It's actually really fun but ran into 2 hiccups I didn't expect:

First, there's the fact that despite me not playing Pokemon with any real fanaticism, I found it's hard to replace my love of the dumb creatures. Some of these are quite cute, but just can't cut it.

Even stranger still though is my second knock - this game is hard, and I like challenging games, but something in my brain is hardwired to want Pokemon and Pokemon adjacent games to offer little challenge. I like them because they're a relaxing time. The challenge makes my brain need to work a lot and honestly I think I'd rather play an smt or persona game if I wanted challenging turn-based combat.

I realize both these problems are hugely subjective but it really kept the game from "clicking" for me.