I never realized how important the story in a Pokémon game could be until I played this game.
Pokémon DPP or BW both had stories that reeled like they mattered, they had a purpose and felt urgent and important. While I appreciate the return to basics with the character's goal being to simply beat all the gyms, that's not the whole equation.
The sudden addition of Eternatus felt forced and nonsensical. If he was the main legendary Pokémon of the game rather than the uninteresting Shield and Sword wolf we got, and/or was the main focus from the start, this wouldn't have been an issue. You fight this world-ending Pokémon a mere ten minutes after you hear about him, making his inclusion not only feel unimportant, but forced and poorly paced.
The characters in this game are also incredibly uninteresting, most of them being either exact copies of earlier characters, or in the case of your rival, his only purpose is to be knocked down over and over.
The gyms all being themed like some sort of sports-stadium, while a nice way to show the importance of gyms, makes all of them feel the same, and not as interesting or solely themed around one type like the Pokémon games before.
The design of more than half of the new Pokémon look either okay, uninteresting, or noticeably terrible, and the fact that only 1/4 of all Pokémon could even be added to this game really didn't help it. Throughout my entire play through of this game I was constantly telling myself, "this just doesn't look like a real Pokémon." Not to mention the new Gigantimax inclusion, which just feels like Mega-Evolutions, except worse designed.
The graphics looked noticeably terrible, especially when compared to other Switch games, and the soundtrack is forgettable.
The only things I can think of that this game did right is the models for characters and Pokémon, and being able to see Pokémon in the wild, rather than running into a random encounter from a bush.
Pokémon DPP or BW both had stories that reeled like they mattered, they had a purpose and felt urgent and important. While I appreciate the return to basics with the character's goal being to simply beat all the gyms, that's not the whole equation.
The sudden addition of Eternatus felt forced and nonsensical. If he was the main legendary Pokémon of the game rather than the uninteresting Shield and Sword wolf we got, and/or was the main focus from the start, this wouldn't have been an issue. You fight this world-ending Pokémon a mere ten minutes after you hear about him, making his inclusion not only feel unimportant, but forced and poorly paced.
The characters in this game are also incredibly uninteresting, most of them being either exact copies of earlier characters, or in the case of your rival, his only purpose is to be knocked down over and over.
The gyms all being themed like some sort of sports-stadium, while a nice way to show the importance of gyms, makes all of them feel the same, and not as interesting or solely themed around one type like the Pokémon games before.
The design of more than half of the new Pokémon look either okay, uninteresting, or noticeably terrible, and the fact that only 1/4 of all Pokémon could even be added to this game really didn't help it. Throughout my entire play through of this game I was constantly telling myself, "this just doesn't look like a real Pokémon." Not to mention the new Gigantimax inclusion, which just feels like Mega-Evolutions, except worse designed.
The graphics looked noticeably terrible, especially when compared to other Switch games, and the soundtrack is forgettable.
The only things I can think of that this game did right is the models for characters and Pokémon, and being able to see Pokémon in the wild, rather than running into a random encounter from a bush.