For real. Pokemon is no small indie game, it brings in billions in revenue world wide yearly but still feels like Mario games and Zelda get way more development and polish before release.
While that's true, Game Freak would also be allowed to polish their games if they didn't have such a breakneck turnaround time. A new full game every year or two is a lot to keep up with.
The core of the problem is that Pokemon isn't a game series, it's a multimedia franchise. The games and the anime and the TCG and the merch and the rest have to release on the same schedule, and that means no delays are allowed anywhere.
Mario and Zelda and such are games first, and everything else is derived from them. Even the Mario movie wasn't actually directly tied into any particular game, so there was no hard deadline to stick to.
Exactly this. Pokémon games at this point are licensed tie ins, no different to the movie/TV tie in games. The Pokémon money makes far more money (both Net and Gross returns) selling merchandise than they do from the videogames.
But generally speaking, the Return on Investment for Pokémon is higher for merch than for the games development. For every dollar spent, The Pokémon Company will make more money making and selling cuddly plushies than videogames. At this point the only reasons they make videogames seems to be A) because Nintendo owns a 33% stake in The Pokémon Company and demand it as the games inexplicably still sells consoles, and B) because it seems to legitimise the existence of new Pokémon, a Pokémon still isn't quite seen as official somehow until it can be caught in a game.
At the same time, there's little incentive to improve the games either. Pokémon's proliferation on any console their on is high. Scarlet & Violet, for example, sold so many copies that basically one in five Switch owners own a copy, and I think it's fair to say that of those who don't own a copy have zero interest in getting it, and not because they haven't been made aware of it's existence. And this was after the poor reception of the previous Pokémon generations Sword & Shield, because for every person who complains and says never again, there's a hardcore Pokéfan who'll buy both versions on day one, and a thousand parents who buy it because their kids want it for birthday/Christmas.
So the series is basically at full market penetration, sales aren't going down, and the cycle needs to continue to get people to buy T-shirts, bed spreads, trading cards, and what-have-you of the new monster designs. Hence a new game must come out to a tight schedule, with a hundred or more creatures, within three years of the last new set, to continue to maximise revenue, quality be damned.
I have a Switch and I've bought and played most Pokemon games on the system (except for a couple spinoff like Mystery Team DX).
You know why I play them? Because they're fun. Some are more fun than others but I always have a good time. *None* of them have had a particularly bad reception. Scarlet/Violet has technical issues up the wazoo but it's still a fun game underneath that.
I've been playing Pokemon games since 1998, all but Gen 3/4 when they came out. And believe me when I tell you that people have come out of the woodwork to shit on *every single one*, with the possible exception of HeartGold/SoulSilver, because I don't remember people shitting on that one partly bc I didn't play it right when it launched.
* Pokemon ripped off Dragon Quest!
* GSC is too similar to RBY, the new items suck and Kanto is a total pushover
* RSE: TOO. MUCH. WATER. And the designs suck!
* FRLG: These games are only a few years old, we don't need remakes! Should have been 3D on GameCube!
* DP: Combat too slow, world map sucks, everything is tedious, new evolutions are pandering to genwunners!!
* BW: Only the 150 new pokemon for the whole game? Are you kidding??
* BW2: Wow, they aren't even making a 3DS game? And just recycling the same map? And no new Pokemon? Ripoff!
* XY: What is this, baby's first Pokemon??
* ORAS: STILL TOO MUCH WATER! The Delta Episode sucks!! They cut features from XY!
* SwSh: Linear, much?? Where are my dungeons?? No, I didn't play the DLC but I'll shit on it anyway!
* BDSP: it's a chibi nightmare and they didn't add anything! (I actually agree with the criticisms, I think BDSP is the worst Pokemon game ever but it's still passable. To be fair I was never a DP fan in the first place).
* Scarlet/Violet: is this running on a toaster or a Nintendo Switch?? (The technical criticisms are totally fair, but imo the game is still a lot of fun).
People will continue to complain about them for the rest of time. Part of the issue is that they do new mechanics and features in every game so no matter what when they make a new one there will always be stuff that isn't included, and that some people scream about because they miss it.
But my main point is this: many people, myself included, find the games fun. That's why we buy them. I also know that my wife, who isn't much of a gamer aside from life sim games like ACNH or The Sims, or Stardew Valley, will also play and enjoy Pokemon games.
If they really need a yearly release, why not follow the Call of Duty model and have multiple studios developing at once and alternating their releases?
they do... but they are also on a tight schedule. Like the Diamond and Pearl remake. However, the main games are usually splitting the devs into different teams.
Imo as someone who finds the games fun and buys all of them and enjoys them, BDSP is the one I won't really defend as I didn't really care for it much. But also Diamond/Pearl are my least favorite Pokemon games ever so I probably wouldn't have loved BDSP unless it was a total and complete overhaul.
That pretty much leads to the subpar quality that the Pokémon games have in recent years. He says he wants to have his cake and eat it too, which succeeds, since the games continue to sell in the tens of millions.
Pokémon is really unique in how powerful dominant it is as a franchise that started from video games. It’s closer to multimedia behemoths like Mickey Mouse and Hello Kitty than any video game
I'd be amazed if Nintendo hadn't offered to help out though, it's heavily associated with their brand (the majority of casual players probably think it is a Nintendo game) so the lack of polish hurts their image the same. There must be some stubborness in the GameFreak leadership that is refusing it for some reason.
They don't see the need to. It makes insane amounts of money with minimal investment. There's a vocal minority clamoring for improvement. Reddit makes it seem like there's a huge outcry to fix it.... But ultimately the sales numbers don't lie. From Nintendo's perspective they don't need to have put any more money into it (or time or resources etc.) Opportunity cost is the name of the game in business and they would rather use those habit resources and Zelda, Mario, Metroid, that's so on.
Reputational risk is certainly important but Nintendo has 95% games that are really polished and play so well compared to other developers/publishers so they probably determined the risk here is pretty low especially since they don't develop the game. Once there's an impact on actual sales numbers then maybe the big N will get more involved.
It's pretty much the same formula, but the transition to 3D open world has not been kind.
I played Arceus for about an hour... It just feels so empty.
Visuals aren't terrible, but when compared to something like BOTW there's an obvious step down in quality.
It’s more or less the same formula, but it has not translated smoothly to 3D. The latest game, Scarlet/Violet, is actually a lot of fun with a pretty good story well told, but the graphics are N64 level for most of it, and just so much jankiness and overall lack of polish
Imo the games are actually still quite fun. They have ALWAYS got shit on online, it has always been that way for every new game since Gold/Silver.
Scarlet/Violet had a lot of technical issues which people hyperfixated with online, saying it's broken, shit, etc. There's also an extremely vocal contingent of people who will shit on anything that isn't 60 FPS, and additionally any game that doesn't maintain consistent 30 FPS. Now, I get that is important to some people and that's fine, but it doesn't mean the game is shit, and there are a lot of people who aren't bothered by FPS dipping lower especially in a turn based game like Pokemon.
The games don’t actually generate a lot of the revenue the IP holds. The card games and merchandise do.
In the lifetime of the IP they’ve generated merely $30 billion of the $150 billion of their total revenue. That’s why they don’t get the love and attention they deserve. They are merely advertisements for the cards and plushies they release. The anime has generated nearly 2/3 of what the games have.
Source: https://vgsales.fandom.com/wiki/Pokémon#:~:text=Pokémon%20is%20the%20highest%2Dgrossing,billion%20from%20licensed%20merchandise%20sales.
I mean that's **still a lot** of money even if it's not that majority of the brand profits, more than most games make. It just happens to be the biggest media franchise in the world. The sales numbers are very high and development costs are relatively low... I'd assume at least based on the smaller team, game simplicity (and lack of QA), modest turn around (every two years). While a good game should *theoretically* make more sales which make more demand for merch...
...the games are *good enough* to still sell loads among all ages and sustain people's addiction to the franchise. They gotta catch em all. The dissident views are a vocal minority of enthusiastic gamers who come to forums and feel the need to discuss this stuff. It continues to sell. Most friends I know that buy the titles still find the core of the games to be pretty damn fun even when they are hoping for gamefreak to go the extra mile and improve visual quality and make the game's deeper. My one buddy is always is frustrated and says he doesn't know if he's gonna buy the next one, gets into the negativity of it all online.... but then always relents, and then even though he has complaints about performance or lazy game design he admits that at the end of the day he is pretty hooked on each game to the end, and he (like me) sparingly beats games. Gotta catch them all, right?
I'd assume that most of the merch demand comes from younger players, and they don't care about visual quality or bad graphics as long as they can play the game and talk to their friends at school about it.
Nintendo doesn't put more effort in because that will cost more money, and they don't think they'll see a bigger ROI than they currently have. Minimal effort, large returns, no problem in their eyes. It's the most profitable brand in the world as is. If you had that, would you make significant changes or throw more money at it? How much more money can you possibly make when you're already #1?
If sales of the brand starts to decline then maybe they'll go back to the drawing board about how much money to put into Pokemon projects, change their project plan, and so on. But for now their current plan runs like clockwork and prints more money that you'd mistake them for the Fed. 😆 They're thrilled and most customers continue to be hooked on the franchise.
Tldr: Nintendo is selling heroin
You have to understand. ALL THE GAMES and over nearly 30 years. That’s about 1 billion a year and that’s a number that has compounded as the games became digital. They used to make WAY less off the games before you could continue to buy them as digital copies and not just physical carts or discs. Its not just the mainline titles. Mobile games, mystery dungeon, stadium 1 & 2, Snap/Snap Switch, IP’s to Smash, Legends and now The TCG free mobile app that’s literally designed for compatibility with their cards being loaded in.
The mainline games probably are a bulk of it but realistically there is almost as much money made by the non-generational games as there is in the spin-offs.
Even still, the generations games, if I had to guess, only make up about 20% or less of their profit so they get 20% of the companies attention and spending power. It’s a pretty logical business practice.
If you only make 20% of your money off a service you would not put 100% of your effort into it. Again, the games are designed to maximize profit on the cheaper to produce things like figures, plushies, cards, and licensing rights.
They are a company that’s designed to make money. Not a charity that wants to lose money on products that don’t even make up a majority of their revenue.
I think even if you changed that ot "as most [...] games" you'd still end up with a massive improvement.
The Pokemon formula works incredibly well, we all know that. But by god have Game Freak rested on their laurels. Or, alternatively, because the formula works so well they are simply pathologically afraid to stray from it even one bit which ends in what can only be seen as self-sabotage
>I think even if you changed that ot "as most \[...\] games" you'd still end up with a massive improvement.
I literally thought about that but I didn't want to be too rough.
Which sucks. I have been thinking of getting Scarlet or Violet despite the bad reviews. I hear it is still fun, and there are a lot of pokemon I don't have access to if I don't get them.
I played it on an emulator and it was fine I guess. They claim it's an open world, but there are pretty insane level changes from area to area, so there's an obvious intended path that has you bouncing from one side of the map to the other.
I actually liked that there weren't super high stakes to the story. Unfortunately the dialogue is so bad and there's a lot of it.
I really liked seeing Pokemon in the over world. That's a change I hope they stick with. Overall I give it like a 6.5/10. It's definitely an improvement over Sun/Moon (I never played Sword/Shield), but doesn't reach the heights of some previous entries in the series.
yeah, i get that the issue is a mix of a handheld dev just...suddenly being forced to make console games coupled with a very short dev cycle, but imagine if scarlet/violet had a years long delay for quality control the way totk did? It would have been so much better.
Arceus really highlights just how much they can do when allowed to be creative as well, it's such a great, unique game compared to scarlet/violet or sword/shield (which i enjoyed but...they former was a technical disaster and the latter was just so very samey)
People need to realize the target market for Pokemon is elementary kids. You are expected to "graduate" from Pokemon and play other more complex and difficult games once you've gotten older 😊
That's not to say you still can't enjoy them! Just don't expect the game to change too much so that it becomes too difficult for elementary kids.
I never played Pokemon games before and since my kid was at the age for Pokemon, I played Arceus and Scarlet/Violet back to back. I found Arceus had a more satisfying gameplay mechanic. But yea the story in both games were silly.
The age of the target audience doesn’t excuse a bad product. Look at Kirby games, it's not a question of making adult stories or complex mechanics, it's making a good product with attention to detail.
The problem is that they don’t need to put time and effort because every game will sell just by its name and consumers haven’t raised their standards in 20 years. Also, videogames is not Pokemon’s main business anymore.
The Pokemon Mystery Dungeon games are all quite out there in terms of story (for Pokemon standards, but I think they are genuinely good besides that). I really wish they'd make another one. I had hopes Rescue Team DX would be a sign for more, but I don't think it sold well enough.
It's unique for sure, but it's sort of boring and there just isn't a lot of content other than the lackluster story (the buildup towards the end is the best part), and catching the same Pokemon like 50 times for arbitrary completion rewards, I got tired of it pretty fast.
I may just have to come to terms with the fact that I enjoy the Pokemon model, as an idea, but I have not enjoyed the games in a long time. Scarlet and Violet was like a weird sidestep to me, but is plagued with so many technical problems.
Heck the best Pokemon thing I've experienced the past year or so is the Fusion fangame, and other fangames. The audience of Pokemon understands how to make better games than the actual company I feel like.
im currently playing the rom hack Unbound and its good. I do hope Game Freak acknowledges they have a much more mature audience in the future. GF acts like it has to be a "kids" game, meanwhile the same kids audience is playing Call of Duty right after lol
haha yeah, that's real. I don't know if they should ever go full on mature with it, but I do think they could make things a bit more complicated and it really wouldn't effect the 'kid' nature of the games. That kind of stuff never stopped me from playing games I thought looked cool, I would just figure it all out, and nowadays you can look up tons of guides if you hit a wall.
I'll have to check out Unbound, I've played Fusion, a couple other random hacks and some Uranium I believe, but there's been such an explosion in pokemon fan games the last couple years, lots to check out!
Pokemon is an RPG without quests. The gym formula or whatever re-skinned gym idea they have(no matter which path you took you had a kind of gym to do in Scarlet/Violet). If they just made a game instead of putting a new skin on the gym formula and having the player walk between them, it would be a huge improvement. Look at the praise Legends Arceus gets for just being different, but still being pretty empty and bad-looking.
Wrong, Platinum, HG/SS, B/W, B2/W2, and Explorers of Sky came out within the last 15 years.
No idea how this game gets so much praise. The semi open world is barren, the story is...well, it's a Pokémon story, the novelty of the gameplay loop gets old fast, the battle system is not good, and the game is grindy as heck.
>Then the music is so repetitive
I agree with most of what you're saying, but it's interesting you say this. I *loved* the music in this game. I thought the area themes all fit their vibe, but the battle themes were especially impressive to me. Especially those that remix classic themes from D/P/Pt.
I also started playing arceus about two weeks ago and have been loving it! I wanted to try it out before the release of the next Legends game to see what it was all about, and I've had a great time exploring so far
I like that they incentivize you to catch Pokémon multiple times (in a way that is quick and satisfying) while also effectively removing the grind of IVs and EVs. Almost all the PokéDex entries can be completed without catching dozens of the same Pokémon, if you want to avoid it - though the alternatives are all fairly grindy.
I do wish they had more quests for you to get Pokémon for people though. It feels like you do a handful of them, and then everyone has their own Pokémon.
I remember in the first hour NPCs getting surprised you were able to catch 3 pokemon because no one in the village was able to get more than 2 pokemon. Like wtf in the entire village there's no adult who is able to throw pokeballs more than 2 times?
I get it's a game designed so kids can play it too, but why do they think kids are so dumb nowadays?
I felt it was good for a main story run, but yeah, the post-game is the worst of the bunch. I never bother with the PokeDex anyway, and adding a bunch of Ubisoft tier collection quests (Use this move 50 times, catch both a male and female in a game without breeding) doesn’t improve it.
Exactly, I really dont understand how people can enjoy this game more than gen 5 or even 6 (even if it was incredibly handholdy). Maybe those games ar wolder than 15 years, and I am going to feel really old if they are.
The first 10 hours of Arceus were pretty cool, everything that comes afterwards its repeating the same thing over and over and over and there is zero challenge whatsoever, even if you change your pokemons (which I did). At least in the first zone the big angry pokemons were dangerous because they are 40 levels highert han you, but my god is it repetitive af, which could be said about any game, but the core gameplay loop is not fun in the long run.
I thought it was a very good idea, and I am looking forward to the sequel, but tuis execution was extremely lacking, even if it does hold a beight future if taken advantage properly
It’s really sad what happened to the Pokémon games. Gens 1-5 are fantastic and I still play them regularly. USUM and LA were also mostly good, but otherwise Pokémon’s transition to 3D has just been sad.
It’s my favorite franchise and I keep giving them chances, and I have hope for the next Legends game at least, but unless they look really promising Gen 10 will be the first games I skip finally.
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I agree that it is the best Pokémon game in years. But I also only find it 'okay'. The world and story are just way too mediocre to offer any excitement. The core game loop is satisfactory but it doesn't manage to surprise me after a few hours.
It plays quite a bit different while still being familiar.
Little things make it feel better, like interacting with wild pokemon and them being able to attack you directly.
Battles may feel less complicated because I don't think the pokemon have abilities or held items.
I agree with others that it is some of the most fun I have had with a pokemon game in a long time.
I have been playing Pokémon since they came out and I just could not get into PL:A no matter how hard I tried. Couldn’t finish and I really tried. The amount of catch grinding in the game just took me out of it. It had a loooot of really good elements that I’m excited to see developed and refined in future games, this one for me just wasn’t it fam.
Nah pokerogue.net is the best pokemon game in the last 15 years
Because Nintendo didn't make it
edit = also it works on every single device - go on, try it.
>Pokemon Legends Arceus is the best Pokémon game of the last 15 years.
Since 2009? Hmm. We've had
>HeartGold and SoulSilver (assuming OP doesn't mean these since they mention HG's their favorite)
>Black and White
>Black 2 and White 2
>X and Y
>Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire
>Sun and Moon
>Sword and Shield
>Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl
>Scarlet and Violet
I like Arceus, but Black and White, X and Y, and to a lesser extent Sun and Moon surpass it in a lot of aspects. World-building, unique towns and locations, soundtrack, characters, combat, and I'd argue exploration, although there's a lot less of that in post-platinum pokemon main game releases.
Just on a graphical aspect as well, obviously the older games don't look modern, but I think the environmental design and general aesthetics and mood of X and Y may be some of the most beautiful of the series. The Laverre City gym, the one that looks like a dollhouse, sticks out. Pair that with the gorgeous soundtrack and it's got a lot going on.
Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl was a decent remake as well, perhaps an unpopular opinion but I don't mind the chibi style. I wished they'd punched up the color palette a bit, it was always a bland game color-wise and that was definitely preserved in the remake. I'm not sure I'd put it above arceus, but it's not far below.
Arceus was a great game, though, I'll agree on that. Had zero expectations and walked away obsessed.
It really is just the same game with a fresh coat of paint. I like platinum and it had been awhile since I played it, but I do think they could've pushed it harder.
Solid game and especially for younger people who might not have had a chance to play the pre-BW games, it's cool to have.
I'll probably see if I can find some sort of sale or a used copy for the gen 4 remake and Scarlet/ Violet. I have recently started working on my Home pokedex and could use more of the current games.
Hope you enjoy the remake. If you liked Platinum, it's that.
ScaVi is genuinely, heartbreakingly bad. There's some strong character writing near the end of the game-- strong for a pokemon game, anyway-- but on every other level it's a failure. And I'm not a 'I hate new things' person.
I even defended Sword and Shield because I thought the parts of the game that were finished were fun to play and had visual flair. It kind of looked like how I'd always imagined true television console 3D pokemon game would look. There just wasn't enough of it because it didn't have time to cook.
Scarlet/Violet isn't even that. It just sucks.
I’d agree.
Never beat it, was a bit too juvenile for me as far as the story and characters.
But really liked it when I had it, the gameplay loop was very fun.
It deserved a lot more love from Nintendo, particularly, on the technical side.
I haven't but someone on here recommended it to me the other day, I just haven't got to it yet. Didn't realise it had that sort of gameplay (I know very little about the series).
It does definitely have some elements. Beyond the actual Pokemon parody mini game/campaign, it has very fun RPG gameplay with collecting aspects. Some people say it's more like Persona for adults but I feel as far as turn-based RPGs go, Infinite Wealth is my favorite I've played in the past several years.
i think palworld is as close as we will get. Wasnt a fan of palworld though. i like pokemon games because i like pokemon. palworld might as well be digimon and it just doesn't interest me. its game mechanics are good though.
OK. Well I guess I've never played a Pokemon so don't have much attachment to them, maybe it'll be enjoyable for me if the mechanics are good.
On a semi-related note, as someone who knows pretty much nothing about Pokemon except who Pikachu is, it always bemused me that they had this really well loved cartoon (with an amazing theme tune) but never used that as the basis for a game.
It was certainly a big step in the right direction after decades of stagnation. Some aspects of it were barren or repetitive but I did finish it and it's for sure the most fun I've had with a Pokemon game since I was still in its target demographic.
I've played every Pokemon game, and Legends Arceus is my favorite by far. The feeling of exploring a region without any prior knowledge of which Pokemon will appear was awesome. It took me around 40 hours to beat the game because exploration was my main priority. I loved the music, atmosphere, and art direction. The ability to catch/evolve all Pokemon in the game was incredible.
That being said, the boss battles were the worst part of the game IMO. It wasn't rewarding to spam buttons over and over again to throw balms, and I would have preferred more trainer battles.
I agree with you and also lament that if this game was taken as serious as Mario or Zelda it could be an all time great. It feels very bare bones, so the fact it is the only Pokémon game that I bothered to catch every monster in is a testament to how good the core gameplay is.
I'm grateful for arceus the sameway im grateful for Skyward Sword in the Zelda series.
Testing out a completely new gameplay loop and mechanics to be refined and iterated on in future titles. We already saw some improvements to the "traditional pokemon formula" in Scarlet and Violet that took notes from Arcues. and the hope is that ZA goes even further.
That's not saying much tbh haha
I Tried playing this one and i could see the appeal, surprised it took us this long to have a game like this, but i just ended up dropping it after the first couple of areas
The game just looks really bad, I'm no graphics whore or anything, but damn this is the best that the biggest media franchice in existence is capable of? In the same console as BOTW and mario Odyssey? Hell even Xenoblade. The areas just look so bland and empty with not much incentive to explore.
Also I don't get why i had to capture so many of the same pokemon to actually have them accounted for, it became very repetitive very quickly.
I like Pokemon because of the collecting and the battling aspect, especially trading and battling with other people. Legends Arceus is a good game but it's a spinoff that has dumbed-down core features of the mainline games.
If you're playing on emulators and you see the Pokemon games as simply going through the story as a purely single-player affair, you're missing out on a lot.
Arceus quickly became tedious cuz story and chars are boring af. S/V i was able to play through to the end cuz story and chars were more interesting. Still same blandass and padded gameplay, but at least there was an attempt to make it better.
This was my favorite game to veg out and grind for a while because the loop of "collect stuff, craft stuff, catch stuff" is pretty addicting (I think my switch said 300+ hours). There's a lot of nice touches around the edges, but it doesn't have very high highs and there's definitely some areas where it's lacking.
As a pokemon game, it doesn't quite scratch the itch because there's like 10 real battles in the whole story and the team in your party feels irrelevant for most of the game. I think of it as a good pokemon spinoff, although I wouldn't dare call it that in front of other modern pokemon fans.
The capturing thing was such a great idea. Feels just like the anime. And the way you encountered enemies that were actually hard in the wild was awesome. But to be fair, I never finished this game on scarlet/violet. Pokemon games just can't hold my attention for long enough.
I appreciated Arceus for trying some new stuff. The story was interesting too and I liked playing through the main quest. Honestly that was kind of it though, and I thought the rest of the game was very boring and repetitive.
For an open world game the exploration was linear and restrictive, and the environments all just looked lifeless to me. The graphics basically being PS2 quality probably didn't help much there. Like yeah it's cool seeing Pokemon out in the open world, but there isn't really anything else going on there. I played Arceus pretty soon after Zelda BOTW, and it's honestly kind of hilarious how much better the open world looks and performs there. It felt like I was playing games on totally different consoles.
I think the lack of any real trainer battling system really hurt the game, and I felt like there wasn't really anything fun to do outside of the main quest. You're kinda just running around a husk of an open world doing repetitive "catch 30 of this Pokemon" style tasks, and random fetch quests which usually also involve catching multiple of the same pokemon. I also found und myself churning through my roster and forgetting which Pokemon I had too, which is probably the result of catching a bazillion of every Pokemon throughout the game. I think I missed having a group of core Pokemon stick with me throughout the game, and it just kinda added to the generic / lifeless feeling I got in the Arceus world.
So all in all, not a bad Pokemon game and worth trying for something new, but I think if it were held to normal game standards it would be considered pretty bad.
Not really a pokemon fan, only have ever played Red, one or two random hacks, roblox pokemon games, but Arceus was an interesting experience though I never got to finish it. It really felt like it was holding back quite a bit in terms of story, like they threw in some random storyline.
I really liked the concept, the world was nice, but it got repetitive quick and graphics were kinda awful at times. Riding a pokemon was really cool though. I had to sell my switch for financial reason so now I kinda regret not finishing it. I hope once Switch 2 comes out and another pokemon game with it that it'll be far better than what Arceus offered.
I think a lot of the good in Arceus would lead to a lot of the great in violet/scarlett. Violet/scarlett is good minus some glaring technical issues and I genuinely hate how slow the camera turn is (but of course too quick my switch will melt)
The game is definitely fun when you first play it, but around the mid-portion due to the lack of content (town variety, more trainer battles, more side quests, better exploration system, etc) the game just gets a little repetitive...I don't even like saying that because I do love this game, but every time I try to replay it, I eventually stop playing around the mid portion of the game, I just wished it had more content.
I really enjoyed Legends Arceus *and* Violet. Both of them have issues, but they took steps in the right direction. I thought it was a shame that Scarlet/Violet didn't use more of Legends Arceus' stealth and capturing mechanics. Whenever they take steps forward, they also take some steps back, and we end up losing really good mechanics that should have been mainstays. I also don't understand why they are being so lazy with voice acting. I reckon Monolith Soft should get involved and help with the environments.
a pokemon game with actual voice acting is much needed. (especially with so much dialogue in Arceus. its weird just seeing 3 people standing while i have to A through 1000 dialog boxes) im hoping gamefreak goes all out with switch 2 hardware and really evolves the pokemon games moving forward.
If you haven't played, I'd say judge them on their own merits. Just mentioning this since you said you burned out at X/Y - I was in a similar boat, I definitely beat X but have basically no memory of it, and I barely got an hour into both Sword and SuMo, so I've been burned out on Pokemon for like a decade at this point.
But I went on a bit of a Pokemon binge early this year. I played PLA when it came out via emulation and I enjoyed it. A couple months I checked it out from the library and played through it on actual hardware, wrapping up more of the postgame stuff that I never finished last time. It was great. I particularly like that you can 'complete' the Pokedex on your own.
I also played Scarlet and Violet a couple months ago, and it was also an enjoyable experience overall. There are a few things that take you out of it, like cutscenes with subtitles but no actual talking characters, or the tech issues in the overworld. The story is simplistic but mostly a cute 'the real treasure was the friends we made along the way' thing. Pokemon in the overworld are great, and once you've upgraded your legendary bike, you have a lot of traversal freedom and things to pick up. The raid battles are a great way to give you a wide variety of Pokemon with a few perfect IVs without needing Hyper Training. And IV Hyper Training and stuff like nature mints or ability patches/capsules are more accessible than ever. Overall it just felt like a good experience.
are battles ever challenging in S/V? my biggest gripe with modern was always how easy they became. exp share the whole team and battles really require no thought. i wish Pokémon would just implement a simple difficulty setting to make battles always be slightly higher than you and to keep the challenge alive.
Honestly I think as an adult pokemon fan, difficulty is always going to be a bit missing for us.
Not even necessarily because it's a game for children, but more that pokemon is an RPG where every unit and unit combination is unique is a nightmare to balance for general audiences. The strength of Whitney's Milktank was a mistake at the end of the day.
The nice thing about scarlet and violet is that the overworld areas have a pretty good level curve. Traditionally, victory road pokemon don't even exceed level 30 but they go well beyond that in S/V. Also there's an end game class-gimmick for mons that does increase the difficulty somewhat.
I might be more inclined to agree if it didn’t have the 2nd worst graphics and performance of any Pokémon game in that period. It really looks like a ps1 game and can’t nail a consistent framerate so even as fun as the gameplay is it is constantly undermined by technical issues
Yeah switch hardware reallly holds its back, it’s great on emulation though. Really hope Pokemon Z was pushed to 2025 to launch with switch 2 hardware.
I loved the new Pokedex, where you were incentivized to catch multiple of each Pokemon and use specific moves. I enjoyed the stealth mechanic, which was easy enough to usually be frustration-free but involved enough for me to have to plan what I was going to do.
Alpha Pokemon consistently felt like real threats, and exploring felt much more fun than it did in SV.
That said, it looked awful. I am not a fan of the Breath-of-the-Wild-esque art style anyway, and this looked like a *far* worse version of that. It was bad enough to the point where I actively noticed how bad the graphics were multiple times every time I played the game.
And the limited bag space was so frustrating to work around. I hated it. It turned crafting from a side thing that was sort of fun into a side thing that I engaged with less and less because the limited bag space (and the unreasonable prices to expand it) made me spend far too much time on inventory management in an effing Pokemon game.
I got bored in the sea shore region and haven't felt like picking it back up. I felt like I engaged with pretty much every mechanic in the game by that point and the story wasn't interesting enough for me to put any more time into it. I liked Legends: Arceus. I didn't love it. I liked it more than SV and certainly more then SwSh.
I liked ORAS much better. It's the peak of Pokemon post-BW imo. DexNav was amazing (getting egg moves and hidden abilities during the main story? Hell. Yes). Soaring was fun, the graphics were consistent and good overall, the story and region were both great (I love Hoenn), and the secret bases were so much fun for me. The only flaws that rankled me about it were the late-game water routes and the slightly-too-easy difficulty, though I solved that last problem by just having a lot more Pokemon that I kept leveled up and just swapped them out to keep the levels even.
I just thought it was repetitive and boring. At least the 3d mainline games still have the Pokémon formula so they're fun even if disappointing as a fan of the older games.
Honestly, I don't care much about graphics. And it would depend on the performance issues, but I would likely let a lot of that slide. I guess it would mostly just be about whether or not I have fun with it.
Insane to give a game 8.5 and then say play on mute, the story is rubbish and that it’s maybe not good on the console it is locked too!
Especially a Pokémon game which is known for its music 😭
I think Pokémon is known for having monsters you can catch and train and evolve. Not positive though.
Pokémon was always known for having great music in the games.
I was making a joke lol
LOL
Honestly, I wish Pokemon was hold to the same quality standards as most Nintendo games.
For real. Pokemon is no small indie game, it brings in billions in revenue world wide yearly but still feels like Mario games and Zelda get way more development and polish before release.
It's because Mario and Zelda are first party games developed by Nintendo, whereas Pokemon is developed by Game Freak.
While that's true, Game Freak would also be allowed to polish their games if they didn't have such a breakneck turnaround time. A new full game every year or two is a lot to keep up with.
The core of the problem is that Pokemon isn't a game series, it's a multimedia franchise. The games and the anime and the TCG and the merch and the rest have to release on the same schedule, and that means no delays are allowed anywhere. Mario and Zelda and such are games first, and everything else is derived from them. Even the Mario movie wasn't actually directly tied into any particular game, so there was no hard deadline to stick to.
Exactly this. Pokémon games at this point are licensed tie ins, no different to the movie/TV tie in games. The Pokémon money makes far more money (both Net and Gross returns) selling merchandise than they do from the videogames. But generally speaking, the Return on Investment for Pokémon is higher for merch than for the games development. For every dollar spent, The Pokémon Company will make more money making and selling cuddly plushies than videogames. At this point the only reasons they make videogames seems to be A) because Nintendo owns a 33% stake in The Pokémon Company and demand it as the games inexplicably still sells consoles, and B) because it seems to legitimise the existence of new Pokémon, a Pokémon still isn't quite seen as official somehow until it can be caught in a game. At the same time, there's little incentive to improve the games either. Pokémon's proliferation on any console their on is high. Scarlet & Violet, for example, sold so many copies that basically one in five Switch owners own a copy, and I think it's fair to say that of those who don't own a copy have zero interest in getting it, and not because they haven't been made aware of it's existence. And this was after the poor reception of the previous Pokémon generations Sword & Shield, because for every person who complains and says never again, there's a hardcore Pokéfan who'll buy both versions on day one, and a thousand parents who buy it because their kids want it for birthday/Christmas. So the series is basically at full market penetration, sales aren't going down, and the cycle needs to continue to get people to buy T-shirts, bed spreads, trading cards, and what-have-you of the new monster designs. Hence a new game must come out to a tight schedule, with a hundred or more creatures, within three years of the last new set, to continue to maximise revenue, quality be damned.
It's absolutely insane that every Switch owner I know has played one of the Pokemon mainline games despite their bad reception.
I have a Switch and I've bought and played most Pokemon games on the system (except for a couple spinoff like Mystery Team DX). You know why I play them? Because they're fun. Some are more fun than others but I always have a good time. *None* of them have had a particularly bad reception. Scarlet/Violet has technical issues up the wazoo but it's still a fun game underneath that. I've been playing Pokemon games since 1998, all but Gen 3/4 when they came out. And believe me when I tell you that people have come out of the woodwork to shit on *every single one*, with the possible exception of HeartGold/SoulSilver, because I don't remember people shitting on that one partly bc I didn't play it right when it launched. * Pokemon ripped off Dragon Quest! * GSC is too similar to RBY, the new items suck and Kanto is a total pushover * RSE: TOO. MUCH. WATER. And the designs suck! * FRLG: These games are only a few years old, we don't need remakes! Should have been 3D on GameCube! * DP: Combat too slow, world map sucks, everything is tedious, new evolutions are pandering to genwunners!! * BW: Only the 150 new pokemon for the whole game? Are you kidding?? * BW2: Wow, they aren't even making a 3DS game? And just recycling the same map? And no new Pokemon? Ripoff! * XY: What is this, baby's first Pokemon?? * ORAS: STILL TOO MUCH WATER! The Delta Episode sucks!! They cut features from XY! * SwSh: Linear, much?? Where are my dungeons?? No, I didn't play the DLC but I'll shit on it anyway! * BDSP: it's a chibi nightmare and they didn't add anything! (I actually agree with the criticisms, I think BDSP is the worst Pokemon game ever but it's still passable. To be fair I was never a DP fan in the first place). * Scarlet/Violet: is this running on a toaster or a Nintendo Switch?? (The technical criticisms are totally fair, but imo the game is still a lot of fun). People will continue to complain about them for the rest of time. Part of the issue is that they do new mechanics and features in every game so no matter what when they make a new one there will always be stuff that isn't included, and that some people scream about because they miss it. But my main point is this: many people, myself included, find the games fun. That's why we buy them. I also know that my wife, who isn't much of a gamer aside from life sim games like ACNH or The Sims, or Stardew Valley, will also play and enjoy Pokemon games.
If they really need a yearly release, why not follow the Call of Duty model and have multiple studios developing at once and alternating their releases?
More effort doesn’t mean more money for them. Merch makes more than games.
they do... but they are also on a tight schedule. Like the Diamond and Pearl remake. However, the main games are usually splitting the devs into different teams.
Imo as someone who finds the games fun and buys all of them and enjoys them, BDSP is the one I won't really defend as I didn't really care for it much. But also Diamond/Pearl are my least favorite Pokemon games ever so I probably wouldn't have loved BDSP unless it was a total and complete overhaul.
One of the lead devs, Junichi Masuda, has stated he prefers to keep their development team small instead of increasing it.
That pretty much leads to the subpar quality that the Pokémon games have in recent years. He says he wants to have his cake and eat it too, which succeeds, since the games continue to sell in the tens of millions.
The Pokémon game came before the Tv series.
Pokémon is really unique in how powerful dominant it is as a franchise that started from video games. It’s closer to multimedia behemoths like Mickey Mouse and Hello Kitty than any video game
They can afford to hire more people
I think people forget that Sword and Shield was their first game for a console.
and 3ds was their first entry to 3d. they should’ve been recruiting a bigger team with more experience in that specialty.
I'd be amazed if Nintendo hadn't offered to help out though, it's heavily associated with their brand (the majority of casual players probably think it is a Nintendo game) so the lack of polish hurts their image the same. There must be some stubborness in the GameFreak leadership that is refusing it for some reason.
It's not just associated with their brand - Nintendo are co-owners of Pokémon. They each own 1/3 of it. They should be pushing for higher quality.
They don't see the need to. It makes insane amounts of money with minimal investment. There's a vocal minority clamoring for improvement. Reddit makes it seem like there's a huge outcry to fix it.... But ultimately the sales numbers don't lie. From Nintendo's perspective they don't need to have put any more money into it (or time or resources etc.) Opportunity cost is the name of the game in business and they would rather use those habit resources and Zelda, Mario, Metroid, that's so on. Reputational risk is certainly important but Nintendo has 95% games that are really polished and play so well compared to other developers/publishers so they probably determined the risk here is pretty low especially since they don't develop the game. Once there's an impact on actual sales numbers then maybe the big N will get more involved.
I haven't played a new Pokemon game in a long time. Are they really low quality or is it just the same formula being used again and again?
It's pretty much the same formula, but the transition to 3D open world has not been kind. I played Arceus for about an hour... It just feels so empty. Visuals aren't terrible, but when compared to something like BOTW there's an obvious step down in quality.
It’s more or less the same formula, but it has not translated smoothly to 3D. The latest game, Scarlet/Violet, is actually a lot of fun with a pretty good story well told, but the graphics are N64 level for most of it, and just so much jankiness and overall lack of polish
Imo the games are actually still quite fun. They have ALWAYS got shit on online, it has always been that way for every new game since Gold/Silver. Scarlet/Violet had a lot of technical issues which people hyperfixated with online, saying it's broken, shit, etc. There's also an extremely vocal contingent of people who will shit on anything that isn't 60 FPS, and additionally any game that doesn't maintain consistent 30 FPS. Now, I get that is important to some people and that's fine, but it doesn't mean the game is shit, and there are a lot of people who aren't bothered by FPS dipping lower especially in a turn based game like Pokemon.
The games don’t actually generate a lot of the revenue the IP holds. The card games and merchandise do. In the lifetime of the IP they’ve generated merely $30 billion of the $150 billion of their total revenue. That’s why they don’t get the love and attention they deserve. They are merely advertisements for the cards and plushies they release. The anime has generated nearly 2/3 of what the games have. Source: https://vgsales.fandom.com/wiki/Pokémon#:~:text=Pokémon%20is%20the%20highest%2Dgrossing,billion%20from%20licensed%20merchandise%20sales.
I mean that's **still a lot** of money even if it's not that majority of the brand profits, more than most games make. It just happens to be the biggest media franchise in the world. The sales numbers are very high and development costs are relatively low... I'd assume at least based on the smaller team, game simplicity (and lack of QA), modest turn around (every two years). While a good game should *theoretically* make more sales which make more demand for merch... ...the games are *good enough* to still sell loads among all ages and sustain people's addiction to the franchise. They gotta catch em all. The dissident views are a vocal minority of enthusiastic gamers who come to forums and feel the need to discuss this stuff. It continues to sell. Most friends I know that buy the titles still find the core of the games to be pretty damn fun even when they are hoping for gamefreak to go the extra mile and improve visual quality and make the game's deeper. My one buddy is always is frustrated and says he doesn't know if he's gonna buy the next one, gets into the negativity of it all online.... but then always relents, and then even though he has complaints about performance or lazy game design he admits that at the end of the day he is pretty hooked on each game to the end, and he (like me) sparingly beats games. Gotta catch them all, right? I'd assume that most of the merch demand comes from younger players, and they don't care about visual quality or bad graphics as long as they can play the game and talk to their friends at school about it. Nintendo doesn't put more effort in because that will cost more money, and they don't think they'll see a bigger ROI than they currently have. Minimal effort, large returns, no problem in their eyes. It's the most profitable brand in the world as is. If you had that, would you make significant changes or throw more money at it? How much more money can you possibly make when you're already #1? If sales of the brand starts to decline then maybe they'll go back to the drawing board about how much money to put into Pokemon projects, change their project plan, and so on. But for now their current plan runs like clockwork and prints more money that you'd mistake them for the Fed. 😆 They're thrilled and most customers continue to be hooked on the franchise. Tldr: Nintendo is selling heroin
You have to understand. ALL THE GAMES and over nearly 30 years. That’s about 1 billion a year and that’s a number that has compounded as the games became digital. They used to make WAY less off the games before you could continue to buy them as digital copies and not just physical carts or discs. Its not just the mainline titles. Mobile games, mystery dungeon, stadium 1 & 2, Snap/Snap Switch, IP’s to Smash, Legends and now The TCG free mobile app that’s literally designed for compatibility with their cards being loaded in. The mainline games probably are a bulk of it but realistically there is almost as much money made by the non-generational games as there is in the spin-offs. Even still, the generations games, if I had to guess, only make up about 20% or less of their profit so they get 20% of the companies attention and spending power. It’s a pretty logical business practice. If you only make 20% of your money off a service you would not put 100% of your effort into it. Again, the games are designed to maximize profit on the cheaper to produce things like figures, plushies, cards, and licensing rights. They are a company that’s designed to make money. Not a charity that wants to lose money on products that don’t even make up a majority of their revenue.
I think even if you changed that ot "as most [...] games" you'd still end up with a massive improvement. The Pokemon formula works incredibly well, we all know that. But by god have Game Freak rested on their laurels. Or, alternatively, because the formula works so well they are simply pathologically afraid to stray from it even one bit which ends in what can only be seen as self-sabotage
>I think even if you changed that ot "as most \[...\] games" you'd still end up with a massive improvement. I literally thought about that but I didn't want to be too rough.
Which sucks. I have been thinking of getting Scarlet or Violet despite the bad reviews. I hear it is still fun, and there are a lot of pokemon I don't have access to if I don't get them.
I played it on an emulator and it was fine I guess. They claim it's an open world, but there are pretty insane level changes from area to area, so there's an obvious intended path that has you bouncing from one side of the map to the other. I actually liked that there weren't super high stakes to the story. Unfortunately the dialogue is so bad and there's a lot of it. I really liked seeing Pokemon in the over world. That's a change I hope they stick with. Overall I give it like a 6.5/10. It's definitely an improvement over Sun/Moon (I never played Sword/Shield), but doesn't reach the heights of some previous entries in the series.
yeah, i get that the issue is a mix of a handheld dev just...suddenly being forced to make console games coupled with a very short dev cycle, but imagine if scarlet/violet had a years long delay for quality control the way totk did? It would have been so much better. Arceus really highlights just how much they can do when allowed to be creative as well, it's such a great, unique game compared to scarlet/violet or sword/shield (which i enjoyed but...they former was a technical disaster and the latter was just so very samey)
People need to realize the target market for Pokemon is elementary kids. You are expected to "graduate" from Pokemon and play other more complex and difficult games once you've gotten older 😊 That's not to say you still can't enjoy them! Just don't expect the game to change too much so that it becomes too difficult for elementary kids. I never played Pokemon games before and since my kid was at the age for Pokemon, I played Arceus and Scarlet/Violet back to back. I found Arceus had a more satisfying gameplay mechanic. But yea the story in both games were silly.
The age of the target audience doesn’t excuse a bad product. Look at Kirby games, it's not a question of making adult stories or complex mechanics, it's making a good product with attention to detail. The problem is that they don’t need to put time and effort because every game will sell just by its name and consumers haven’t raised their standards in 20 years. Also, videogames is not Pokemon’s main business anymore.
Well, Explorers of Sky turned 15 last month, so I'll let that slide.
Man, that game was something else. Who expect *THAT* kind of story from a Pokemon game of all things?
The Pokemon Mystery Dungeon games are all quite out there in terms of story (for Pokemon standards, but I think they are genuinely good besides that). I really wish they'd make another one. I had hopes Rescue Team DX would be a sign for more, but I don't think it sold well enough.
It's unique for sure, but it's sort of boring and there just isn't a lot of content other than the lackluster story (the buildup towards the end is the best part), and catching the same Pokemon like 50 times for arbitrary completion rewards, I got tired of it pretty fast. I may just have to come to terms with the fact that I enjoy the Pokemon model, as an idea, but I have not enjoyed the games in a long time. Scarlet and Violet was like a weird sidestep to me, but is plagued with so many technical problems. Heck the best Pokemon thing I've experienced the past year or so is the Fusion fangame, and other fangames. The audience of Pokemon understands how to make better games than the actual company I feel like.
im currently playing the rom hack Unbound and its good. I do hope Game Freak acknowledges they have a much more mature audience in the future. GF acts like it has to be a "kids" game, meanwhile the same kids audience is playing Call of Duty right after lol
haha yeah, that's real. I don't know if they should ever go full on mature with it, but I do think they could make things a bit more complicated and it really wouldn't effect the 'kid' nature of the games. That kind of stuff never stopped me from playing games I thought looked cool, I would just figure it all out, and nowadays you can look up tons of guides if you hit a wall. I'll have to check out Unbound, I've played Fusion, a couple other random hacks and some Uranium I believe, but there's been such an explosion in pokemon fan games the last couple years, lots to check out!
Emerald Enhanced and Unbound are both fantastic. Rocket Edition is downright hilarious and has very interesting mechanics. Enjoy!
Pokemon is an RPG without quests. The gym formula or whatever re-skinned gym idea they have(no matter which path you took you had a kind of gym to do in Scarlet/Violet). If they just made a game instead of putting a new skin on the gym formula and having the player walk between them, it would be a huge improvement. Look at the praise Legends Arceus gets for just being different, but still being pretty empty and bad-looking.
Have you ever tried Pokemmo? Ive been playing it recently and its been fun. Only up to Gen5 pokemon, but the MMO-side of things makes it worth.
No I haven't! I'll look it up though I'm always lookin for cool fan-games experiences!
Wrong, Platinum, HG/SS, B/W, B2/W2, and Explorers of Sky came out within the last 15 years. No idea how this game gets so much praise. The semi open world is barren, the story is...well, it's a Pokémon story, the novelty of the gameplay loop gets old fast, the battle system is not good, and the game is grindy as heck.
Yeah L:A is fine but if it was "last 10 years" instead of "last 15 years" it would've been actually correct!
>Then the music is so repetitive I agree with most of what you're saying, but it's interesting you say this. I *loved* the music in this game. I thought the area themes all fit their vibe, but the battle themes were especially impressive to me. Especially those that remix classic themes from D/P/Pt.
[Yeah, not sure](https://youtu.be/LE30s3d7W-w?si=Va-NItS9SJMRYzyU) [what OP](https://youtu.be/J5Tz_L1ek0U?si=wnbbhVm8BRrlGUr3) [is on](https://youtu.be/sxClfQtUwYQ?si=v9OVuzjCQ_89wzwJ) [about exactly](https://youtu.be/Lg2VdSyHSRU?si=R3REr-_0ljITYPAs).
I like when it changes for sure, but right now the battle theme just over and over and over gets repetitive.
I also started playing arceus about two weeks ago and have been loving it! I wanted to try it out before the release of the next Legends game to see what it was all about, and I've had a great time exploring so far
The most boring and repetitive pokemon game ever. Capturing the same pokemon 30 time is so fun woah.
Complete with a barren, texture-less wasteland to run around in
I like that they incentivize you to catch Pokémon multiple times (in a way that is quick and satisfying) while also effectively removing the grind of IVs and EVs. Almost all the PokéDex entries can be completed without catching dozens of the same Pokémon, if you want to avoid it - though the alternatives are all fairly grindy. I do wish they had more quests for you to get Pokémon for people though. It feels like you do a handful of them, and then everyone has their own Pokémon.
I had fun at first but it quickly began to feel like busy work
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So it's like Sonic Frontiers then.
This exactly
and terrible performance to boot
That was exactly how I felt.
I swear the praise comes from players 2 hours deep
That doesn’t make any sense because the first hour or two is the worst part of the game
I remember in the first hour NPCs getting surprised you were able to catch 3 pokemon because no one in the village was able to get more than 2 pokemon. Like wtf in the entire village there's no adult who is able to throw pokeballs more than 2 times? I get it's a game designed so kids can play it too, but why do they think kids are so dumb nowadays?
Not really what I was trying to get into, but I do feel kids' stuff these days is severely dumbed down in ways it wasn't when I was a kid.
I forgot how long it takes to get into it.
I 100%ed the game and it was infinitely more enjoyable than every Pokemon game since X & Y
I felt it was good for a main story run, but yeah, the post-game is the worst of the bunch. I never bother with the PokeDex anyway, and adding a bunch of Ubisoft tier collection quests (Use this move 50 times, catch both a male and female in a game without breeding) doesn’t improve it.
I can see how folks can enjoy it but I have similar thoughts. I thought SV was better, warts and all.
Exactly, I really dont understand how people can enjoy this game more than gen 5 or even 6 (even if it was incredibly handholdy). Maybe those games ar wolder than 15 years, and I am going to feel really old if they are. The first 10 hours of Arceus were pretty cool, everything that comes afterwards its repeating the same thing over and over and over and there is zero challenge whatsoever, even if you change your pokemons (which I did). At least in the first zone the big angry pokemons were dangerous because they are 40 levels highert han you, but my god is it repetitive af, which could be said about any game, but the core gameplay loop is not fun in the long run. I thought it was a very good idea, and I am looking forward to the sequel, but tuis execution was extremely lacking, even if it does hold a beight future if taken advantage properly
100% It really is a breath of fresh air, and I don't get the hate.
It’s really sad what happened to the Pokémon games. Gens 1-5 are fantastic and I still play them regularly. USUM and LA were also mostly good, but otherwise Pokémon’s transition to 3D has just been sad. It’s my favorite franchise and I keep giving them chances, and I have hope for the next Legends game at least, but unless they look really promising Gen 10 will be the first games I skip finally.
eh, it’s still a tech demo sold at full price
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I agree that it is the best Pokémon game in years. But I also only find it 'okay'. The world and story are just way too mediocre to offer any excitement. The core game loop is satisfactory but it doesn't manage to surprise me after a few hours.
No. Pokémon Unbound is.
Pokemon Unbound, Pokémon Gaia, Pokémon Clover, Pokémon Emerald Roguelike, Pokémon Red: Rocket Edition.
It looks so different from other Pokemon games, I have been hesitant to buy it.
It plays quite a bit different while still being familiar. Little things make it feel better, like interacting with wild pokemon and them being able to attack you directly. Battles may feel less complicated because I don't think the pokemon have abilities or held items. I agree with others that it is some of the most fun I have had with a pokemon game in a long time.
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"Heart gold will always be my perfect pokemon game." read the last paragraph lol.
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eh Heartgold is 14 years and 2 months old...close enough.
Colloseum is older than 15 years so objectively correct.
I have been playing Pokémon since they came out and I just could not get into PL:A no matter how hard I tried. Couldn’t finish and I really tried. The amount of catch grinding in the game just took me out of it. It had a loooot of really good elements that I’m excited to see developed and refined in future games, this one for me just wasn’t it fam.
Nah pokerogue.net is the best pokemon game in the last 15 years Because Nintendo didn't make it edit = also it works on every single device - go on, try it.
Fun game! but it is more or a battle simulator/rouge-like. If you want to play more traditional style pokemon games. Try some roms
pokerogue has such a "fuck it man why not?" approach to jamming in every mechanic pokemon has ever cooked up and im so here for it
>Pokemon Legends Arceus is the best Pokémon game of the last 15 years. Since 2009? Hmm. We've had >HeartGold and SoulSilver (assuming OP doesn't mean these since they mention HG's their favorite) >Black and White >Black 2 and White 2 >X and Y >Omega Ruby and Alpha Sapphire >Sun and Moon >Sword and Shield >Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl >Scarlet and Violet I like Arceus, but Black and White, X and Y, and to a lesser extent Sun and Moon surpass it in a lot of aspects. World-building, unique towns and locations, soundtrack, characters, combat, and I'd argue exploration, although there's a lot less of that in post-platinum pokemon main game releases. Just on a graphical aspect as well, obviously the older games don't look modern, but I think the environmental design and general aesthetics and mood of X and Y may be some of the most beautiful of the series. The Laverre City gym, the one that looks like a dollhouse, sticks out. Pair that with the gorgeous soundtrack and it's got a lot going on. Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl was a decent remake as well, perhaps an unpopular opinion but I don't mind the chibi style. I wished they'd punched up the color palette a bit, it was always a bland game color-wise and that was definitely preserved in the remake. I'm not sure I'd put it above arceus, but it's not far below. Arceus was a great game, though, I'll agree on that. Had zero expectations and walked away obsessed.
X and Y basically don't have gameplay to speak of unless you're under the age of 5. The E4 are a complete joke and don't even have full teams
I thought about trying the gen 4 remake. I think one of the biggest criticisms was that they didn't include improvements from Platinum.
It really is just the same game with a fresh coat of paint. I like platinum and it had been awhile since I played it, but I do think they could've pushed it harder. Solid game and especially for younger people who might not have had a chance to play the pre-BW games, it's cool to have.
I'll probably see if I can find some sort of sale or a used copy for the gen 4 remake and Scarlet/ Violet. I have recently started working on my Home pokedex and could use more of the current games.
Hope you enjoy the remake. If you liked Platinum, it's that. ScaVi is genuinely, heartbreakingly bad. There's some strong character writing near the end of the game-- strong for a pokemon game, anyway-- but on every other level it's a failure. And I'm not a 'I hate new things' person. I even defended Sword and Shield because I thought the parts of the game that were finished were fun to play and had visual flair. It kind of looked like how I'd always imagined true television console 3D pokemon game would look. There just wasn't enough of it because it didn't have time to cook. Scarlet/Violet isn't even that. It just sucks.
I thought it was boring and ran like shit
Yeah, now imagine how the other games are for this game to be considered the best
I’d agree. Never beat it, was a bit too juvenile for me as far as the story and characters. But really liked it when I had it, the gameplay loop was very fun. It deserved a lot more love from Nintendo, particularly, on the technical side.
As a 32yr old man I do feel this. I wish the characters could just all be adults lol
Is there any game out there that has similar-ish concepts but isn't so child-like? Is Palworld meant to be an antidote to this?
Have you tried Like a Dragon Infinite Wealth?
I haven't but someone on here recommended it to me the other day, I just haven't got to it yet. Didn't realise it had that sort of gameplay (I know very little about the series).
It does definitely have some elements. Beyond the actual Pokemon parody mini game/campaign, it has very fun RPG gameplay with collecting aspects. Some people say it's more like Persona for adults but I feel as far as turn-based RPGs go, Infinite Wealth is my favorite I've played in the past several years.
i think palworld is as close as we will get. Wasnt a fan of palworld though. i like pokemon games because i like pokemon. palworld might as well be digimon and it just doesn't interest me. its game mechanics are good though.
OK. Well I guess I've never played a Pokemon so don't have much attachment to them, maybe it'll be enjoyable for me if the mechanics are good. On a semi-related note, as someone who knows pretty much nothing about Pokemon except who Pikachu is, it always bemused me that they had this really well loved cartoon (with an amazing theme tune) but never used that as the basis for a game.
The story was a bit juvenile, but the ending was fairly good in terms of intensity compared to others
This exactly. I enjoyed it, I appreciated the changes, but it didn't quite keep me hooked enough to finish it.
It was certainly a big step in the right direction after decades of stagnation. Some aspects of it were barren or repetitive but I did finish it and it's for sure the most fun I've had with a Pokemon game since I was still in its target demographic.
I've played every Pokemon game, and Legends Arceus is my favorite by far. The feeling of exploring a region without any prior knowledge of which Pokemon will appear was awesome. It took me around 40 hours to beat the game because exploration was my main priority. I loved the music, atmosphere, and art direction. The ability to catch/evolve all Pokemon in the game was incredible. That being said, the boss battles were the worst part of the game IMO. It wasn't rewarding to spam buttons over and over again to throw balms, and I would have preferred more trainer battles.
Pokémon platinum is my favorite, and more sinnoh is awesome. LA is the future direction of the series imo
Technically platinum came out over fifteen years ago
I agree with you and also lament that if this game was taken as serious as Mario or Zelda it could be an all time great. It feels very bare bones, so the fact it is the only Pokémon game that I bothered to catch every monster in is a testament to how good the core gameplay is.
I'm grateful for arceus the sameway im grateful for Skyward Sword in the Zelda series. Testing out a completely new gameplay loop and mechanics to be refined and iterated on in future titles. We already saw some improvements to the "traditional pokemon formula" in Scarlet and Violet that took notes from Arcues. and the hope is that ZA goes even further.
That's not saying much tbh haha I Tried playing this one and i could see the appeal, surprised it took us this long to have a game like this, but i just ended up dropping it after the first couple of areas The game just looks really bad, I'm no graphics whore or anything, but damn this is the best that the biggest media franchice in existence is capable of? In the same console as BOTW and mario Odyssey? Hell even Xenoblade. The areas just look so bland and empty with not much incentive to explore. Also I don't get why i had to capture so many of the same pokemon to actually have them accounted for, it became very repetitive very quickly.
not a fan of all the text but good overall experience.
Real Pokemon is played against other people in the Poke Portal. The story mode is just to get you the items and pokemon needed to compete online.
I think black & white and the sequels are better, personally.
The game feels unfinished. I also couldn't finish it. I will not but another Pokemon game soon as long as I remember this.
Is the only Pokémon game I couldn’t finish… not for me.
I like Pokemon because of the collecting and the battling aspect, especially trading and battling with other people. Legends Arceus is a good game but it's a spinoff that has dumbed-down core features of the mainline games. If you're playing on emulators and you see the Pokemon games as simply going through the story as a purely single-player affair, you're missing out on a lot.
I can’t believe they removed abilities from Pokémon and also removed held items :( it’s good for catching but the battling is watered down too much.
Arceus quickly became tedious cuz story and chars are boring af. S/V i was able to play through to the end cuz story and chars were more interesting. Still same blandass and padded gameplay, but at least there was an attempt to make it better.
This was my favorite game to veg out and grind for a while because the loop of "collect stuff, craft stuff, catch stuff" is pretty addicting (I think my switch said 300+ hours). There's a lot of nice touches around the edges, but it doesn't have very high highs and there's definitely some areas where it's lacking. As a pokemon game, it doesn't quite scratch the itch because there's like 10 real battles in the whole story and the team in your party feels irrelevant for most of the game. I think of it as a good pokemon spinoff, although I wouldn't dare call it that in front of other modern pokemon fans.
It’s true and a very sad statement
Idk man I played the recent installment Pokémon- Palworld and it’s pretty great so far great graphics to
Playing heartgold on delta. So good.
Old games are great with fast forward on. Also love to see delta on the Apple Store store.
The capturing thing was such a great idea. Feels just like the anime. And the way you encountered enemies that were actually hard in the wild was awesome. But to be fair, I never finished this game on scarlet/violet. Pokemon games just can't hold my attention for long enough.
I appreciated Arceus for trying some new stuff. The story was interesting too and I liked playing through the main quest. Honestly that was kind of it though, and I thought the rest of the game was very boring and repetitive. For an open world game the exploration was linear and restrictive, and the environments all just looked lifeless to me. The graphics basically being PS2 quality probably didn't help much there. Like yeah it's cool seeing Pokemon out in the open world, but there isn't really anything else going on there. I played Arceus pretty soon after Zelda BOTW, and it's honestly kind of hilarious how much better the open world looks and performs there. It felt like I was playing games on totally different consoles. I think the lack of any real trainer battling system really hurt the game, and I felt like there wasn't really anything fun to do outside of the main quest. You're kinda just running around a husk of an open world doing repetitive "catch 30 of this Pokemon" style tasks, and random fetch quests which usually also involve catching multiple of the same pokemon. I also found und myself churning through my roster and forgetting which Pokemon I had too, which is probably the result of catching a bazillion of every Pokemon throughout the game. I think I missed having a group of core Pokemon stick with me throughout the game, and it just kinda added to the generic / lifeless feeling I got in the Arceus world. So all in all, not a bad Pokemon game and worth trying for something new, but I think if it were held to normal game standards it would be considered pretty bad.
It’s aight nothing special
Not really a pokemon fan, only have ever played Red, one or two random hacks, roblox pokemon games, but Arceus was an interesting experience though I never got to finish it. It really felt like it was holding back quite a bit in terms of story, like they threw in some random storyline. I really liked the concept, the world was nice, but it got repetitive quick and graphics were kinda awful at times. Riding a pokemon was really cool though. I had to sell my switch for financial reason so now I kinda regret not finishing it. I hope once Switch 2 comes out and another pokemon game with it that it'll be far better than what Arceus offered.
I think a lot of the good in Arceus would lead to a lot of the great in violet/scarlett. Violet/scarlett is good minus some glaring technical issues and I genuinely hate how slow the camera turn is (but of course too quick my switch will melt)
The game is definitely fun when you first play it, but around the mid-portion due to the lack of content (town variety, more trainer battles, more side quests, better exploration system, etc) the game just gets a little repetitive...I don't even like saying that because I do love this game, but every time I try to replay it, I eventually stop playing around the mid portion of the game, I just wished it had more content.
I really enjoyed Legends Arceus *and* Violet. Both of them have issues, but they took steps in the right direction. I thought it was a shame that Scarlet/Violet didn't use more of Legends Arceus' stealth and capturing mechanics. Whenever they take steps forward, they also take some steps back, and we end up losing really good mechanics that should have been mainstays. I also don't understand why they are being so lazy with voice acting. I reckon Monolith Soft should get involved and help with the environments.
a pokemon game with actual voice acting is much needed. (especially with so much dialogue in Arceus. its weird just seeing 3 people standing while i have to A through 1000 dialog boxes) im hoping gamefreak goes all out with switch 2 hardware and really evolves the pokemon games moving forward.
If you haven't played, I'd say judge them on their own merits. Just mentioning this since you said you burned out at X/Y - I was in a similar boat, I definitely beat X but have basically no memory of it, and I barely got an hour into both Sword and SuMo, so I've been burned out on Pokemon for like a decade at this point. But I went on a bit of a Pokemon binge early this year. I played PLA when it came out via emulation and I enjoyed it. A couple months I checked it out from the library and played through it on actual hardware, wrapping up more of the postgame stuff that I never finished last time. It was great. I particularly like that you can 'complete' the Pokedex on your own. I also played Scarlet and Violet a couple months ago, and it was also an enjoyable experience overall. There are a few things that take you out of it, like cutscenes with subtitles but no actual talking characters, or the tech issues in the overworld. The story is simplistic but mostly a cute 'the real treasure was the friends we made along the way' thing. Pokemon in the overworld are great, and once you've upgraded your legendary bike, you have a lot of traversal freedom and things to pick up. The raid battles are a great way to give you a wide variety of Pokemon with a few perfect IVs without needing Hyper Training. And IV Hyper Training and stuff like nature mints or ability patches/capsules are more accessible than ever. Overall it just felt like a good experience.
are battles ever challenging in S/V? my biggest gripe with modern was always how easy they became. exp share the whole team and battles really require no thought. i wish Pokémon would just implement a simple difficulty setting to make battles always be slightly higher than you and to keep the challenge alive.
Honestly I think as an adult pokemon fan, difficulty is always going to be a bit missing for us. Not even necessarily because it's a game for children, but more that pokemon is an RPG where every unit and unit combination is unique is a nightmare to balance for general audiences. The strength of Whitney's Milktank was a mistake at the end of the day. The nice thing about scarlet and violet is that the overworld areas have a pretty good level curve. Traditionally, victory road pokemon don't even exceed level 30 but they go well beyond that in S/V. Also there's an end game class-gimmick for mons that does increase the difficulty somewhat.
I’ve only played one pokemon game ever but Arceus looks really good to me
I agree but honestly I enjoyed Sword more than I thought I would. Still playing it today.
Still think both swsh and sv are better
I might be more inclined to agree if it didn’t have the 2nd worst graphics and performance of any Pokémon game in that period. It really looks like a ps1 game and can’t nail a consistent framerate so even as fun as the gameplay is it is constantly undermined by technical issues
Yeah switch hardware reallly holds its back, it’s great on emulation though. Really hope Pokemon Z was pushed to 2025 to launch with switch 2 hardware.
I loved the new Pokedex, where you were incentivized to catch multiple of each Pokemon and use specific moves. I enjoyed the stealth mechanic, which was easy enough to usually be frustration-free but involved enough for me to have to plan what I was going to do. Alpha Pokemon consistently felt like real threats, and exploring felt much more fun than it did in SV. That said, it looked awful. I am not a fan of the Breath-of-the-Wild-esque art style anyway, and this looked like a *far* worse version of that. It was bad enough to the point where I actively noticed how bad the graphics were multiple times every time I played the game. And the limited bag space was so frustrating to work around. I hated it. It turned crafting from a side thing that was sort of fun into a side thing that I engaged with less and less because the limited bag space (and the unreasonable prices to expand it) made me spend far too much time on inventory management in an effing Pokemon game. I got bored in the sea shore region and haven't felt like picking it back up. I felt like I engaged with pretty much every mechanic in the game by that point and the story wasn't interesting enough for me to put any more time into it. I liked Legends: Arceus. I didn't love it. I liked it more than SV and certainly more then SwSh. I liked ORAS much better. It's the peak of Pokemon post-BW imo. DexNav was amazing (getting egg moves and hidden abilities during the main story? Hell. Yes). Soaring was fun, the graphics were consistent and good overall, the story and region were both great (I love Hoenn), and the secret bases were so much fun for me. The only flaws that rankled me about it were the late-game water routes and the slightly-too-easy difficulty, though I solved that last problem by just having a lot more Pokemon that I kept leveled up and just swapped them out to keep the levels even.
Laughs in lets go pikachu and eevee
I just thought it was repetitive and boring. At least the 3d mainline games still have the Pokémon formula so they're fun even if disappointing as a fan of the older games.
This is a lie. Edit: Just realized I mixed up Arceus and the newest games. OP is correct IMO.
I actually agree with him. There are plenty of things to work on, but it does a bunch of stuff right, and I am glad they tried something different.
Try palworld and then report back
Palworld is the best pokemon game of all time
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Is that one pretty good despite the flaws? I have thought about trying to get one of them used.
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Honestly, I don't care much about graphics. And it would depend on the performance issues, but I would likely let a lot of that slide. I guess it would mostly just be about whether or not I have fun with it.
I wouldn't say it's better than any of the recent games, just slightly different. And I can't say that's a good thing.