Oh no. They made pokemon good.
From a mechanical perspective I was very pleased with a lot of the decisions made. Mints and bottle caps are easily accessible which solves a lot of the tedium with catching pokemon. A lot of the 'A' mashing brain dead combat with random pokemon and trainers on the road has been streamlined or made completely avoidable. Tera whatevering is a really interesting new mechanic that isn't over powered and helps ALL pokemon instead of just a few. The three storylines have different forms of combat in each one that provide gameplay variety to break apart the general fun of exploring. It was just FUN. The normal dread that hits at around the 3rd gym in a pokemon game never came while I was playing this. From day one to day done I was actively having a good time just playing the game, exploring the cool world, catching some cool dudes, and accomplishing goals.
Just mechanically this game gets a big gold star for solving a lot of my gripes and making pokemon fun again but then it went and did something unbelievable. It made me care about the story.
I was invested in all three of the main storylines and when they converged into a single finale I was kind of floored by just how much I cared about everything. I nearly cried like 3 separate times. It's not the deepest story and they pluck some pretty low hanging emotional fruits but that's what pokemon SHOULD be doing. The IP is suited to simple stories like this and not these grand narratives of Gods and terrorist groups. Good lord I was reading the dialogue and there were parts I thought were genuinely funny. In the last chapter the characters are riffing off each other and I was absolutely consumed by the warm feelings of friendship. WHAT IS HAPPENING. How can they just suddenly know what makes a pokemon game good after YEARS of coming off completely oblivious. Is this game an accident? I'm losing my mind.
Other notes:
-They absolutely nailed the legendary pokemon in this game. I'm glad they had so much confidence in the world they made and the player's ability to explore and enjoy exploring.
-The technical stuff is bad but I don't care. Suck it nerds.
From a mechanical perspective I was very pleased with a lot of the decisions made. Mints and bottle caps are easily accessible which solves a lot of the tedium with catching pokemon. A lot of the 'A' mashing brain dead combat with random pokemon and trainers on the road has been streamlined or made completely avoidable. Tera whatevering is a really interesting new mechanic that isn't over powered and helps ALL pokemon instead of just a few. The three storylines have different forms of combat in each one that provide gameplay variety to break apart the general fun of exploring. It was just FUN. The normal dread that hits at around the 3rd gym in a pokemon game never came while I was playing this. From day one to day done I was actively having a good time just playing the game, exploring the cool world, catching some cool dudes, and accomplishing goals.
Just mechanically this game gets a big gold star for solving a lot of my gripes and making pokemon fun again but then it went and did something unbelievable. It made me care about the story.
I was invested in all three of the main storylines and when they converged into a single finale I was kind of floored by just how much I cared about everything. I nearly cried like 3 separate times. It's not the deepest story and they pluck some pretty low hanging emotional fruits but that's what pokemon SHOULD be doing. The IP is suited to simple stories like this and not these grand narratives of Gods and terrorist groups. Good lord I was reading the dialogue and there were parts I thought were genuinely funny. In the last chapter the characters are riffing off each other and I was absolutely consumed by the warm feelings of friendship. WHAT IS HAPPENING. How can they just suddenly know what makes a pokemon game good after YEARS of coming off completely oblivious. Is this game an accident? I'm losing my mind.
Other notes:
-They absolutely nailed the legendary pokemon in this game. I'm glad they had so much confidence in the world they made and the player's ability to explore and enjoy exploring.
-The technical stuff is bad but I don't care. Suck it nerds.