found myself entranced through my 25 hours of playtime. the open-world and triple quest line adds a ton of stuff to do. i like the new setup of how everything is set out from the start, though i do wish levels scaled with gyms & weren't set. the glitches and awful story are both so goofy that i couldn't help but laugh.

i think that's why i liked pokemon scarlet so much. a good chunk of the flaws are just so fucking stupid that i just laughed them off, and the others were good concepts with flawed execution. if given more time to polish, game freak could've made an excellent game. unfortunately, the game is just a messy clusterfuck that i still enjoyed quite a bit.

I can't fault anyone who doesn't have the patience or the energy to play a broken game. Much less an expensive one.

I do understand that, but it's increasingly hard for me to engage with videogames by that kind of perspective. If it runs at 10fps I'll just adjust to it, if it's buggy I hope it's funny, if it's ugly then, well, beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Most good, interesting and ambitious ideas overshadow bad technical aspects for me and thankfully Pokémon Scarlet is good, interesting and ambitious.

I had so much fun that I can almost consider it the best in the franchise. An ode to broken games with plenty of soul.

I really tried to enjoy this, and bought it after undergoing a vasectomy. Unfortunately the vasectomy itself turned out to be a more pleasant experience than this. It really is a testament to how little Game Freak cares about its games, when there are a myriad of glitches, coding problems and optimisation issues that seem to be simple to fix...yet remain there to this day. I guess there's no money in fixing a game that sold millions when you've already got the cash.
Getting a vasectomy on Valium and whisky while listening to Iron Maiden? HIGHLY recommended.
Pokemon Scarlet? HARD pass.

i played this game way after release, emulated, so i didn't really have technical issues too often. the game was a near steady 4k 30fps, so I can't speak to how the game launched. but oh my god, this game was so fun. the most fun pokemon experience i've since x and y (haven't played arceus yet) i love the mix of classic pokemon progression with a more open world. area zero was really cool and i liked seeing the story take some weird turns that i wasn't expecting. but please add voice acting, especially if you're gonna animate the scenes like there is. overall, a little janky, but i didn't have many issues that people dealt with on launch. this game was honestly such a joy, i was just happy to play a pokemon game.