It seems with every new Pokemon game, the single player gets better and the mutliplayer becomes worse. If you are a person that just enjoys completing a Pokemon game's campaign and/or completing the pokedex, you'll probably really like Pokemon Scarlet/Violet. But if you're like me and the draw has always been matches with other players, the series has sunk to new lows.

In addition to the continued abolishment of the National Pokedex, the game further punishes longtime fans by giving legacy Pokemon traded though generations a random set of moves, making them competitively unviable (albeit fixable in some cases). Breeding and training is easier than ever, but my urge to create new battlers is non-existent. Why bother when there's a chance they won't be compatible with the next game that we all know will release in 1-2 years? I have 300+ battle ready Pokemon with perfect stats in Pokemon Home, and only about 3 dozen are able to be sent to this game. Online battling is still enjoyable, but the lack of options that existed in past games can make matches feel stale after awhile. This is still a game I'll regularly come back to, but it genuinely makes me sad that the franchise's best multiplayer games are behind it.

I miss Starmie :'(