A step in the right direction for the future of Pokemon. The open world maps make the previous games feel archaic in how they went about catching pokemon. Being able to just throw a pokeball and/or other Pokemon to catch Pokemon in the overworld makes collecting them SO much easier and makes the battles you do end up doing take far less time than previous titles. I thought I'd also hate the crafting in the game but even that is flushed out in a way that feels justified, with you being able to have your Pokemon collect some materials for you.

The graphics and story are probably the biggest cons with this game. The last Pokemon game I played was Pearl but I don't remember the story in Pokemon games being this bland and uninteresting. Friends have told me that it's to be expected at this point though, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised. There's a lot of technical graphical issues with the game too. To be clear, I understand the style that Game Freak went with and most of the problems aren't due to the style but rather how it's implemented. Pop in is blatantly obvious, textures get really pixel-ly at times, and there's a lot of frame drops depending on the amount of Pokemon and what they're doing. Looking out from a mountaintop you can clearly see where the game stops rendering trees and from high in the air the map looks empty and barren.

These issues, aside the progressive leaps this game has made in updating the Pokemon formula more than make up for it and makes me eager to play future games in this style.

Reviewed on Aug 03, 2022


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